Loss

An entire world lost its mother today An entire world got the news Somewhere on a California highway An entire world full of children Women and men Going north, south, east and west Each one with a mother inside each of them Even if their mother is just an empty space Left behind by her absence And yes, there is even a mother in that man Who only speaks of knives and steak Make no...

Daybreak Winter Solstice After a long dark night We stare into ceramic darkness That floods our morning with life Egad, what’s this? The sun that shines In our eyes while we’re trying to write?   Piercing light whom I address One little request if I may? Just please step aside And shine from behind My eyes weren’t yet ready to play   My coffee’s not drank My mind like a bank Robbed at the break...

In the home where I grew up A porcelain monk lived on the kitchen counter Belly full of cookies Admonishing us not to steal Back when the house was full of sneaky fingers   I saw him enter the kitchen one day 30 years ago Something clearly wrong Part of him had vanished Struggling for the words To tell me that my grandpa was gone His father The pastor The preacher Thou Shalt Not Steal...

There was a song my father sang Not really a song at all Just a rhythm of syllables Rising and falling With every step And a pause with Every breath   There were never any words Neither for the song itself Nor for the way It brings me home   It would often be sung Out in the wilderness Surrounded by wonders Sometimes emerging From an ice cold pool Formed by a beaver dam In...

Heather Road Long Beach, California The actual street sign Hung on the wall In her room down the hall   She was just a child Leading a rebellion With discarded toys Striking out At them At us At herself And though she made a fool of the enemy Throughout the Ten Year War She lost the final battle yesterday And now she’s gone   She left home too soon There was heaviness in the entry...

1981 She sat in her chair Laughing (With concern) I’d put 27 grapes in my mouth at once And got one stuck up my nose Again   1982 She sat in her chair Sleeping (Blissfully unaware) While I dug a hole All the way to China Again   1983 She sat in her chair Pondering (With me) When I sat beside her and asked Why the sand was full of plastic Again   1984 She...

You always had a way with words Man, you could ramble a story Like Johnny Appleseed across an entire conversation Quips loaded like hippies into hatchbacks Looking for a place to crash With eyes full of wonder One thing you knew The Truth is not a “What” But a “Who”   We go back lifetimes And then some But never all that close Until we shared beers on the deck under a hot sun And...

“Will this be your first?” That was my first stupid question for them I’m not very good at this They were a beautiful young couple Watching another perfect Southern California sunset From the edge of a crumbling cliff Over the mirror of the sea Clearly expecting A green flash I’d just finished drinking 3 beers That’s not exactly the usual for me But I was with good friends that day And it sometimes goes that...

He burned hot and bright like a distant campfire, like candlelight. He’d laugh his howling little cackle that pulled you into his slipstream as you made your way along the path, down the makeshift rope, repelling over the edge of the cliff and dropping weightless into the crystal cerulean waters of the rocky cove far below. Everything made him laugh. And almost everything he laughed at led you to math, calculating the odds of survival....

It’s the end of the west It’s the setting sun It’s a train-wreck that’s only just begun   It’s a crowded bar It’s the law of the land It’s illicit activities obscured by hot sand   It’s a war at sea It’s the first shots fired It’s victory in sight, though not the one desired   It’s a shift in the wind It’s an outgoing tide It’s the last man standing as the captain died...