what is the moon, really?

what is the moon?

no one really knows,

but I have some ideas.

maybe it's a felt circle

stuck to a woolen blanket

or a breath of light

the night sky takes

swelling with whiteness,

and then exhaled.

it is the night’s drain

the starlight circles.

the accretion of the glow

given off like pollen

from each humming streetlight.

maybe it’s an eye-hole

cut in the fabric of the night.

it could be a pearl, I suppose

flawed and dusty.

what is the moon?

no one really knows.

everything

everything is not you, recently I’ve noticed
because like the dog I raise my head to look
whenever something might be you.

I look for you mostly in lists these days
lists of names, lists of numbers
messages left, missed calls, letters received

my friend Emily told me this is what she believes
that a dog will miss you all the time that you are gone
but when you are back, he’ll forget you ever were

I could learn to think like that, is what I think
it actually makes a lot of sense to me, the forgetting
when you’re around, that everything is not you.

two cans and a string

I have been living here now
for about one year
where there are mountains
and rivers
(without end)
and now everything is green,
like it was when I arrived -
though I feel sometimes
I am only just now
really arriving

once, then
everything was orange (yellow)
and people came up
in buses
from the city you lived in

soon though that ended
and the trees, bare
were revealed as wood
hard and grey

wind poured through
and cold, it was
sweaters on,
hat on

this winter
was like no other
the diagrams of weather,
air thin, but not like before
not full of wires

combinations of snow,
white/grey possibilities
those
were the mathematics of winter
unlike any other winter
any other place

window panes
woven in frost

the trees were glass
sunlight fastened
to their limbs and branches

but , slowly though
it vanished

by then
you were further away
and I wrote poems
about distance

they were two cans
and a string

and came the mud
wet black wood

some curious softness
a down, like pasture
green and brown
more colors than one

everything loosened
and I sat by a river
as it tumbled over rocks

I have been living here now
about one year
going into the forest, into
stores and houses,
riding rarely in cars
and kneeling in my garden
to pick radishes

now it’s almost
goodbye mountains,
hello not mountains

but it’s also
goodbye distance,
hello you.

Lucky

walking to the bar
I found a penny
on the sidewalk
heads up,
shining

I put it in my pocket
and wondered if it meant
I’d talk to you tonight

untitled

on a good day

when I get home from work

the sun has not set all the way

and light still comes in

there is some bread

in the silver breadbox

some homemade jam

and water in the kettle

the heat is working well

i can take off my wool socks

put on an old record

slow dance to my desk

on a good day

you might be in any

number of places

in the mood to talk

if not, I can still smile

I understand that too

so I find the words

you leave behind

I read them slowly

with tea and toast

listening to an old record

as the light dims

it's slow dance enough,

for a night like this

untitled

there is something more, here -

more than the other half of the bed,

than the space next to me on the sofa

at the party I feel uncomfortable at,

bigger than the frying pan

being used to make only

one portion of pancakes

the second space in the toothbrush holder,

room on the bench by the river,

just instances,

of something

more.

heavier than the pile of records

bought with you in mind,

taller than the shelves

to hold all our poetry.

there is something more, here -

and for now, I sit with it

like these mountains

waiting out the weather

dreaming during the day,

because I never do at night

This is My Plan to Help You Deal With Your Worrying Nature

step one
I will arrive presently,
with my robin egg suitcase
the lavender interior filled
basic necessities,
sweaters and flannels.

You will probably
have to collect me
at the bus station.

step two
I will put my suitcase in your trunk
and completely surround you
with my arms

totally surrounded,
we will go back
to your house.

There is no step three.