now you are darker than I can believe it is not wisdom that I have come to with its denials and pure promises but the absences I cannot set…

  The ear is the last face. —Emily Dickinson   Now the owl comes to my sleep, unbidden. I take its call, sculpted and clear, in to the immensity inside…

  Let’s say Heraclitus is right, we can’t swim the same surf twice— the way waves soak into the sand, the patterns left as darker stains that fade when the…

  The city warns that coyote have been sighted broaching a few neighbors’ yards. Scat & paw prints found come morning. They must be hungry & desperate,   trembling in…

  My brand new polydactyl cat uses two extra dewclaws to chase the crumpled pages of mistakes I’ve thrown at the floor. Then he sprays them.   Bored by pleasure,…

  Neither of us smiles.   I cradle his body, left arm snug across his back, right arm slung below his legs.   I think I’m holding hours of night,…

  Mera nam kya hai. Mein kidhar se aayee hoon. The wanderers wander in Urdu and the kings die in English. Everyone has lost the first song. The Portuguese came…

  I know, you believe in nothing, so, when you   step off the fire escape, fall into nothing, never   bloody the courtyard’s snowdrifts. Nobody   screams, rushes down…

    Rabbits are made of watching, stillness, pulse-pound & leap. String a parade of heartbeats in the air & a rabbit will form around them. Teeth exist that can…

  Charleston, SC   The marsh flickers in the beading of bridal lace, a train that swallows the dock as she promises tidal fidelity in the shadow of pruned oak.…

  I An old man wipes his glasses with a handkerchief with no corners. He remembers in circles. He cries in circles.   II A day laborer stands on a…

              Dawn.  Waiting for you at the café among the whitewashed posadas.  Shadows stir with dim awakenings.               …