Originally posted 8/30/2013.

The last hawk in this town
just lifted off from the Town Hall roof

and flapped straight over the river,
rising as she went.

I know somehow she won’t be back.
I know somehow we’re somewhat doomed.

I get an itch in my limbs just thinking of it.
It’s not going to be the same here without the hawks. 

I’ve been trying to empower myself
with other animals’ symbolic value

but they all insist on living their lives.
How dare they! They really ought to be

useful.  The hawks
have never understood that well.

Far beyond the river, a dim sighting
of many hawks plunging and soaring.

Such teases.  What are they telling us?
How should we respond? 

Originally posted 5/18/2012.

Stupid you, cold drunk crashing
right through the knee-high fence
in your own front yard
and planting your face
among the weed-strangled old tulips.

Through the old weak fence
right on your old weak face 
in the front yard where the neighbors can see,
and you don’t seem to care enough
to run and hide in shame this time;
you seem content
to lie there ass up
for all of us neighbors to see.

You’ve been stupid since you were a kid,
a drunk since you were just past that,
and none of us can count how often
you’ve tripped over that fence stupid drunk.  
Stupid drunk, that’s what you are —
our object lesson, our signal disaster;
face down in the dead tulips with ass sticking up.

You’ve been in that position for a bit now,
at least an hour, and we’re all still laughing because
it’s likely the best job you’ve had, the perfect job for you —
no real effort required: just lie there,
let the neighbors point and laugh
and say things to their kids
about being drunk and stupid
and a public spectacle.

Now a crow, a real live crow,
has landed next to you and is inspecting you
up close and personal.  

Never gonna let you live
this one down, asshole.  
Priceless.  I’m gonna see
if I can get close 
and snap a picture —
if you can’t get up on your own,
you deserve this.

Originally posted 2/27/2014. 

Caught napping, nebulous, infirm,
soft edged, cloud-conscious.
You snap back to semi-solid — 
did someone knock?  

Jump to that door and pull it wide open. 
No one’s there but a wisp, bowing near invisibly.
You can see it only because you’re still
waking up, mostly wisp yourself right now,
so it’s kin.

It straightens up, slides
past you to the couch, and takes
your spot.  

You step out into the hall.
The door locks behind you —
what now?

Everyone for miles is sleeping.  

Start knocking on doors and bow
when one opens for you,
even if the occupant can’t see you;
slip by, take their place on the couch,
and begin again.

You are learning to be comfortable
as one of the cloud-caught,
as more thought than flesh.

When you jump from that couch
and are in the cold again,
you go out to the street and recognize
that the spirits out there with you
have the same indistinct and tender face
you now wear and you lose any desire
to ever knock on a door and change places
with the sad life of flesh ever again.

Originally posted 4/12/2010.

A little cup of coffee,
hot, black and unadorned,
would be good right now.

Now and then I’ll take a little milk
to ease it down, but not today; and I’ll never
use sweetener — no, not at all,

because I like it bitter and I like the heat.
I like the way it stains my teeth
so my smile’s not as happy-kid bright.

I like how it opens my eyes
to the day
as it has been made.

God may trouble the waters yet
and if so I’ll have to wade them;
that little cup of coffee will help me go.

A little cup of coffee now.
Perhaps another later, and then another,
depending on how deep and swift the water;

a little something to remind me
that the sweet life
is not the only one worth living.