Folding a Blanket With My Young Son

Look,

butterfly wings

I say, folding

and unfolding

the corners

of the blanket.

A blanket --

what possibility!

A tortilla

to roll him in,

a meadow

for living-room

picnics,

a sail

pulling us

to Alexandria.

A cloud. An igloo. A ghost.

A page

from a story

unfolding.

Challah French Toast

Challah waited centuries

for this October morning;

for completion in this bath

of milk and eggs and honey;

for this Northwest kitchen

where my beloved whisks

the batter as our children jostle

at the counter just like siblings.

The morning is aflame.

A year ago I did not think

I could be loved again.

Someday the children,

if they persist, will learn

the things I know right now.

That manna can appear

to the lost still tending gods.

That this is indeed the

"Best french toast ever!"

And yes, that arrival takes time.

Trusted Footing Gives

As if it were 
a jungle pit
designed to trap
the innocent,
we speak of 
falling, never

landing, in
love. So deep
is the darkness
we can't see
who is the fallen,
who is the tiger.

Reminder

The gospel of heart physiology 

says attacks such as yours, Father, 

are mere reminders to set down 

your lonely hammering and let

what you've spent all afternoon building be,

if not done, then done enough: This was

supposed to be the time you came back into

the sun room, sat down at the piano, 

and showed your grandchildren 

how they can sing their way

back to themselves if they get lost, 

even for years.

What the Cactus Dreams

In your dreams, you swim.

You tumble in the raucous waves

submerging and twirling 

or tilt into deep cool places

and looking up see the sun

fracture into spangles.

You go back abashed.

Water beads from your green skin.

You cannot hide your joy
from neighbors who've not 
gone swimming.

What you have is good. A view 
of the aspen-whiskered mountains

and water enough — if you are fastidious.

One child survived. Gilded flickers 
and red-tailed hawks craft nests

in your arms. Bats nuzzle the night.

You have carefully read two centuries

of sunsets, and it is quiet, and the stars.

The desert swells with creosote perfume

before it rains but still sometimes

you dream of swimming.

Clearing the Leaves from the Water Trough

I spread my hands 
apart along the skin 
of water to clear 
the leaves away. 
The gesture is 
the opposite 
of prayer. 
It is to brave 
unhope and accept 
what resolves.
The surface stills. 
I see my face, 
and beyond me, 
infinite blue. 
How do we thank 
such a world? 
I bring my hands, 
wet with sky,
to my lips. 
And I drink.






What could have been, my friend. ...

Just Us Let's

Just us let's 

make the 

time right

now right 

now not 

wait till 

they are 

right our 

lives that

is the boxes 

checked each 

question 

answered weight 

lost best

selves 

realized just

us let's 

meet right 

here right here 

all right all 

scared all 

open all

unperfected

Delight

Delight comes in parentheses,

whenever life's relentless syntax

cracks and you can see God waiting.

Delight is where you part from plans

mid-plan and depart out the hole

in the whole you thought you'd built.

Delight's the exit from our sentence

and is itself a little death, just like

all our comings, all becoming,

and maybe even second comings.

(Every second, one thing's going

just as another's coming.)

Ding Dong

Everyday's now strewn with 
wonders disappearing unremarked. 
I give you yesterday.  
Something almost utterly 
unspecial. Ding Dongs. 
For sale at a food-court
restaurant. Except, except
I hadn't tasted one in years. 
I wanted to call. I wanted 
to ask if you ever sat on a 
curb in summertime, you and
your best friend. No plans. 
Nibbling the chocolate shell 
till only spongy puck remained. 
Which you gulped. I wanted 
to ask if you ever conjured 
pterodactyls from the foil wrappers,
then flew them round the lawn. 
If some lost creatures momentarily 
took flight.

The Divorced Couple Puts Their Dog to Sleep

We hold her

while the chemicals

gently stop her heart,

hold one of the last things

we love in common.

We rub her ears and murmur,

"Good girl. Such a good girl."

And then there's just a body.

Where she goes

we've only seen in flashes –

dreams, deep pain,

or fast collapses –

whenever what in us will last

goes wandering and then returns.

Or when it stays, and waits

unresurrected.