hourstruck
Our butterfly summer has faded to moth-
eaten memory in the worthless dark
before dawn, when merry-
making has turned sour
into self-parody
more poignant than a
flock of priests
red-faced in the gutter
the broken spring of faith
or dismembered dragonflies
cellophane stained glass
and an offering of flame
to the purity that burned us.

Plastic & Tar
I take a pick-axe to the pavement of time
Splintering cracks in fault-lines we laid
where once we lay smooth-skinned
now stretch-marked and scarred with traverse
such is the birth of souls
Prying these pale reflections of light we cast
thinking to see beyond ourselves
my nails bleed on severed stone
holding aloft what once shone
the recollection brighter than the reality.

Progressive
We who were gifted with grotesque aunts
Wore our slippers through with dance
& could no more gold from spindel compel
Than shirts for swans or sleeping spells
What arts remain in distaff or sword
Upon a barren & concrete sward?

Prints of Tides
This shore is neither of siren nor Circe
I am a child culling shells by whim
Lifting each to sun & ear
to make them come alive
Sand dollar for the penthouse, pale as his skin
Abalone for the image from magazines;
Oh, but they all were pretty,
Razor clams to bleed along his edge
Cast back into the tide
I am still unlearning the art of sea-change