Four Poems for Spring
(No, Six)
I
We are frames, changing.
Always. A rapid flight
through dog-eared histories.
And we are alone. Contemplating
the calculations. Collating
the differences, the misspellings.
This is good. And bad. Like
any movie with flickers of allure.
And we look and look away.
Into the furnace of empty air and
fully vacant promises.
We’re together. Grab the wheel.
We’re not driving yet. 
_________________________________________________
II
Children calm claim victory
in smallest sunshine, in the
slightest chance
Their day is a flame they
easily control
Leaping it into and out of existence
carelessly
Leaping into and out of it
selflessly
They skate on the edge of attenuating
ramparts above crumbling clouds
insouciantly
It is not for them to decide
the shapes of hearts that evoke
their caterwauling attention
They can only eschew technique
and inundate the orange blossoms
with a rush of indifference
Even the rain will offer them
precarious shelter
Even the air knows the dare
of their forgetting
They bought you long ago
when the world was a match
to the way you opened fire
dropping everything for less
than you could ever name
_________________________________________________
III Evaporate swans know the meaning of words spoken in haste with subtle nods of the head and eyes which would like to give more Secrets dispel knowledge and empty themselves of ourselves in mid-flight We turn a corner looking back they’re already gone with the moments they never appeared in And what does it matter The elegance of becoming gains weight and loses weight before we can register the transcendent energies of a consummate flowing Some of them love their chains as much, no more, than liberation Who can open doors where water towers its crush, its certainty, its sharpened aversions to drown days in days for night unnoticed to disappear ____________________________________________ IV A Song This song was born of itself A lion told me in the night to beware of teachers and spokespersons I told her to mind her own business And she laughed Showers are good in the morning At night it’s better to dream, or try to dream, or watch dreams fade away as lovers tend to do Explanations are not for us They’re for those who seed a need with old shoes and unread newspapers They spit in the wind and declare Casual silence is more like our sobriquet Don’t ask what that means Meaning is an overripe fruit I’ve already left through that plunging door When everything feels like cardboard find a scissor and cut out a mountain You will find yourself alone Alone at the end of time Then you can finally read that magazine on the table or at least count the ways survival has made you its dog and eternity has lost your number ___________________________________________ V I knew you in the rain You knew me in the storm We came together to touch stones In the gallery beyond fear Who could have told us Who could have known The birth that would astound us The calm that ruptured certainty Your name was mud and clarity Mine was Someone Else I was thin branches along the road You were the catch that held my breath All you had to do was nothing All I had left was a hand and empty glance Things you left were shining fading Things I took could only be filled by you _____________________________________________ VI My feelings have all gone Wounded fauns have taken their place Even they have no more evolutions Things are golden in the light Afterwards their sheen limps away to sleep Everything is fine with closing eyes and crunching teeth Equipped to follow orders without following orders the mass of the masses congeals in standard ecstasies They sing their theme songs holding the sheet music already memorized I love their indolent alacrity They love my constant disappearance Together we are the overworked chorus that never meets but always rehearses I had directions once to a field which I have since lost It may be in a new neighborhood or could have been total fantasy Either way the wonder of all of it is about equal to the magic we’re unable to sift and suffuse Walking away through doors into a blinding sunset To walk through doors into dazzling sun lights