11.1.11

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One is not lonely
Standing in a crowd of four
Numbers in their prime.

When Her Number Was Up

Her last dying wish

Has its own anniversary

On August Thirteenth.

Mother's Little Helper

As I get older

I don't look like anyone

But for my mother.

Kind of Blue

What kind of blue are you
a cerulean, a turquoise, a cobalt
of a Grecian sea or Venetian sky
I don't understand the feeling "I'm blue"
because blue is beautiful

Listen

Listen

Listen to the walls around us

Raindrops and voices

From between the cracks

Look

Look to the skies that drown us

The devil and God

Two sides of us

Think

Think about the songs that reveal us

Films and Sundays

Spent w/ you

All I need from you is a little more fortitude

All I need from you is a little less change

Maybe that's something you could arrange

The Sound of Walls

Half Hour, Maybe More

Do you know where she goes

when she kisses you on the cheek

Does she walk out the door

saying she'll be back

Do you know who she knows

passin' love notes under the table

Maybe under a door

You'll wait for a knock

Half hour maybe more goes by

You'll save her, then you'll cry

You'll save her, then you'll cry

Do you know where she goes

when she has nothin' to lose

thru an empty door

maybe she'll come back

She's not w/ you

She's not w/ me

She's not w/ him

She's not w/ her

She's not w/ them

She's not w/ us

She's not w/ you

The Sound of Walls

Cemetery

What one needs at a cemetery:

1. creepiness
2. quiet paranoia
3. headstones w/ psalms etched on crosses
4. epithets which may not have been entirely true
5. gravediggers' shovels
6. religious monuments
7. solid terra firma
8. hallelujahs and amens sung from neighboring church bells
9. a potpourri of pine needles, leaves and debris underfoot
10. a Bresson black 'n' white moon
11. rusty crosses and dates w/ no names

I went into a cemetery, darkly dark and alive, w/ spirits of people I've known and blowing reeds. I was really wanting to find my mother among magnolias & dogwoods. I passed a boy holding flowers. I noted my apology as something old and new. I think it was my brother, a younger version of the man he was, serious and stalwart at times but a charming mischievous cad at others. I was walking faster than him, but it was nice to see he was taking her flowers. In the end I found my mother.

I found my mother
On the day she gave me life
I lost her later.

For Kathryn
9.9.44 - 8.13.93