Meaning

I read your poem.
It was like looking
Into a well
That grew darker
And deeper
With each word;
It was only after
I dropped a stone
Into the silence
That I heard
the faint whisper
of water.

Post Mortem

The Chinese maple,
Brought back from death
Five years ago
By the Italian yard worker,
Is a living testament
To the faith you possessed.

You asked me for a prognosis:
I pronounced it dead.
But here it is, again, this spring -
Exploding with delicate
Diminutive green leaves,
And the stoic soul of an old bonsai.

Had you listened to me
There would be nothing in its place,
But a hole in the sky.
Thank you for acting on your faith.

Fairy Tale

o sweep away the waves of seas...flat
be still and serious...
so that i may speak of flowers,
on levels of my knees,
swaying in fields
full of breezy butterflies

ask grass impossible questions
and trees shake feathery birds
out of their limbs
under whose shadows you lived
like a lifeless princess

your bare feet and lips
and face asleep,
your whole soul
limp with gravity

you silent hands
held sudden kisses

your waking hands
touched buttons
pulled zippers full of honey

before the summer rain
forgotten in this fields

red apples grew
and fell, uneaten

spring was, bees buzzed,
crikets chanted

and before that
gray squirrels scurried

while flat brown leaves
floated soundlessly down

dreaming or drowning
we stood under stars ticking

woke wildly in fields
with red roses singing

and heard, (ever so faintly)
the invisible wings of love

hovering above
this new green season

Bedtime Story

read me a story mama,
one with bad bears
and a sleeping princess

one with a ballerina
forced into the gutter

leave out the commas
and the counting numbers

put in george washington
and his soldiers
freezing a valley forge

leave out electricity
and time-sharing computers

but put in the boy
who rain away in the rain
without an umbrella
to live with the gypsies

At a Loss for Words

rain,
mumbling in monotone,
makes me wonder:
how long i can endure
silence
between thunder?

The Skater

skating backwards
in the center of the rink

she seemed to move in special ways
through dreams of her own

turning moments of imbalance
into movements of ballet

it was as though she reached out
and touched the air to steady herself -

she never fell