On the edge

Not the center of the world,

they faced towards each other.

If you drift, if you stare,

the tree outside the window

branches into four,

another branch branches again.

Across the street

a red minivan,

maybe a little burnt orange,

or maybe there’s some dark rust.

Does it matter?

Where are your eyes,

if not in the forefront

of your mind?

Sometime near daybreak

The stars were like gemstones,

the proverbial diamonds in the sky,

how should I profess my wonder?

The sky, the velvet in the jeweler’s shop

only more resonant with beads of moisture

too minute to see,

except the sky glowed,

the blackness not complete,

and hanging, dangling, in the east,

from a silver strand invisible,

unless you opened your eyes,

a perfect crescent pendant

low in your ample bosom,

Cassiopeia high overhead.

I swear to you I didn’t see the morning

approach like this,

approximate,

my bare feet ice cold

in the dew water grass,

what light, Oh Shakespeare,

what light yonder breaks

the crystal night,

and these poor words

my richest praise.

And still I thought of you,

my heart, be still not,

I will see you

as soon as I can bear,

it is me you will see

if you open your eyes,

my love for you,

not like exquisite

lightening dark,

but these are my feet

and my opened eyes

for you.

Checking on the moon

 

This month’s waning moon was just rising over the neighbor’s house when I stepped out late into the early spring night. The air was cool and still. I could hear students partying into the night many blocks away. Our neighbors have two girls. I think that the younger one will finally learn to ride a bike without training wheels this year.

I looked for the constellation Cassiopeia, but I couldn’t make her out. Maybe she is still hidden below the eastern horizon. Maybe I will see a young woman that I know in the summer. She has been studying abroad across the Atlantic. She fell off her bicycle last fall and broke her collar bone.

And there’s a new moon every month.

And my neighbor up the street is starting to show. Due late summer. I wonder if it will be another girl - or a boy this time.

Now, back inside with the light on, my window is opaque. My cat sits warm on my lap as I make a few notes so I don’t forget what I remembered.

And now Rita has jumped over the arm rest to curl up in my wife’s purple chair.

I really should go back to my bed.

Sunny and 70 is the morning’s forecast. But this is Kansas. Anything could happen.

The perfect day

If the bright blue sky is for me a 7

and for you only a 4;

If the spring breeze on my cheek is only a 3

but for you an 8;

If the warm sun glinting in my eye is a 6

and for you only a 2;

And what if your hand in mine is a 5

and my hand in yours is a 5;

Are we having the same day,

or does it add up to something quite different?

Afterimages on a computer screen

I almost called her over

from where she spooned oatmeal

into her mouth in front of her

computer screen

in the other room.

A blotch - irregular,

the color of a prepared blood-stained

slide, ready for my father’s microscope,

possibly out of date,

since he is no longer around

to read this,

like the floater I watched

in my left eye

off the starboard wing,

my mother handing me

lifesavers to keep me quiet --

hovers over the letters and words

that I am trying to affix to a

digital piece of paper

here in the study.

A shadow fringe, off white

rectangle, the bottom of the page

does not exist in any dimension,

but still the top half

appears to elevate slightly

on Word.doc slate blue,

completing the illusion

that I might have something

to say.

As I stared into the screen,

suddenly iridescent bubbles

appeared and bounced

perfectly round against

each other, and round, so round,

clustering like too perfect cherry

tomatoes in rectangular corners,

still eternally fresh

from last summer’s garden,

laying bare out my window,

some salad greens planted.

I looked up.

Again, the sun, behind me as sure

as it comes up in the east,

just past the vernal equinox,

reflects straight through my right eye

to my startled brain

from the upstairs window

in the brown brick house

across the back fence.

I faced the sunrise,

nearly due west.

It was as close to a miracle

as I was likely to see

before lunch,

probably.