Genre: Poetry

Take heart—the lilacs are yours

as much as anyone’s; you need never

audition for spring. What delights

delights in you. What is luminous

beckons, and makes room. Look—

there

To us children,

the small hotel garden

was filled with effects,

but not causes.

Overhead, petals falling, or

leaves spaced perfectly—

if we bury a coconut,

it will turn into a tree.

I page through the Death album

Face after face after face

The longer the war burns

The more faces I recognize

I empty out my chest of dreams and pack it with

Before the Onslaught

What is an ear, but a snail shrinking inside the head? 

The city crawls with men in safety vests 

& hard hats. They swing from ropes, 

climbing long ladders of dust. What’s sadder 

than being

No boats hovering on the river

and the scattered trees hide behind 

a sky-wide sheet of cotton.

Only the fence rises black in the whiteness. 

The birds that chirped in the early morning fall silent 

and the light