Drizzle

Satisfaction

guaranteed to miss

appointments.

The first strawberry picked

a day early,

the chorus entered twelve bars

late. Stare at the sun

you can't see behind the moon screen

of the kitchen window.

A son returns,

a grandson turns 

from a camera flash,

and the anniversary of demise

lands on the calendar again.

Only eternity

outlasts confusion.

The certain heart fills

a certain part of

the puzzle, the outlook

and the in, look like rain

before drizzle.

I put off penning,

the blank page no calmer

than this stage of our lives.

This too is perfect,

no matter the grammar.

Leopold

Life
and life making
a boy or a girl.

That moon
pulling oceans
with a head of hair.

The clock can't count
a catcher's mitt
pacing the hall.

Manger, mansion,
Momma, breast,
blanket.

The name game
riddled
and solved.

This day, pink sky
blue plums,
your place in the sun.

Grand schemes,
grand pianos,
grand baby
born.

Another Year in April

Blue through clouds
is the eye of God's promise.
A ray is a way of hope.

All that rumbles
in the bottom of our hearts,
will rise as steam,
after night fall's rain.

Any day you wake up
is a good day.
My Momma taught me that.

The next day she wakes
will be the Last Day,
when we look at clouds
from the other side of blue.

The Tangle

Lilac and chestnut
sweeten the tromp,
wild radish and mustard
high as a streetlamp,
pink plums tangle telephone lines.

The awaited sun,
since January,
since March,
alights,
not just the crazies and homeless
barefoot the beach.

Warm, warm
of heaven
softens the wait for Jesus.
Weather or not,
we believe,
but it is easier
in bloom.

Graffito

Elk stands,
mallard roosts,
a big lagoon
named Big Lagoon,
the drive to Pelican Bay State
Prison.

The boys have tattooed heads
and necks,
insignia knuckles,
state issued pants as low as gravity
and code permits.

Forgive Us Christ King
is carved in the plaster chapel wall,
grammatical rescue, sound
theology.

A sleeping Villa Boy
startles to join the choir,
mercy chasing all the days of his life.

His forgiving heart
slips eternity
past the guards.

The Curve of The Earth

There's an ugly plant

in Africa.

A crusty star aloe,

looks like something a dragon

spit out when Adam was struggling

to pronounce wildebeest.

Its root holds dust dear as a child

and the flower bobs centuries old

under the sweltering Serengeti moon.

When the rain comes in buckets and tubs

in Northern California

I think of the thimble full it would take

to make the desert dance

and how Isaiah promised blooms

would supplant thorns.

My throat gets dry

as I argue.

If God meant for this,

then why is there that,

knowing full well

He asks the same thing of clouds

and neighbors.

I saw the curve of the earth there.

The horizon has that much play,

to bend things,

as if the earth has a choice to smile,

or frown.

Fog Fold

Our ocean slams the sand under fog.
The gulls won't fish this slop,
train inland to peck trash
at Wal-Mart.

The buoys in chorus,
the light on the head rock
give bearing,
on glassy days they're quaint,
like Scripture and hymns.

A poster on the meeting board,
under plastic for the rain
that falls on the just,
and the just so,
sells a lecture on 'The Folly
of Faith' for five dollars.

Ought to draw some disgruntleds,
except for the storm.

My windbreaker wraps
my preposterous soul
against the pull of the moon,
my worn portrait of Abe Lincoln
folded in my jeans.

This side of the grave
ignores the tide,
but every sea
has another shore.

Clever won't cut it,
when the waves break
higher than a man can
stand himself.

Equinoxial

What the rose knows
about saving daylight
is dismissed by the poppy.

The first to shed
a winter hull
is the only expert
in the running.

Plant politics.
Put down roots,
face the sun,
even through clouds.

Mud is so less useful to me
than them with stems,
stain my hands and shovel,
make or break the stalk life.

Bloom where you beat the other guise
to light and water,
we assigned such grace
to cutthroat chlorophyllians,

but soil or soul,
it's a battle for the seed
to spring forward.

Night Willows

Worry winds whip

the roof tiles,

pounding the dog's heart rate

a yelp above normal pulse.

Willows bend

outside my window,

storms come

and leaves blow, with an occasional branch,

down the bluff.

I won't walk out on the choppy bay

but go to the sink

for a drink to calm down.

Dehydration a very spiritual metaphor.

Midnight prayers

with morning in mind,

selling the stark dark short.

There is a root

I belong to,

fruit connected to faith,

not shadows on a wall.

Lightning

silhouettes

a trunk.

Man like arms

and hair

up raised.

Jesus slept through

worse than this, so

it must be the dog

keeping me awake.

Buoy Bell

An anchored bell

sounds noon

above a bluff of

fishermen, California seals,

and children that won't wear

wetsuits for years.

He brought me here,

this Lord of the winds, to know

the twenty steps from East Street

to West in a harbor town.

I count the boats

easier than waves;

crab traps, buoys,

mechanical foghorn

in a Mecca like song

to be stilled, and know,

the call to be a fisher

of men, comes with boots.

Road Trip

Keeping it buried

in a book

has come to mean clean,

nose to the grindstone should I slip

and forget gathering gas

to bring him home from jail.

Four hour ride to tell

we're vegetarian now,

Mama might grow her hair grey.

I'll say ,"Yes, I'm still preaching Sundays.

No one's embarrassed.

We sold the furniture,

hoping to be gone

before long."

I don't mind lifting my pen,

it's my sights that get blinded

by the windshield sun.

Cloud of Praise

God is the only One

who's heard it all before,

every whisper tone tenor

in every Georgia juke joint

joining the jumble of julip glasses

and pay day smiles,

every under the breath grunt

of the pineboard piano player

counting his honeys and black worn keys,

the vocalisms of a fronting throat singer

that may have been golden or silver in youth

but has bronzed and brassed

with the crowds applause

or indifference.

"Why's the devil got all the good music?"

is the revivalist organist's accelerando.

"Well, he don't actually," is what God says

from the back corner booth

everything that has breath hanging on His 

every word. Rackety crickets pop

outside the window, crispy flying things

fry in zapper blowing under the porch awning.

Willow leaves whistle in their own night, 

nightingales prove the point in their black eyes

is a star from the far side of a cymbal ride

that has even the lamest feet tapping.

You want glory realized?

Trace the walking bass

to the blindless place in your heart

and the all seeing skirts of the dancers

that raise up the dust we came from

in a cloud of praise.

On Deck

All my prayers

are sailor's words,

trying to push the rain.

For three days

soldier grey cumulus

hid the arc of hawks.

Before pillows cool my head

I'm up, counting moons.

Is He walking on waves tonight ?

I'd call out through the storm,

but I know you too,

are waiting to hear your name.

Anchor

Straight as the crow cries

a dawn between storms

lights the rain weighted daisies.

Barrel bellied bees bungie

on long lavender wands.

I've got the straw beds down

between bean and beat rows

in case Jesus comes to lay His head

in the cool shadow of sunflower crowns.

I hope He finds me here

with a gentle pea pickin' heart,

butterflies curious if I'm as sweet

as swaying cosmos.

"I've come for the lost,"

and me mapping my way with lies,

forgeries, forced advantage,

foot in a snare,

hand in the cookie jar...

overnight a young green tendril

seeks anchor at the beanpole

of Calvary.

Push

I don't care more

than you care,

I doubt my lungs

take more in,

I'm a feather in the middle

that completes a wing,

a blueberry

balancing on butter just so,

if there's a diamond

abandoned in your mother's drawer,

a key to an office

long closed,

then I'm the right age

for coffee on the porch,

I'll remember books

and gospels long overdue,

if you get a phone call

that returns

and returns to a swing in a tree,

I'll push, do a duck under

and run.

Four Strides

Peas tall as rain,

winged flowers strung to a pole,

careful to plant boots

between ankle deep beans,

I snap pods for salad.

The whole patch is four strides

by ten, just enough mud

to stain fingernails

and knees. Late lettuce

bolted since the storm I hoped

would drown the mole.

No flaming sword at the gate

but it is a bit of Eden,

for beginners.

Footnotes

Feet on the floor,

one day the cold wood

could shock the heart,

the daily miracle of knees

interrupted.

Aspirin, magnesium, exercise, even

scripture, all cautions;

an ant wrestling crumbs

across a mountain of cake,

the arterial paths of stars,

the pulse of the moon.

We make our way, 

grunting turtles in the sand.

If it were just magnets and light,

this thing of mornings from night,

we'd not bother with letters or names,

or footnotes to the intelligent

design.

Mud of a Man

Airborne blossoms

simulate snow,

a blushed blizzard

of parachuting pear petals

touches down on up turned

ground, a new garden.

Seeds captive in a sack

await almanac

for thumb deep immersion

in sanctified soil,

new life in three days rain...

a bud added to the body

of earth to catch sunbeams

and make them fruit.

Unless a saint dies in harvest

saints can't spring up.

The Savior taught that from a tree.

Scorned, thorned, born

for this, to breathe His life

into the mud of a man.

Sparrows and Lilies

There is a gold

butter envies in a sunset

backlighting

a stand of long leaf pines.

Spring begins extending light,

gilding a dozen tree top sparrows

as purple crocus

thumb up from the ground.

Swaying maple buds

tap their hint at resurrection

against stained glass

as we ash our foreheads in

procession,

from the basement, a crashing noise

as the Life of the party

drops burial cloths,

and the faces of lilies

rupture death's dour door.

Loaves

Modest commerce,

trading Mingus recordings

for coffee, Coltrane for 'cados.

We make eggs from music,

a garage sale of loaves and fishes,

worn wicker baskets stacked to capture

the outpouring sun.

It's still too cold to consider lilies,

new birdbath is dry, drained

by an ice storm crack,

sparrows in tumult descend

on scattered seed.

A circus of squirrels tightropes the fence.

What we feed now

we'll shoo when the fruit

comes in.

Oreo full moon melts,

evening tea bags twice squeezed

to stretch the week.

We'll make it to payday

but not by bread alone.