Slate blue clouds cloak the dawn, crepuscular rays creeping round the blockade to wake songbirds and squirrels. The mill house wheel clacks and tumbles; yeast rises like a whisper. Only the blueberry thicket knows that the taste of sunlight keeps the bread warm.
You never told me
that you play the bass.
Some stories I hear over
and over again - Xerox
computers, meeting well-known
authors - but others I learn
haphazardly, stumbling into tidbits
and details like a newborn
fawn - a junior year spent
living on pancakes; a car
accident; animating projects
in the early days of Flash.
You never told me you play bass,
piano, guitar. And I worry -
what other talents and footnotes
are buried too far in the past
to light up on my radar?
What will I learn about you
only after it's too late?
I remember myself kneeling on the pillows while watching the rain, listening for the phone. Kneeling on the pillows behind an open window, listening for the phone, waiting for your to call. Behind an open window, the rain splashes the sill. Waiting for you to call I sigh resignedly. The rain splashes the sill; the phone lays dark. I sigh resignedly as thunder rumbles. The phone lays dark while watching the rain; as thunder rumbles, I remember myself.
Norma Jean drew a heart on the back of my hand in hoop snake blood.
“When that fades,” she said, tapping the center of her work, “you may forget about me.”
Norma Jean and I dated on and off through high school and then some. We grew up wandering the forest and exploring the caverns surrounding Ripple Creek, running from the hide-behinds and hodags when we stumbled too far into their territory. The backwoods of Minnesota were our playground, from the shores of Loon Lake to the edge of Crazy Dan’s property, where the pine trees grew so tall you couldn’t see the sky.
The day Norma Jean disappeared, I saw a
Opalescent
puddles shimmer aside pick-ups
and diesel engines resting
in the lot of a local diner.
The highway rumble fades
to jukebox country and patron
chatter past glass doors
smudged with the syrupy fingerprints
of apple-cheeked children.
There are no leftovers; everyone
leaves full or happy or contemplative,
eyes on the sky or head tilted
down, gazing into oil slick rainbows
and seeing entire worlds.
Quicksilver
moonlight shines past birch
trees, leaving puddles of shimmer
on the wet grass. The creek
gurgles with recent heavy rain,
singing forgotten lullabies
to squirrels and rabbits nestled
in earthy burrows hidden by
muscadine bushes. Bluebells
and blackberries flourish
among soft clover - the first
nudge of winter is a fallen
leaf, crunching under the feet
of a lonely traveler.
Denim
patches don't cover scraped
knees knocked about by road
grit and mosh pits thrashing
at decibels even the dead
could hear. He grinds gamey
venison with yellowed teeth
and washes it down with the burn
of bourbon older than he is.
The smouldering filter hovers
between chapped lips, the bead
of orange the last light for miles
as night falls on the deer stand.
Apricot
clouds roll over the Dolomites,
the blush of sunset whispering
its secrets to the quietly
waiting ear of dusk. Her
mouth is a plum, glazed
with pink lemonade; his collar
is stained with sangria.
Grass prickles their feet
as the last warmth shines through
gauzy clouds, parted like her thighs
underneath endless heavens.