For perfection lay not
in the opt-
i-
mal-
suffusion of color,
but in the anticipation thereof.
A happy thought!
until I thought,
If this green is perfect,
then perfect is past,
on the day I should’ve seen
this day coming.
The wondrous world
Man’s plans many and varied
I’m going to bed to think of you, sky
Of why you wait
and the things that you say.
What was that trick
you did with the rain –
swirling to scatter
leaves, but no matter,
one day you’ll keep
your promise again?
The Tsar’s Window
Campfire in the woods, east of Eden
Guard the secret
star you stole.
Hide it dark
within your eye.
Wait for dawn,
smoke will teach
you how to tell
the lovely lie.
Let’s back up to that day
When plum-sucked juice
dizzied the man
who dared to be gladdened
by you in your youth
Contemplative
Your splendid evanescence
Is an icon of the Lord –
your coming and going,
the fact that you exist.
Where did you learn to
to walk through walls?
Who taught the vanishing
to raise the dead?
Sentimental ditty about a rock-solid someone
I thought I’d visit my neighbor
instead of myself. I’d seen him sitting there
many a time, in the window,
bent over his lunch. And yes,
Come in, he said, I see you go by.
What’s gone by in him is 92 years,
51 of which were spent playing
trombone
in the Utrecht City Orchestra.
In the war they stuck him
in a German munitions factory,
where the Poles and the French and the Dutch
were all saboteurs,
and the boss, a German,
was a pretty good guy.
This neighbor, Piet,
has pictures of the boss’s daughter.
He’s lived in that house for 60 years.
He’s got an open leg
and can’t go out. But he’s
sweet as sunshine,
shining while we make our way.
Utrecht Journal 