We are travelling quickly on a path that is blind to our misery.
We believe that destiny will unfold itself.
Our goals change, and so does our path.
Nothing appears to be close to where we want to be. But we keep moving.

COMES A MOUSEY

"Comes a headache you can lose it in a day,
Comes a toothache see the dentist right away;
Comes love nothing can be done! "

she wiggles her fingers
she wiggles her toes
tries to mouth the words

she gurgles in her cot
waves her head about
hits her mobile toys

I sing her old jazz
standards from the first
day of her life

from tiny tot
to the toddler
of now

she can join in
and sing
with relish and delight

and demand of Daddy
"Sing me mousey
Sing me mousey!"

"Comes the measles, you can quarantine a room
Comes a mousey, you can chase it with a broom
Comes love, nothing can be done!"

Comes love, nothing can be done

Comes love...nothing can be done

Comes love . . .nothing. . .can be. . . done

The best poems avoid eye contact.

Just before you find their rhythm,
catch their direction,
they dance away,
and you watch their beauty,
leaving

you full of wanting
wishing
you knew the steps
hoping
you might keep up
wondering
where they led
leaving
you to tap your feet,
missing
every third or fourth beat,
kidding
yourself that you too
could be sliding, shuffling
and maybe grasping the sway,

but they dance away,
and you stay,
while your eyes follow.

And then
there are
these things
called words
oh my

the night is silver
air, her dark ink
flowing like a pen, her
aches and sinews, water-
born, melted out of sky.
there is no cage

to hold the bird, page-like,
built out of river and
dream, it is free to fly,
carry the green of
the trickling leaves to the
rain-heavy cloud.

february builds her palaces
of love, a pretty rose,
a sentimental card,
a rain-sweetened kiss.

we are as full of the night
as a poem, our lips glazed
red, our hearts glowing
golden gathering petals
and sky.

/ˈvis(ə)rəl/

vis

—as if you could twist out your arm,
hand clawed,

wailing pagan poetry with the clinically insane
who have feigned recovery to get out &
proclaim it an escape, as if you could leap
away from already being gone.

•

(ə)

mattress on the living room floor.

rhinestone. ashtray. loose eyelash.

—as if you might lick the slickness of your
image in the bathroom mirror & instead,
taste the texture of flesh.

•

rəl

—as if you could feel the weight of gravity
spin, mouth open now: tin. blister. wool.

wrist-bone; book page. charcoal briquette.

clavicle; over burner coil. burnout velvet.

jawbone; wooden oar. dollar bill.

earlobe; baby’s breath. jingle bell.