Little Star

Abandoned shopping cart

in a creek,

twinkle twinkle.

Rainy season; plastic tarps

rumble in the wind, blankets

become roofs.

Our homegrown homeless get

headlines when cops clear

the campground.

The war they're running from

is quieter than Syria,

the battlefield of what if…

Away in a manger,

a motel for the night,

any question where He'd be born

again this Christmas?

Sound Bite

chamomile yellows low to the shifting

ground, another boot is keeping toes

from knowing what grows below.

the rain is washing blood

the sun wasting time on fresh graves

the wind is way ahead of soundless music.

sirens, bulletins, bullets;

new vocabulary words

at the kindergarten.

smiling through scars

shared meals prepare

to heal survivors

families break bread

stones break windows

poems break into silence.

All Punched Out

Orion's belt unbuckles

above the on ramp

I take home from the night job.

The star warrior and the wage earner

change lanes;  raised club and turn signal

flashing bright.

The black ocean peeks through passing trees.

I don't see what's constant as I drive

home from overtime.

The hero wonders when he can put his arm down

and ride the waves in the mythical moonlight

of California.

My exit's coming up. I'll be home soon,

boots off, legs on the couch.

No need to set the alarm, I'm already ready.

All That Flitters

follow the finch up seeded branches

the gold flitters in and out the green

it's a day's work eating your weight in the sky

my office window opens to a world too wide

the square peg of punched in time

separated by a pane of glass from the whole

a hummingbird came close to pecking

my workspace color, I nearly tasted

the break neck nectar in his wings

the daydream is my hourly wage

when the New Jerusalem settles down

these bird notes will fill my resume`

Water Line

Raindrops connect us to the clouds,

sometimes in whisper, sometimes

in a bullhorn from the balcony,

getting wet is getting the message.

Like love, at the border of a family,

there's always never enough to go around

unless we stand in it, faces up,

hands outstretched like pails and a chalice.

It's up there, what we need down here.

Balloons, kites, and prayers know this;

the falling down, the coming to terms,

is the simple miracle of our blue planet.

Wet back, dry throat,

the clouds migrate across oceans of sand.

A cup of water to the least of these

is grace breaking open the damned.

Shingling

Set the roof right before rain,

simple plan, booted crew high as trees,

shovels toss the old tar paper,

hammers tack the dry hope in place.

Intelligence prepares,

noon sun bolts through the gathering clouds,

a green circle of thermos rests at an impossible angle

to the ground.

A length of ladder equals someone's prayer,

we reach for heaven sensing safety

is just above our sight line.

It starts from the ground up,

this work of walking tall,

where it ends, depends

on the hours we put in,

climbing.

Cusp Runneth Over

She caught the last of summer

by the sleeve, granddaughter born

two days before the Fall change.

 

Easy to predict strawberries

and melons, both parents are gardeners,

the dirt will turn up.

Newest human I ever met

forty five minutes in,

pounds, ounces, inches, stretch our hearts.

The light in her eyes

lights the room, lighting

the world, starts tomorrow.

Lunar Tick Tock

The moon, patrolling a sky
to itself, silenced the highway
dwarfing our house and the hidden
ocean, waves through an open window.

A white light on the white cosmos
moth still and breathing the sea
arcs the flower petals with that same
moon singing like a still bird
-an anti-rooster.

These dark as a lark hours flash
stuck numerals as the power comes
and goes through the kitchen clock.
Two nights now I've danced like a stick, not a conductor's baton,
just wood remembering wild.

Sleep spells it one way, a waking dream quite another, this time
of fingers talking and some letters
fitting like buttons, while others, like loons indifferent, ride the reflective surf.

There's a kiss in all of this,
a night curl, a heat to the cool
pillow, a thing cats know across
a shadowed floor. There's so much
we miss when we miss each other.

Baby Blanket

   The dream fogs forward.

   We're weeks away

    from grand baby to be,

    plums barely clinging to the branch.

    The ocean, a little further than

    the next door rooster, breaks on the beach

    morning after morning, anticipating footsteps

    as our family strolls.

    The math of compassion adding up,

    the little ones make us larger.

    Passing down humor, songs,

    and curls, decades away from going grey.

    God has no grandchildren, the one thing

    we can pity. The smallest finger

    He'll ever feel in His hand

    is ours.

Banked Notes

I listen to the greats as rent ticks by

unpaid another week,

this elasticity of time and money an uneasy hat

fitting too well from use.

it's mostly jazz; the border music

of trombones, and hours black

as smoked mirrors, that I prefer to the sound

of slagging commissions bouncing on the down turned beat.

my shadow career tails me,

the trail of time cards littering an alley

like song sheets blown from a briefcase

minutes before a concert.

an instrument of His peace

holds time still for a stanza;

we whistle, work,

while sane people play their dues.

Tale Bone

sat still, rocking chair,

the clock un-phased

by chirrups.

neck roll

incomplete,

too many days gripped

to slide easy, bones

the best of my 

serenity.

rain gutter

drips

the minutes in

the mercy seat,

the God head,

the foot cramp.

monk make note to monkey;

muck out whatever stalls

the makeover.

list to the side,

listen to the roaring chorus,

passing for quiet.

Flowers & Arrows

William wore a hair shirt
somewhere around Italy,
shows you what I know about saints.

Little picture cards litter
the chaplain's desk,
flowers and arrows pierce the heart.

A yard and B yard assemblies,
melting pot of hot heads
and maimed spirits.

We gather to pray here,
two or more
the math of heaven.

Just a closer walk;
the forgiven getting up,
time after time, doing time.

We leave one chair open
for who went before,
and who comes after.

Each lost sheep
makes a sound only
the Shepherd can hear.

Silk Inheritance

Cuff links and a wrapped chocolate

lay on my desk like shells

from a sea as long gone

as my Pa.

I wore his tie to prison,

in and out, just visiting.

Guys abandoned to the streets

get a kick out of the fat double Windsor

bouncing on my Adam's Apple

when I sing Amazing Grace.

I used to wonder how

such a noble soul

could have such an atrocious wardrobe.

Now I know, disguise

the limit.

Costa Coconuts

Green, the thing
to save a mountain
from slipping.

Coconuts planted
knee deep in the howling
monkey rain.

A roadside taller
than stars slanting
through trees.

Work crew, machete,
shovel, bag of seeds
the size of bowling balls.

Erosion, a soul disease,
the first day with no kneeling
washes out.

Gloves, peeled wet
from the forest,
stay folded in prayer.

One of the things
equal at the equator is
the root of love holding soil.

Rash Decision

Picking green as vengeance

against a late life strawberry rash.

My backyard crop, a

political substitute for water sucking lawn,

off limits.

The alternative is to wash and bag

each ripe berry as a gift.

Fruitless, or fruitful,

each in my hand.

Knee Stain

Drops swell at branch tip

to catch bubble light and, glass like,

wink to the waiting grass.

Even with scrubbing
the new dirt of the strawberry hill
paves the crease in my finger skin.

Between pig pen, and prodigal proof,
I garden with the angel of Eden,
hoping to keep a foot in the gate.

Put down roots, pull up weeds
hoping for another hand
on the wheelbarrow.

Father and Son team,
such a threat to the devil,
such a joy in the spring wet mud.

temperature tutorial

Lake cold is bluer than veins

snaking up ankles, hoping brain

will hop back to beach hot 

and leave the body surfing to braver souls

with seal thick skins.

There's no boards or language for it,

Great Lake breakers

only waist high, chest cold,

jump just right, swell feeling the sand bar

on belly and loose trunks balloon with water

and flap flag flat like so much

mis-named seaweed.

The shiver delicious in summer,

numb and colored lips smiling in towels

too thin, jawbone creaking as if the ice

set in, and way out in the waves,

without a chance of toe tip on the bottom

Pa swims arm over arm as if last night's stars

could follow him against the tide.

Tag You're It

When license plates expire

every black and white

is a cop or a skunk.

I slow to hug a truck's front

bumper

to hide my tags,

faith and hope

beading beneath the brim

of my baseball cap.

Criminal activity;

ignoring calendars,

fudging checkbooks,

skimping on the cheese

in a work day sandwich.

I insert the receipts for poems

rendered into the ATM,

blank looks from the screen.

C.S. Lewis says other worldly rewards

rhyme with brother, not

bother.

Emberionic

The woodpile come indoors,

all memory of tree cured by chain

saw

and a year's dry stacking.

The orange eye fire

draws the cat close,

closer,

and then back to purring range.

The mid winter night

doesn't quite require heat,

so 

the glow is more for peace of mind.

Away from the hearth,

addicted kids

cut 

into parents sleep.

Stare at the flame from the couch

and hope, like a moth

it

draws their hearts to home.

ANSWER WE

On the day of diagnosis

I looked at my nails, bit past the quick

and the point of stopping,

as a cloud spoke to the sun

and said, "Now we will see

the Hand of God."

From an empty beach bench

I watch low mountains of grey waves 

circle the crab fisher's rocks

in swirls of creamed light.

Any and all un-netted disease cast

far from the glistening shore.

If it were my faith, un-weaved

and un-woven, the sky

would settle on the sea a stranger

and the sparse wind let balloons escape

their strings, but timely mother hurries to the hospital bed

with painted flowers, whispering hope,

un-faded and unfazed.

The wake up call

is not for God never slumbering,

nor for blood cells efficient,

serene, and rightly numerous.

It is for the promise maker,

the singer of songs,

the vigilante stirring home fire,

pressing candles, daring

to smile in the antiseptic mask.

Moccasin Man

Mowed the lawn in moccasins
to make a point about January
being different in the great
and generous Northwest.

My Daddy, frostbit, from chopping ice
off the walk a few decades
and states east of here, would marvel
at anything so green close to his birthday.

Late in life, we might just miss
the things our children notice,
like an upstart of daffodils closer
to the curb than the wild.

Over at the cemetery
the sun shines equal
when it does come out.
Night rain on the graveyard don't
bother residents, however temporary
the stones.

The shut down engine and smell of simple labor
whispers what God thought
when He said, "Well that's enough mountains
for now."

One long string of soft steps,
makes everything we climb, puny.