I see the treesyou’ve seen and knownpoised in mute witnessthe baled hay hunchedlike insatiable livestockgnawing its wayback to the earththe river muttering madlyits secrets swallowedunder the . . . . Continue Reading »
This feast of a day on the river is heavily salted with gulls. And the leaf-pared birch on the shoreline is lightly peppered with crows, And from dawn’s appetizer to the entree of noon, to the hungering sweetness . . . . Continue Reading »
There is nothing left to say now and nothing left to do the tears will not come to the eyes of the child who has kissed her mother and watched the methodical men bind her with tape the child who has heard her mother’s last words before the death in the small Brooklyn house with her niece and her . . . . Continue Reading »
Structure of organic stone this vacant house built molecule on molecule by the body of a mollusk witlessly devising spectrums, stripes, spots, coruscations which it could never see or wonder at nor even hear within (emptied of its mortal substance) the sea which echoes certain power forever; This . . . . Continue Reading »
No angel with uplifted hand, no symbolof the Holy Spirit, gliding down ongilded beams—and for all we know the woman is no virgin. Still, any woman readingis an annunciation. Vermeer knew this:reading is parthenogenetic, magic doubling of the self fertilized by words.His girl reading stands in . . . . Continue Reading »
“I used to believe that there was a green stick,buried on the edge of a ravine . . . on whichwords were carved that would destroy all theevil in the hearts of men and bring themeverything good.”—Leo Tolstoy When he was old, pate bald, skin sere.Back humbled as the turtle’sFor all his . . . . Continue Reading »
Like the imprintof my two thumbs in clay,so you appear, my Lord,by what you leave behind.Disguisedin the tracery of fingerprint,the whorls a worldof delicate, true lines,you are revealed.You mark me deeper still,that imprint, too, indelible.You sayyou’d know me anywhereby that . . . . Continue Reading »
In the din of agesso quiet only the squeakof charcoal sneakersand the stentorian tutelageof living massesobtrude—goddesswith a breast exposed,Mary drawing bloodfrom fingers brushing thorns—overhead the tapestryof knights and days—in glass enclosed, breastplates,armor . . . . . . . Continue Reading »
From the stack outside the window’s frame,White smoke, mostly steam, breaks hard acrossA bright blue square of winter sky.It tumbles in gusts, and its knots untieThen vanish in air. They are strangely calming, these forms aboveThe skeletal trees, the drifted roofs,Above the houses where livesGo . . . . Continue Reading »
First snow falls in kindagreement to timeless ways.Gratia plena. Our Lady of Careis a kindly countenancesad as autumn frost. Faithful tears reclaimgardens brought to graceless ruinby wishing wells of sin.—Frederick S. . . . . Continue Reading »
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