"We Go To A Really Good Fish Restaurant In Gainesville Florida"

and we are sitting on the benches outside the Bonefish Grill waiting for the hostess to call us

it will be about fifteen minutes she said

we start talking with the fellow next to us he is from Daytona

a journalist

he looks Native American or Hispanic

he talks with a kind of I don’t know inner quiet

we say we’re retired teachers driving from Florida back to Vermont

what kind of journalism do you do I ask

I cover the courts and the police

it’s sometimes a downer I’ve been doing it for years

I ask how do you come down at the end of the week after all that heavy stuff

I just tell my boss don’t call me after 6:30 Friday night I am out of touch

the biggest case we had was a few years ago

six young people slaughtered beat up throats cut you would not believe it

and all over a bunch of video games

what I ask

yeah this guy was wanted for violation of parole the police went into his apartment

took him out

what am I going to do with all this stuff his landlady said all these video games and junk

just get it out of there the police said just throw it away whatever you want to do with it

well she had a niece living in one of her apartments seems like she gave some stuff to her

whatever

then the guy gets out on parole

busts into the niece’s apartment when she and her roommates are out

sees one game cd on the living room floor and just goes psycho

he is a real psychotic

he leaves waits gets two other thug buddies only seventeen and eighteen they go back one night

the niece her two roommates and three other friends are there

just having a good time

these three guys bust in and slaughter them

you would not believe it

we covered it so heavily never had a murder case like that before I did a lot of research up in New England Maine Rhode Island Vermont

ran a big spread one day on each of these six nice young people

a couple of them had worked at Burger King had come down to Gainesville to start their lives

got some roommates to share the apartment expenses

the others were just friends visiting can you imagine

he gives us his card:

Mauricio Gonzalez Reporter-Police/Courts The Daytona Beach News-Journal 901 6^th St., P.O. Box 2831 Daytona Beach FL 32120-2831 tel 386-681-2557 www.news-journalonline.com

but why did you travel so much up in New England covering this case

because the grandmother lived in Maine

and all the six young people were from Vermont

- - - -

our table was ready we went in

and had some really good grilled fish

"I Keep Waiting For The Other Shoe To Drop"

 I keep waiting
 for the other shoe to
 drop
 for that lowest
 pendulous apple to
 break loose
 for the Tower of Pisa to
 waver slightly
 shudder
 then smoothly incline
 carving down
 into that soft terra santa
 borrowed from Jerusalem
 and it
 nestled neatly in that holy court
 would await such
 a visit

 it would receive those stony blocks mercifully
 surely
 but
 is awaiting such things
 our mission
 here
 that is
 standing behind the striped lines
 not proceeding until instructed to do so
 by the higher authorities
 looking looking
 for that event
 that quick
 instant
 happening
 to bring focus and depth and loss
 to our lives

"If You Built Something Very Big"

if you built something very big

very large

all dimensions blasted far out and away

as big as the engineering and construction and sweat capabilities

were capable of constructing

well

what would that mean I wonder

you look at the Olympeion in Akragas

O Megale Ellas

you folks were chomping at the bit

to build something so grand

and also chomping

to smash each other’s polis to pieces

at the drop of a hat

how does that all fit together

you think that the big column

twenty men holding hands needed just to circle around it

you think that in the end means something?

and you

baldacchino maker

when you twirled those giant columns

raised the Cathedra Petri so high up

on the mighty hands of those four fathers

and set the dove in the glass behind

is not what really matters

that light that light

that equally streams

over a single stone

far away?

"I Am Where I Am Now"

I am where I am now

moving through air through clear

as I move the streetscene

curves around me

a continuous

changing

curve

all around 360 degrees around

and the curve moves along with me

when the I that I am right now

is not here any more

maybe it will be in another part of this

maybe it will be in that large decorative stone

in front of the newly restored 1893

house on the corner

the one with the mauve shutters rust trim and gentle camel cream exterior walls

in that rock

ringed by shasta daisies in the hot summer air

the I that I will be then

will not have eyes like mine right now

but perhaps

through the grainy

layered strata of that fairly small rock

by the entry door

I will in some way

perceive myself

as I am walking now

down that street

this street

right now 

"If I Were To Say To You"

if I were to say to you look

you cannot turn back time

you would say to me look

at that corkscrew at that

point sharp

how it gouges into the cork

but it does

does return withdraw

come back out spiralwise

so what would I then say

yes

it comes back

to those coordinates in space

 in time

perhaps

we can turn time back

in some way

that that sharp point

of act

does not really penetrate and pierce

this time around

as it did

at first

"We Could Be For Example"

could be for example

had we not been us

another thing

or scores of them

a museum

filled with let us say inanities

objects which in Diodorus’ time meant many things

but which today

are

for us

odd knobby bits cracked gashed edges

stone tongues what did they say

we do not care

they simply rest inside us

we could be

for example

granite

having swallowed hors d’oeuvres of feldspar

perhaps porphyritic perhaps something else

and with a sleek sheen polished

we would simply reflect

when people looked upon and at us

they would not know what we were thinking

or even yes a thurible

upside down arcing almost orbit-like

whiffs of labdanum and sandarac

winding through the congregation

and they would smell the beatific

or think they do

"Ode to Fennel"

imperious fennel

you rise Venus-like

from the frothy loam

virginal bulb waxing full

as you spire green and thinly

toward the empyrean

we give you thanks

that you deign to donate

toothsome roasted tranches

bathed in unguent herbs and roqueforts

and other manner of adorning

your verdant feathers

clipped

grace

our humble offerings

wafting tasty vapors

from our tongues

heavenward

"Irreducible Squash"

factual zucchini

imperceptible squash

you lurk lizard-like

under the flat umbrella leaf

absorbing the summer morning

not in any greeting-card way

but rather nonchalantly

to say that growth

and green

do not depend

on concepts precepts

theorems paradigms schemata

gridlines ledger sheets or other astutely arranged algorithms

you will grow expand harden your tough green skin

ultimately they won’t even be able to eat you

"Enough"

Enough.

I hate this word

the ending looks like ugh

although it tries to disguise itself as uff

which conjures up warm moist nuances

of fluff and puff shuffle and snuffly

it walks onto my kitchen counter on sleek tiny feet like ants

thinking I will not smush it away

but I do want it away

do not want repose

stillness

finite boundaries

living like Luxembourg

no -- give me baldacchino ogee ormolu

splash and panache

and roasted lobster red

oozing through my bank account

"Husk"

it is not like anything else

not like the jellyfish

because it is hard oval pointed shelled

not like boustrophedon

it floats down it does not go this way and that

not like waves

it forms around space stubbornly hard

but is it like

the ear seeking the echo

the default of love

“Everything Has Salt In It and Artichokes Fall From the Sky”

making hilarious music

unexpectedly

I not hearing them

will turn the corner walking down Union Street

the blue Packard pristine 1927 and undented

will edge out from the driveway

mom and dad and their four-year-old son

walking by the little one in blue jeans sweat shirt and

a fluffy pink tutu


I will not be making this up

the sky shall cut its edges into the line of maples brightly


now

here’s the question:

do you think all of this will come about because of the

way some oxygen molecules danced

a long time ago?

"Are Humans Smarter Than Clouds and Waves"

at Key West sunrise all the band members appear on stage

and go through their act


clouds gold-and-raspberry paintbrushes

waves wet rocks flying-feather-things



do they say to themselves

I do not want to die

I want a café con leche

I want to fly forever through this turquoise sky

I want to be loved by everyone



as I sometimes do

on the pier

at 6:27 a.m.

"A Sense Of"

came flying out of the air of the torrents

a letter

postmarked Ljubljana

espousing flights of sentiment

hitherto unsuspected

what portended those

unfranked stamps?