"The Next Step"

this is

the next step

on this early November day

the cherries shrivel on the zigzag branch

leaves long gone

the zigzag parts the sky

the crows part it too

dew does not crust the grass it’s frost now

and all this is like nothing else

all this is not a metaphor for that

do not link one thing to another simile-wise

like the plastic cars of the children’s train

you are also at some point this morning

in some state

so is the garbage man in Buenos Aires

and the bumpy horned lizard looking at something

in the Painted Desert

all of these things are

as they are

this morning

"Simple"

if you

were simple

you could walk away

after having touched the Buddha’s foot

placed the stone onto the ground

just so

aligning it with the pathway of thought

that straddles your eyes on the one hand

and the horizon on the other

walking away now

you part the air with your palms

doing so produces a squeak a sibilant

objection from the space

it is asking

for more commitment

"Context"

some say

you can only understand by knowing what came before

i love you just by itself hanging there in the whirl

doesn’t really tell us much

so the

markedly veined marbled right hand of David barely touching his upper thigh hanging

really doesn’t tell us

anything

unless we know

what he had just perceived moving

there

over

the horizon

Splendor In The Grass Glory In The Flower

"The Tree"

it is a mark of

our poverty

that we flee the act of

placing words on this here this earthly emanating goldly skyward

fearing too many tropes have stuck on it

glue-like

how many layers

since that earliest sin-filled garden tale

by now it is the world’s thickest palimpsest

so what should we do this autumn morning

chill licking our fingers ears

and camera shutter barely clicking

as we see

its sharp intensity

bending our sense

of what today

is new

"In The Land Without Adjectives"

in the fall the King

parsimonious

forbade all adjectives from

attaching

to any stone or growing flowing thing



henceforth

the grove had to own the shade or hue

could not be it

or seem

and you

also could not slide

thoughtlessly into that nuance so much fancied then

but had

to swallow quick

and say

I

clasp

now

 it

"Which Of These Scrambled Words"

which of these scrambled words is least like the others

burbles the airplane magazine game page

do you mean

which of the words is least like anything at all

which of them is variously floating

there

in mind space

black chemical ink on cellulose fiber with a light slick coating

so that the printed airline logo gleams

at 32,000 feet

while that particular word over there

and this one over here

actually those physical objects

of black and cellulose

are hurtling along with us and our steel tube

trying to attain our spot of desire

what would be these words’ desires I wonder

do they even have them

basically squiggles impressed on the page

no meaning at all

if you come from Cefalu

and are being accustomed

to different squiggles entirely

the meaning

whatever it is

seems to be a link

kind of like an electric arc

from our mind

to the squiggle

these two things are glued together spiritwise

and that spirit-glue

is also

hurtling

along with us

at one hundred kilometers per minute

to Miami International Airport