See Arkansas First

“See Arkansas First” said the ghost of the bikini babe,
One hand in the air and one hand on the ski rope,
smiling through the rust and flaked paint of her sign. 
Out of place like a saguaro on the shoulder of Highway 61,
but the speedometer said sixty five 
and she was gone as I asked “Why?”
Arkansas is three hundred miles away.
Nothing between here and there but Louisiana. 
Another day, another flake loose in the wind.
Another week, another tank of gas
Another year, another life
and her constant invitation remained
as her smile disappeared under the rust,
neglected and abandoned,
still calling me to see Arkansas first.

September

It's September and like every September
decades running hand in hand, 
you come back on the breath 
of laundry soap and a song.
Why does the man remember what the boy can’t forget?
Rod Stewart sings, “It’s late September,”
and I am back in school,
a tiny bit of the man who will be
the boy who can’t forget.
You are the one who broke the seal and said,
“Begin your exam. You have the rest of your life.” 
No time to study and poorly prepared,
the test is the lesson,
a master piece submitted by the apprentice,
unfinished and unplanned, 
runs in the wet paint,
and graded by every woman who came after you.

I'll Make an Exception

It’s one thirty in the morning and I’m drinking alone

while two hundred people make noise

and smoke and drink and dance.

The band is good or loud, and wants to know

What did you think I would do at this moment?

There’s a blonde in a red dress sitting on the cigarette machine.

Not my type, I prefer quiet crazy,

the hidden neuroses that reveals itself over days or weeks

or maybe years, leaving me to wonder if I was the cause.

But, no.

I got here way too late and I don’t have that kind of contagious madness

or a treatment for it.

I’ll let this one pass by.

Every man needs a friend named Tex,

Tex, the guy who pulls the blonde through the crowd and says,

“I want you to meet this guy, he’s a great friend of mine.”

Tex solves seven problems, none of which I had two seconds ago.

I’m ready to make an exception for whatever crazy she brought.

It’s ten minutes til close, too late for another drink.

 I ask if she would like to get some breakfast.

Fifteen minutes later we’re in my car, but going nowhere.

Time to talk about kids and divorce and babysitters

without the music and smoke and a little cold air to clear the mind.  

She is in a car with a man she has known twenty minutes.

The slow hand of reality pulls the parking brake lever to vertical.

She just wants to go home.

I take her phone number and watch her walk to the red car that matches her dress.

A phone number is better than nothing, or maybe more than nothing.

I think of breakfast alone, but there’s no hunger,

just a drive home and an empty bed.  

The little red car turns ahead of me.

I sit at the light and watch her walk into the café.

The big windows and bright lights have no mercy

as everyone slides over to let her sit at the booth.

Couldn’t you have stayed crazy for just a little longer?

A New Year's Resolution

I resolve to stop driving past your house,
knowing I won't knock on your door.
Not today, maybe not.
Maybe, if I see some sign of life.
A flower pot moved into the sun or an open curtain.
Anything to entice me to your door
and ask the question I don't want answered
and maybe ask forgiveness for buckling under the weight
of a burden no rational man would lift,
but a boy would raise high and carry,
and I did. 
I have to know if you know
what you cost and what you bought.
Maybe you know,
maybe you always knew,
maybe you never cared,
maybe you never thought of it,
maybe it never mattered at all.
I did not leave.
I did not run away.
I did not hide.
I just stepped outside for air,
a boxer's minute between rounds,
just to breathe deep and stand at the bell,
gloves at my chin, ready to swing and jab.
The ceiling caved in behind me 
and you were in the wreck,
buried under debris a boy could not lift. 

So I drive past your house, 
not so far out of my way,
not so much time out of my day,
and know one day you will be there.
I will stop and act as if it was just chance.
Act as if I recognize you through forty years
and wait for you to answer every unasked question.

La Vie en Rose



I awoke to la vie en rose
through an open door.
The pillow is damp with her perfumed sweat
and I hear le vie en rose and a splash
as she raises one foot above the water,
and French slips between the English
smoother than the cloth across her breasts.
Quand il me prend dans ses bras.
When he holds me in his arms? 
The faucet interrupts to refresh and reheat my songbird
and she sinks to her chin, 
careful not to dip the happy towel 
who holds her hair off her freckle peppered white shoulders.
Il me dit des mots d’amour.
Words of love?
My song drowns in another splash
as she stands and all the pink in her 
rushes to her skin,
my la vie en rose.

A Funeral on Wednesday

Yeah, I look good in suit
and you don't own one.
What else does everybody know? 
It's early and I have too much to do
before I have to sit on the survivor's bench
and watch a parade of daughters,
still shocked and too young to know,
and nothing I can tell them, 
even though I know it all 
and know how long it will be 
before it is real again
and how real it will be. 

It's too many times
and every time is harder,
and holds less reason.
Is it anger or denial that comes first?
What's third and tomorrow is pitching today. 
It doesn't have to make sense
and I don't have to explain.
I don't have to do anything
but pay taxes and die
and I've seen how to die,
so get out of my way 
and let me get this done.
I've got some grief to process
and I don't need your fucking help.

Blueprints

Blueprints

On blueprints drafted before birth

you were planned and crafted

to be my compliment.

The silhouette of my profile,

the mend for my every flaw,

the finished form of this ragged prototype.

On blueprints drafted before birth,

you were created to complete me.

Carefully measured and laid on the cutting table,

every hair on your head

and thought in your mind..

Such perfection in execution

could never be left to fortune.

The Lamentation of Katrina

By the waters of Pontchartrain,
we lay down and wept for thee, Easy.
Wept for all we lost,
the precious and unique.
Wept for all we gained,
the bitter and unending.
When black night blind, minion of the storm,
stole the sky, wiped light from the world
and left us not in the dark, but under it.

By the waters of Pontchartrain,
we lay down and wept for thee, Easy.
Wept for the harsh detergent 
that scrubbed all color from our world
and left everything brown and gray.
Stripped and scoured the thin paint of civilization
off the wooden skeleton of the city,
unbleached and unbleachable,

never to shine again. 

By the waters of Pontchartrain,

we lay down and wept for thee, Easy.

Wept for our city by the river,

wept for our city by the lake

wept for our city by the sea.

Wept for our faith in walls of mud,

Wept for our faith in machines,

wept for our lost faith

in what we should have done,

could have done, would have done

with our moment of failure,

frozen in time.

By the waters of Pontchartrain,

we lay down and wept for thee, Easy

wept for the our Mother Water,

wept for days when she filled our plates

and held the cool cup to our mouths.

Wept for the nights when we slept between her breasts.

For what can the child do when the Mother says,

“I don’t know you,”

but lie down and weep.

We lay down and wept and knew

nothing would ever again be Easy.  

Green Eyes and Black Hair

Green eyes and black hair,
you did delight me and I wanted you.
I wanted you in my arms all day
and under my arm all night
with that last ember of blind boyish love.
The ember which turns to coal and hardens the man.
We danced every night and I loved to dance with you,.
spins and twirls and kicks and slides,
until that night you weren't drunk enough
and just sober enough to see us
and my happy awkward unconcerned
out of time rock and step embarrassed you.
You did delight me and I wanted you,
but I heard a voice that said,
She'll never do.

Crazy Redhead

There she was and there I was and there we were,
but Fogelberg and Chapin wrote it first and maybe better,
old love and the ghosts of Christmas past.
Songs are more forgiving than poems.
Slow the tempo and drop the key.
The clock twists backwards and slows,
caught in a relived moment that died in the moment
and took a piece of me with it.
The poet has only words and no music,
while life is such a sad song and sadder still,
when you can't hum the tune.
There she was and there I was and there we were,
ten years vanished in the air with no idea where they went,
a sweet monument to victory over myself
and walking away from problems I could not cure,
stepping over the snare, backing out of the unsprung trap
while the Who sang, won't get caught again.
Call it selfish, call it self centered, call it self preservation,
I couldn't save us both.
I wish I could have kept you.
Why didn't you?
My brain locks in mid-spin.
I don't remember the one hundred reasons, good reasons, everyone.
My drinking, right?
Not one hundred, just one.
There she was and there I was and there we were,
ten years captured in a word.
Thrown out, dried out and tried out was what it took
to solve your problem and I had the solution all the time.
My gift to the world.
There she was and there I was and there we were,
married to different people and beautiful baby pics on a cell phone.
Once, just once, I wished another man's child was mine.
There were one hundred reasons.
I remembered them all before the morning.

Just till I Turn Blue Haiku

Sweet olive perfume
breezes keep my eyes awake
keeping you with me.

Photographic smiles
and letters fade in the night
when I catch your scent.

I inhale, holding
my breath hoping to keep you
inside forever.

Captured in my lungs,
throat closed, face in the pillow,
air seems less needed.

Venus and Mars Tanka Quartet

I peel our sheet back
to reveal your nakedness,
moon lit like Venus found
by Mars, his warlike heart stilled,
his sword put to loving use.

The sparse cover of your
mound offers no defense as
you roll to open your
unguarded thighs to the tender
charge of a single finger.

Dew of half waking
dreams, slick and sweet, precious
scented oil fuels my
lust and soothes my ache, fills
our room and brings you to me.

Mars’ armor will rust
while Venus holds the scabbard
to his sword. Let me
now be Mars to your Venus,
pacified only by your love.

Art of Love Tanka Quartet

Titian moonlight bathes
you pink alabaster on
silver sheets as I
wish to be brush and canvas,
painting you with every stroke.

Painter's eyes, poorly
trained for night, cede the darkness
to sculptor's fingers,
where model and work are one,
poor Pygmalion's art outdone.

Shall love be as music,
heard in the moment, to live
then as memory,
Whisper nightly in my ear
our never ending love song.

Painters, brush in hand,
Musicians, fingers on strings,
sculptors, hammer raised,
defer to poets, the true
masters of the art of love.

Smart Girl

You were the smart girl in the class.
I sat beside you in science.
When the teacher wrote H2O
on the board.
The pretty girl called it
H-two-zero
You giggled and bit your hand
and smiled when I looked at you
and we shared the joke
I have loved you ever since that day
If you never knew
it is my fault
But since that day
Every woman
who remembers my birthday
Knows your name.

Tapestry

The day's fatigue fades our pillow talk
to the gray sleep we crave,
the day washes off quickly under closed eyes,
held in your arms.
The moon wakes me long before the sun
cuts the room or the alarm bangs the day awake.
I feel you in the dark, a curled spoon against me,
your warm ass under my stroking hand
and my hard cock tucked between your cheeks.
Darkness hides you from my eyes,
but touch, taste and smell are my guides,
spurred by a hissed breath though parted lips,
a sigh induced by my finger tips
grazing your pussy, parting and
dipping into sweet cream, your morning dew,
called by my teeth and mouth on your neck and shoulders,
chasing your dream lover from your mind,
leaving me his place to press my belly to yours,
put your legs around my hips and push deep inside you,
heartbeats in rhythm to our cries and moans.
The planet loosens its grip on us as we tumble through the night,
braided, interlaced and woven into love's cloth,
a tapestry of two.

Stud Buckly

Let me be your Stud Buckly
and you can be my Scooter Pie.
Hang your love on my neck
and I can kick the sky.
Spread the blanket on the grass
and feed me what I eat.
Smear jelly on the biscuits
and mustard on the meat.
When lovers roll in the grass
and laugh like lovers do
kiss me with your sweet lips
and I will roll with you.

Let me be your Pup Lover
and you can be my Mindy Moll
I'll carry you in my arms
and toss you like a doll
I'll hold the string in my teeth
and you can fly me like a kite
or hang me in the apple tree
and pull me down for a bite.
Pour wine in my open mouth
and feed me bits of bread
Make a pillow of your lap
and let me rest my head.

Let me be your Bottom Dollar
and you can be my Shiney Dime
I'll drop you in my piggy bank
and keep you for all time.
Spend me like a sailor
or steal me like a thief
I can be a millionaire
or a bankrupt on relief
Pin me to your shirt
and wear me like a pearl
And I will shine like all day light
Riding on my sweetest girl.

What's in a Name?

What’s in a name the Bard would ask.
The name we choose is but our mask
to hide our face as though somehow
a mummers head would not allow
the world to see our heart and soul
and let us act to play a role.
The name my mother gave at birth
was her measure of hope and worth
in me as I would take my place
on the starting line for a race
not finished when I chose the name
to tell the world who I became.

Written Proof

Your perfect school girl script.
Thank you for everything
you have added
to my life.
I love you
I cant remember when.
I don’t remember why.
Must have been early.
You didn’t stay very long.
A short hot summer
that could never end
while you smiled.
Dancing to every song.
Drunk on your laugh.
Ready forever when
forever is less than a year
The breeze turns cold.
I never see the season change.
and you are on the wind
like the leaves around my feet.
Is small comfort, no comfort,
when I wonder
if you loved me.
Even if I have proof
In writing.
And signed by you.

Sheepdog Tanka

To deny nature
is only nature deferred,
waiting for release.
The wolf is hungry for lamb
and the dog doesn’t care why.

A wolf among sheep
finds his natural desire
for flesh in his teeth,
met by the teeth of the dog
who eats neither wolf nor sheep.

The confused actor,
who knows the lines, hits the mark,
certain of his role,
in the wrong play, the wrong stage,
bows for applause in his head.

Dogs never feel used.
Even used up and useless,
he guards his charges,
Thinking you are loved for that,
is just a sheepdog’s conceit.

Summer Night

I was the boy who
came to your window late at night,
and helped you climb out
so we could lie on a blanket
in the field behind your house.
You do remember me.
You may have me confused.
Its hard to imagine I was once
such a skinny, slobbering, clumsy boy,
who had trouble getting your jeans unzipped.
I remember your face
as the moon rose over the trees.
You were the most beautiful thing
I had ever seen in my life.
I wanted the sun to rise
so I could roll you over
and look at every part of you.
If love is measured
by how much it consumes,
I have never loved anything or anyone
as much as I loved you that night.
The only reason I let go of you that night
was to get you back into your bedroom
before your parents woke up
and found you missing
In a perfect world
we would still be two young lovers
locked together on a blanket lain on a grassy field
a warm summer breeze across my back
my heart beating so loud
I could barely hear you
whisper please in my ear.
Any night when I look up
and see a summer sky
with a full moon caught in a tree.
I am back on that blanket with you.
I had heard about it
I had read about it
I had imagined it a thousand times
but nothing had prepared me
for feeling of entering you.
The fire in my spine burned through my brain
and I was melted in a cauldron
and poured into you
You gasped and I knew I had hurt you
but the fire was burning
through my back where your hands held me
and all I could do was open my mouth
and incinerate us both in the flames.
I held you so tight I was afraid you would break
but I could not let go or move.
We were pressed together from our necks to our thighs
your breasts flattened against my hairless chest.
I thought I would never move again
and be forever frozen to you
but the smell of your hair
and the sound of your breath
so close to my ear woke me from my from my sleep.
I slowly pulled back
and your breath became a whimper
and again please
like a cry from a well
far away, yet so clear in my ear
drawing me back into you.
There we were, untaught and unschooled
young lovers, who knew nothing but each other
learning each other and making it up.
Me thrusting at the urging
of your fingers in my hair
and your mouth gnawing at my ear
pleading not to stop
not to ever stop
to hold you and fill you forever.
Forever is easy when time stops
Forever is your chin clamped to my shoulder
Forever is our mouths sealed
so there is only one breath between us
Forever is your arms and legs
wrapped around me
as I pick you up off the ground
and we fall back to earth
I will never stop
I will never let go
I will cling to you like precious life
not to be shook off.
part of me will hold you forever
part of you will forever be in me.
And so suddenly I burst open
and you climb inside my ribs
to hold my heart
Oh sweet love, can you love me forever
Can you stay inside me forever
Can I feel you hold my heart forever.