long ago I would listen to bullfrogs
now in the evening I watch fireflies
these two acts feel connected
spacer beads on the same mala
the croak and flicker measuring a length
thus I count my moments lived
thus they in turn count me
a silent mantra humming
this and this and this and this
outside the heat tries to draw me back
with air that shimmers visibly above the street
asking me to recall other roads in other times
I’ve been down them so much
that I still pick gravel from my shoes
today I turn away and close the door
then go into the cool shadowed room
any memories that linger beyond
can burn away in the sun
as a child, I knew that I was ordinary
I am ordinary today
nothing I did was new, nor is it now
anyone could do it, anyone can
it being whatever act might be called out as special
my circumstances were not ordinary
I had little control over those
I did what anyone would
Made the best of where, when, and how
still I do this but now with a bit of grace and ease
not hard to learn for anyone
was I ever able to talk?
on that day when the cloud covered the sun
then split open for just one second
so that light became a focused dazzle
I remember speaking
not important nor memorable nor heard
something dropped from my mouth
a foreign coin falling from the pocket of a careless guest
I am a visitor here
have spent my time in useless loiter
pacing the platform of trains that do not exist
when the next one arrives, I shall board
settle into the window seat until I am home
pay the conductor with another word
another word another word
placed with attentive care into his waiting hand
long discursive fever dreams
drift without effort but still somehow
heavy with the heated weight of story
not mine always
slow building intense profound
teachings light and delicate as spun fairy sugar
reach too tightly and they dissolve
relax and they linger
sweetness dropping as a seed within
I never knew my father as anything other,
though from stories I heard he lived a life
rich with travel, music, art, and other dangerous things.
for years I carried with me my sole testimony to this,
a charcoal self-portrait he had drawn of himself as a young man,
the paper creased and worn from years of being folded
before it passed into my hands, and I chose to keep it close
in the left back pocket of my jeans just like he had done.
one day it simply fell apart, and I went to a bridge
and scattered the tattered remnants over the water.
I doubt he ever traveled in this area but think he would have approved.
as the heat rises, as the dome settles into place
and even the mountains lose their cooling air,
where now do I go?
before I could slip easily away into a boat
and take myself into the shaded silence of bayous overhung with cypress.
the local alternative is a trail which offers some canopied foliage
but also people and dogs and bikes and noise.
summer has become overwhelming at times,
too bright with sun; too loud with all sorts of clatter;
too noisome with industrial odors.
in other worlds I find the hush and stillness,
so that is where I’ll be.
how can I not remember you? how can I forget?
at the market you would gently pick through summer squash
to find the ones that were just the color of the sun
and hold a blueberry to the sky before tasting it for sweetness,
then at home, you would spread all we bought in riotous display
and circle it talking aloud to yourself of the delicious possibilites.
sometimes when we cooked, you’d dance around the kitchen
and grab my hands to pull me in until I joined you.
you said I was too serious always and your job was to make me laugh.
oh love, long ago and too soon gone love, you did that so well
that still I remember your lessons and the beauty of your smile.
did I hold you enough? no, never enough, yet I tried to the very end.
though you slipped away to wander the unknown fields of death,
you remain with me in unexpected ways, forever my abiding joy;
forever my happiness; forever my heart.
when I was young, I knew so many dangerous things
boys risk their lives for chance
in brief suicidal encounters with other boys
girls buzz their hair in swagger
for langorous forbidden dances with other girls
bodies hide different meanings
with changes and revisions often unseen
words and stones hurled from car windows
are equally capable of inflicting bloody wounds
queer fag dyke tranny used on us like knives
to carve their imagined shame into our very being
but
the most dangerous thing I knew is what I still know
we are here, have always been, will never not be
our risk brave, and we pay love’s cost
our swagger pride, and we openly embrace
we have taught each other magic
made our scars into marks of beauty
transformed their scornful terms into rallying cries
when we look at you with clear unafraid eyes
we see who you really are, so that you turn away
because you know, have always known:
we are the dangerous things
what can I offer on a day that begins
with a walk down the street
in the company of a small dog and a small duck?
sometimes the world presents whimsy
wrapped in thick mountain fog
and the wing-beat of swallows rising in the clouds.
this is enough to fill my heart;
just this, reason to breathe.
