--THE HEART ALWAYS INSTRUCTS,

USUALLY WHILE POINTING

IN WHISPERS,

SAYING

   HERE,

THERE,

AND THERE, TOO,
  PLEASE?
 I'VE HEARD THAT'S TRUE.
BUT REGARDLESS,
AND ABOVE ALL ELSE,
  BE A GOOD STUDENT. 
  PLEASE LISTEN CAREFULLY. 
 STAY ALERT.
NOTICE THINGS. 
FOR GOD'S SAKE,
  TAKE NOTES IF IT HELPS YOU
 RECALL WHAT
   YOU MIGHT HAVE
OTHERWISE MISSED.
 FIND PEN AND PAPER.
   KNOW WHAT IT FEELS LIKE
TO STAY HUNGRY
  AND ALIVE,
 VIBRANT AND
  RELEVANT.
TELL THE HONEST
 TO GOD TRUTH;
   IN THE END, DON'T
 WE REALLY JUST WANT
TO BELIEVE THAT THERE'S
SOMETHING IN THE WATER?
 THAT IT'S ACTUALLY MAGICAL,
 IF ONLY IN OUR HEADS?



In the Rubble

Already at such an age
You are a war
A boy
Son
Broken arrow
Broken water glass
Broken window and promise
Wanna-be orphan
Closeted poet
Romantic
Closeted dreamer/schemer
Obedient
An open-air dart board
Awaiting the first throw
 
You can’t run fast enough
Can’t hold your breath long enough
Can’t find Jesus in the rubble
Can’t get a refund on your DNA
Can’t imagine why you’re even on this earth

Yet you are a fighter
Scrawny but scrappy
Hard to pin down
A sprig pushing up from the dirt
Shadows bounce off you
Prancing on cement
Until one day they don’t
Until one day sunshine
Shoots through you
The way it does through glass
Because now you’re a ghost
Invisible to everyone but
The ghosts around you
Who are also hiding
Wandering and dead

How Sand Is Made

It’s impossible to

Avoid the current
Raging river contorted
Curled and cramped
As if in aguish
Its swirl and eddies
Hypnotic water fire
The underlying
Sexual current
Offshore is itself
Twisted and perverse
Vaguely cloaked
By rare parental kindness
But we are young
And don’t know better
Or so we tell ourselves
The pitched tent
On the rocky bluff
Rattles as if ransacked
By a starving bear
The center pole
Wobbles and strains
I keep calling out for Sis
Wondering why
She’s not here
To see how beautiful
And angry
The water is
As it scuffs every
Sea stone
Below it
One slap
Two slaps
Ripping away grain
Until someday
There will be
Nothing left
But sand

 

Thread

We ate the animals we owned

And the ones we didn’t sat at
The dinner table afterward
Playing Gin Rummy
As if was something
Important and special
Like taking communion or voting
They spoke German
Always German
When it was about us
Our names mired in the harsh dialect
Each tsch! richt! or flucht!
A discordant piano key
Dissolving in the smoke-filled ceiling
In fifth grade
I earned the language
But didn’t tell anyone
Voyeur spy or traitor
I might have been them all
Seated nearby listening
Deciphering code
Stitching their secrets together
Then my mouth and eyelids
Using a sharp needle and
Mother’s finest silk thread