Listed below is a sampling of the published poems that will appear in a forthcoming book (Red Hen Press, June 2024) titled Ripples in the Fabric of the Universe: New & Selected Poems. In some instances, the titles have been changed and the poems have been revised since their first appearances in literary journals and magazines. As of July 1, 2023, thirty-seven of the forty-one poems in the "new" section of the book have been published or accepted for publication.
THE GRAPH OF YOU (appeared in BigCityLit.com)
I’ve been thinking of you,
and I’ve been thinking about
graphs, those mathematical
objects composed of lines
joining one point to the next.
With a finger, I draw a line
from A to B along your body,
knowing where that will lead--
my flesh touching your flesh,
healing each other’s wounds.
GALE-FORCE WINDS (appeared in The Café Review)
The breeze off the western reservoir
riffles the air in the gaps
between the backyard deck’s floorboards.
Its song starts as flute-like whines.
Those soft moans become groans,
a bassoon’s longer-lived grumbling roar
building to a rage more outspoken
and violent, too few leaves left to impede
the mounting blow. The gale passes through
almost-bare branches and slams against
the house. Drafts sift in around the windows;
my wife wraps her comforter close.
We turned the clocks back last Sunday,
but only an hour. Our friends remind us
that we can’t turn farther back,
not even a few years, for another run
at how things ought to be. With too little
cover afforded by my anorak,
I hold onto the railing and peer out over
layers of graying hills. It won’t be long now.
SHE CHOOSES TO DIE IN HER BED (appeared in Third Wednesday)
--in memory of my sister-in-law, 1965-2016
The doctors honored your request to stay
at home in your own bed. You chose
the side you’ve always slept on, near
the window through which, when you are
conscious for moments that no longer
linger, you can watch the remaining leaves--
everything else just branches and twigs--
detach in the wind. Now you hear wings,
the birds also on their way. It’s the passing
of fall, this final falling away, leaf by leaf,
bird by bird, and you, pound by pound,
your body nearly weightless now, skin
drawn tight over bones almost porous,
you light enough to be able, at last, to fly.
CHILD COLORING IN A WAR ZONE (appeared in Grey Sparrow Journal)
Sitting on the stone steps of her broken home,
mother and father already gone,
only her grandmother left, the girl colors
the jigsaw of the girl in her coloring book,
who’s sitting on the steps of her own broken home
on an empty street. She likes that each piece
is a number because she’s always liked numbers.
She fills in the 1 with sky-blue, then 2 and 3
with leaf-green, wonders what to do
with the number she doesn’t recognize, an 8
fallen on its side. Looking at the plus sign,
she imagines the crosshairs of a sniper
turning her into a minus. Out of crayons and hope,
she, too, will become a number in a war
she’s been told is not a war. At another 8,
right-side up, her age, she stops, at last
understanding the number 0 she left blank,
her alone in a world no longer here, the shadow
seeping down the page blood-red.
SAFE HARBOR (appeared in Chronogram)
Buried deep in the Sound, a tetrapod of poles
supporting a crow’s nest with two “red, right,
returning” triangular signs, a beacon
for boats coming back to a harbor sheltered
from rough seas. Out here on the long jetty
with flat-topped boulders forming a wide
walkway, you know that the winds won’t blow
you away; you’ll be okay holding onto your hat
and stepping past the bits of crab shells
and claws left by gulls. You’ve come out today
because the skies are finally clear, and, for
a few moments, you can get far enough away.
UNABLE TO SEE OUR WAY CLEAR (appeared in Hawai'i Pacific Review)
A nearly symmetric tree, spilling
its leaves like a fountain
by the pool, the weeping cherry
appears the same from all angles
in daytime, left side indistinguishable
from the right, but not at night, one half
yellowish, ground-lit by incandescent
bulb, the other bright white, an LED,
the contrast then as stark as in
the aftermath of the latest deaths
by gunfire, when we find ourselves
once again split in two, unable to see
our way clear to turning off the lights
and waiting for the sun to rise.
ON THE MERITS OF TAKING UP PICKLEBALL (appeared in Third Wednesday)
On a walk through any community park
with racquetball sports, if it’s still morning,
you can’t miss it, the pickleball courts
all taken by seniors getting their daily
exercise. I often stop and watch,
applauding the skill these older folk
display. They’re a competitive lot,
the ladies especially. This morning I saw
a pretty woman with a red ponytail
grin as she smashed a high ball away
for a point. My wife tells me I should take up
the game, too much time on my hands,
she says, it would be a good way for you
to meet new people. I would need a lot
of practice first, I say—it’s been thirty years
since I’ve played tennis, and I stopped
because my ex-wife finally beat me
when I developed what might now recur
as chronic pickleball elbow. But you claim
they’re ancient, she counters, and you
aren’t quite there yet. Aren’t you concerned
that I’ll latch onto a sexy single woman
to teach me to play, I ask. We might be
so good together she’d want me as her
permanent partner. Don’t get carried away,
she says. You’re not that young.
ACORNS FALLING ON OUR HEADS (appeared in New Feathers Anthology)
This would be good news if you were a squirrel
and the work of shaking them loose
were kindly being done on your behalf.
But you’re more like Chicken Little,
who’s frantic over those fallen bits of sky,
the world around you tumbling down.
And yet, you want those acorns to keep falling
for the little good they might do if they land
on enough heads, knocking some sense
into those who keep sowing their bad seeds.
I’ve been thinking of you,
and I’ve been thinking about
graphs, those mathematical
objects composed of lines
joining one point to the next.
With a finger, I draw a line
from A to B along your body,
knowing where that will lead--
my flesh touching your flesh,
healing each other’s wounds.
GALE-FORCE WINDS (appeared in The Café Review)
The breeze off the western reservoir
riffles the air in the gaps
between the backyard deck’s floorboards.
Its song starts as flute-like whines.
Those soft moans become groans,
a bassoon’s longer-lived grumbling roar
building to a rage more outspoken
and violent, too few leaves left to impede
the mounting blow. The gale passes through
almost-bare branches and slams against
the house. Drafts sift in around the windows;
my wife wraps her comforter close.
We turned the clocks back last Sunday,
but only an hour. Our friends remind us
that we can’t turn farther back,
not even a few years, for another run
at how things ought to be. With too little
cover afforded by my anorak,
I hold onto the railing and peer out over
layers of graying hills. It won’t be long now.
SHE CHOOSES TO DIE IN HER BED (appeared in Third Wednesday)
--in memory of my sister-in-law, 1965-2016
The doctors honored your request to stay
at home in your own bed. You chose
the side you’ve always slept on, near
the window through which, when you are
conscious for moments that no longer
linger, you can watch the remaining leaves--
everything else just branches and twigs--
detach in the wind. Now you hear wings,
the birds also on their way. It’s the passing
of fall, this final falling away, leaf by leaf,
bird by bird, and you, pound by pound,
your body nearly weightless now, skin
drawn tight over bones almost porous,
you light enough to be able, at last, to fly.
CHILD COLORING IN A WAR ZONE (appeared in Grey Sparrow Journal)
Sitting on the stone steps of her broken home,
mother and father already gone,
only her grandmother left, the girl colors
the jigsaw of the girl in her coloring book,
who’s sitting on the steps of her own broken home
on an empty street. She likes that each piece
is a number because she’s always liked numbers.
She fills in the 1 with sky-blue, then 2 and 3
with leaf-green, wonders what to do
with the number she doesn’t recognize, an 8
fallen on its side. Looking at the plus sign,
she imagines the crosshairs of a sniper
turning her into a minus. Out of crayons and hope,
she, too, will become a number in a war
she’s been told is not a war. At another 8,
right-side up, her age, she stops, at last
understanding the number 0 she left blank,
her alone in a world no longer here, the shadow
seeping down the page blood-red.
SAFE HARBOR (appeared in Chronogram)
Buried deep in the Sound, a tetrapod of poles
supporting a crow’s nest with two “red, right,
returning” triangular signs, a beacon
for boats coming back to a harbor sheltered
from rough seas. Out here on the long jetty
with flat-topped boulders forming a wide
walkway, you know that the winds won’t blow
you away; you’ll be okay holding onto your hat
and stepping past the bits of crab shells
and claws left by gulls. You’ve come out today
because the skies are finally clear, and, for
a few moments, you can get far enough away.
UNABLE TO SEE OUR WAY CLEAR (appeared in Hawai'i Pacific Review)
A nearly symmetric tree, spilling
its leaves like a fountain
by the pool, the weeping cherry
appears the same from all angles
in daytime, left side indistinguishable
from the right, but not at night, one half
yellowish, ground-lit by incandescent
bulb, the other bright white, an LED,
the contrast then as stark as in
the aftermath of the latest deaths
by gunfire, when we find ourselves
once again split in two, unable to see
our way clear to turning off the lights
and waiting for the sun to rise.
ON THE MERITS OF TAKING UP PICKLEBALL (appeared in Third Wednesday)
On a walk through any community park
with racquetball sports, if it’s still morning,
you can’t miss it, the pickleball courts
all taken by seniors getting their daily
exercise. I often stop and watch,
applauding the skill these older folk
display. They’re a competitive lot,
the ladies especially. This morning I saw
a pretty woman with a red ponytail
grin as she smashed a high ball away
for a point. My wife tells me I should take up
the game, too much time on my hands,
she says, it would be a good way for you
to meet new people. I would need a lot
of practice first, I say—it’s been thirty years
since I’ve played tennis, and I stopped
because my ex-wife finally beat me
when I developed what might now recur
as chronic pickleball elbow. But you claim
they’re ancient, she counters, and you
aren’t quite there yet. Aren’t you concerned
that I’ll latch onto a sexy single woman
to teach me to play, I ask. We might be
so good together she’d want me as her
permanent partner. Don’t get carried away,
she says. You’re not that young.
ACORNS FALLING ON OUR HEADS (appeared in New Feathers Anthology)
This would be good news if you were a squirrel
and the work of shaking them loose
were kindly being done on your behalf.
But you’re more like Chicken Little,
who’s frantic over those fallen bits of sky,
the world around you tumbling down.
And yet, you want those acorns to keep falling
for the little good they might do if they land
on enough heads, knocking some sense
into those who keep sowing their bad seeds.