in the bed
of an old pond
that sinks low in dry times
stands a single granite piling.

someone must know
if there was a bridge there,
or a dock. but no one’s
telling.

everyone with a clue
will be dead eventually
and it’ll be up to archeology
to tell the tale.

archeology will get it wrong.
it will be a ritual marker.
it will be a revolutionary find,
or a pampered dog’s toilet.

today it’s lonely and silent
when i drive by it. i want it
to speak to me and tell me
its name. i want to believe

it had some prosaic use: something
the common folk depended on. royalty’s toys
are uncommon here. it was surely something routine
and happy in its routine.

i drive by it
as the radio speaks of the gospel of judas —
the new found traitor’s testament to the need
to let god go. judas

was buried in clay, jesus in granite.
we’ve built a sour bridge from the lord’s tomb.
we hid judas’ word for years. we made of him a piling,
and no one is sure now what truly happened.

i want the stone
to speak to me
before we forget
who set it there.

CHECK, PLEASE

i sat across from a woman at dinner last night
and asked her a question
and when she opened her mouth
the angel of choice flew out
and streaked across the room
into a plate glass window
and fell stunned and bleeding to the floor.

she sat there picking feathers out of her teeth
as i rushed to the angel’s side.
i picked him up and settled him on the sill.
i asked if he was ok. he said,

i’m fine.
this happens.
sometimes, choices crash into invisible things.

i opened the window and he took off,
a little unsteady still.

back at the table
she was demolishing a chicken leg.

my god, i said, as i sat down.

eh, things fly out of people
all the time, she said.
get used to it.

after dinner, i walked home alone,

my mouth shut tight.
something
fluttered inside me. I was damned
if i was going to let this one get away. but
a choice flies on certain wings
and it has to fly to be a choice,

so i opened my mouth and let it go
and it flew off
and i feel empty
with it gone.