I do love apples:

how they bite back,
how they resist. Their
snap and thick punch.
How all that fight 
illuminates their sweetness.

Sometimes I eat 
two apples, one right
after the other. I eat my fill
and feel ready, taking on
apple-warrior-soul
as armor. 

Oh, come on, you say,
all this silly talk of apples
when there’s a war on —
talk to me of bullets or
barricades or dark swords.
Talk to me of fire and 
surging masses 
pressing forward toward 
victory.

I say that I know that some prefer
red meat before their battles.
Some tear into flesh
and sneer at those
who cannot or will not. 

I have neither fear of meat
nor any distaste for it — but

call me what you want:
just give me an apple
with which to face 
any given Goliath
and I’m ready — even if
when my time comes
all I can do is slip it
into my sling and take aim,
I will do that
with a singing, snapping
red tang to my attack,

and after, whether or not
I survive, there will be
peace in my apple-full belly

as I hope there will be peace
in yours 
regardless of what sustains you
through battle.

Five in a room in a snowstorm,
talking of the cold. Talking
of the way home, how bad
the road will be,
how warm it is in here. 

It is warm in here,
isn’t it?  Almost as if there’s no
storm spitting intermittently,
glassing the pavements, 
crusting the cars they’ll need
soon enough.  

The woods that surround
this sanctuary grow more and more
ominous. Some would say not ominous,
but peaceful.  It depends
on where you’re standing —
out in the cold among the trees,
or in a room in a warm building.
Under the trees, peace;
in the room, anxiety. 

Five in a room in a storm
with the woods all around
and danger waiting on the road
all of them will soon be traveling.

Outside, some are traveling already.
Some have been traveling a long time;
their whole lives, in fact.
What is it they see
when they pass the room
and catch a glimpse of
the five inside? Nothing,
really.  They might notice
a light and some privilege

but they know better
than to take their eyes
off the road
in weather like this.

“The air is crisp.”

They always say that
when it’s gotten colder. 
It seems right sometimes
but then the question:
how so? Does it
shatter when
someone walks through it?
Small flakes of it like
smashed potato chips
littering the ground? 
If enough people
walk through crisp air
will it eventually be
too broken
to sustain life? 

It’s gotten colder.
The air is beginning
to shatter from all
these people marching
under orders, all those
marching against orders.
Some are struggling 
to breathe. Some have
already stopped.

People also say
that spring 
always follows winter,
but it’s hard to imagine 
hearing the approach of
any warming breeze 
over these sounds of 
choking and breaking,
the crackling
of shards of frozen air.

They say the air will 
get softer soon. They say
wait and see. They say
a lot of things.

I wrote poems,
a lot of poems.

At the time
it seemed to many to be
an indulgence.

But now it seems
I wasn’t writing poems
as much as I was 
making bullets and 
planting seeds: bullets
for the moment, seeds
for the future.

Sometimes
one poem would be
both — those were the times
I think I was at my best. 

I do not like war —
I am not one of those
whose blood sings with it.
But there were times,
I admit, 
when I’d look
at what I’d written
and say, there’s one
that will hurt, there’s one
that will sprout later,
and I would sit back 
and say, there. There
it is.  I mean,

why do you fight a war
except for the chance
to hear poems
when it’s over?

(Which is why they killed
some of us,
you know.  It wasn’t
safe — not as dangerous
as some things, but still,
they killed some of us
not because
our bullets hurt them
but because our seeds
terrified them.)

When you ask me
what I did in the war,
I tell you this: it wasn’t
as much as some did,
but it was everything 
I could do — an indulgence,
maybe, but I did it with
my hands and it took
all the strength I had on
some days, some nights,
when the firefights came close
and I thought I would or should 
die but nonetheless I
kept the lamp on above the paper
as I tried to make a better world
with my pen.

“In the wee small hours of the morning…”

A Sinatra song on his mind. Commercials for 
Miracle Prosperity Spring Water on his TV, and he’s
tempted to call. It’s not worth it, he knows, but what if?

“While the whole wide world is fast asleep…”

It’s the wee small hours of the morning of Election Day.
Does it matter what he does now? Vote one way, 
vote the other; will it ever be 1955 again? 

“When your lonely heart has learned its lesson…”

Whether or not he votes, he loses. Whether or not he 
wins, he loses. Perfect time to buy what they’re selling.
Perfect time to croon, sip, and try to go back to sleep.

I was born into killing,
into loving the killers,
I lived in a killing. I 
breathed murder, I slept
on a pillow of carnage
and gore, but because I knew
nothing else, I never
slept so well in my life.

I woke from that
and lived among those
who gentled me.  I learned
of something beyond
easy blooding,
and when I slept 
I stirred often in my sleep
now and again for fear of
the killing’s return.  

Now, after small sleep,
I am back among killers,
born again to the circle
of slaughter. I recognize 
the scent, the thick, sick
air; this time, though, I have
a taste of what it could mean
to know nothing of this, 
and I thank stars and moon
I will never be able
to sleep again.

Just to taunt my dread and doom
the cat did everything
she did this morning
the same way she always does.

She tore things up.
She knocked things over
and walked my chest
until I was awake

and got out of
my torture bed
with the same back pain
as yesterday,

my feet on fire
with the same nerve pain
as yesterday. In the bathroom
I learned

that somehow I’d lost
three pounds in the last week
and my glucose reading
was near normal,

two points lower
than yesterday.
Overall my body
seemed better than it did

a few months ago —
but no time to cheer as the cat
twined and threaded through my legs,
softly biting my ankles as always,

until her dish was full so
she could, as always, ignore it
more effectively. She jumped
from the floor to the window seat

to see what was outside:
birds, of course;
my neighbor Irving
banging around inside his car

before work;
gray skies, no rain,
last of last week’s snow
disappearing.

Just to taunt me, just to taunt me
and my haughty opinions and full-on
fear, the small things of the world
insisted on their importance: Coco

worked her diva magic, Irving
got on with what needed doing,
and my body reminded me
of its primacy

as it pulled back a little,
for now at least,
on its relentless march
to the End. So

I’m not going to say
we’re going to be
alright,
because we’re not.

I am going to say
that someday
it may happen that
it’s all going to be alright.

Thanks to age and illness
I can’t close either hand
upon a bottleneck,
a lighter, or a hilt.

Two open hands that tingle
with no grip. Two dead feet
that feel just like that; one hard knot
in my gut; still working to be

ungovernable
to my limited extent
I stumble forward,
hands out for balance.

If nothing else works at least
they’re always open; even if
my scant capacity shortens my reach,
stunts my ability to hold what comes to me,

to push off what attacks, to signal
to all around if there’s danger,
these hands and feet
were dealt to me, are what I must play with

in this game for as long as I can, so
I keep playing for stakes higher
than I can afford.  That’s all 
I’ve got —

no win assured and
none expected 
in what remains of 
this life.

Thanks, he said, for playing along
with a rigged game
for as long as you did
and pretending that it was fair 
from start to finish.

Thanks, he said, for being
a good sport, a tough competitor,
a worthy adversary.
Thanks, he said, for giving it
all you had. It was a good run.

Thanks, he said, for your rise 
to a challenge, your grace
in falling short. Thanks, he said,
for stepping aside when all
was said and done. 

Thanks, he said, for not
kicking up a fuss, for 
lying down and taking
a fall, for high roads and 
all that.

Thanks, he said, for being
so understanding, for not getting loud
or making a scene. Thanks,
he said, we got this and
don’t let the door hit you

in your loser ass on 
your way back to the back
of the back of the back. Dark
as it is back there I hope
you don’t fall and break your neck

or something. Hope
you stay upright. Hope
you hope and pray. Hope
you learn some manners
back there in the dark. Next time

you’d better say “you’re welcome”
when someone thanks you, when someone
lets you off this easy.  Next time someone
beats you like a drum, chum,
you’d better dance.

This story isn’t even remotely true;
this is myth on a skateboard
rolling through. It has streamers
and smells like fresh bread but
it’s as fake as a tail wriggling
in a predator’s mouth as the skink
escapes to grow another distraction.
But that taste…you want more, of course
and you’ll get more as long as you
keep your ear to the ground, your nose
to the grindstone, your shoulder
to the flat tire you are trying to make
round. Meanwhile all around you go 
the fast stories faking their paths
and drawing merry millions behind them
with tails in their mouths
while scaly little truths 
get away into the underbrush
and continue growing into
dragons.

It would have been better
to have been born now
rather than earlier.

There would already be rules
for growing into this.
This horror would be normal
and unhappy would be 
default and somehow 
there would be love and
silliness seeded among
thorns.

Daily news
would be a stream
of heartbreak
as it is today but kids
could shrug it off and 
slowly accept gray as
a perfectly acceptable
color for lawns and 
flowers. Someone

would make a game of
bullet casings and 
police tape. Any songs
would be written
around the wail of
a siren,

and children would sleep
at least now and then
immersed in dreams of joy
fit for their times, dreams

that would seem
wounded and dim
to us today.

Lightning over there
already.

Here, we’re still just
waiting for it. Sitting outside
watching the sky over 
the far hills blink red, listening to
the late rumble that follows. 

It’s got a few miles to go yet
before it gets here, 
if it does get here — 
might only get a few drops,
might get a deluge
and a firestorm.

A few years ago
a big one took down
all the power here on the hill
and tore a branch off
the maple out back 
that was the size of a tree
all by itself.

We stared at it
lying there the next day,
adjusting to how different
the backyard looked now
in changed, unfiltered light.
I try to remember
what it looked like before that
and fail. 

So:
lightning over there,
and here there’s nothing
yet. We sit and shiver
from experience
of how much can be erased
in no time at all.

We say
maybe it won’t be that bad.
We don’t say
maybe it will be worse,

even though the sky
is as red
as a torn heart.

Are you truly so surprised
to learn that my hand 
bursts into flame
a few times daily,
and that I have learned 
to shut out the pain
and move on?
You shouldn’t be.
This is old hat
to many
who are
torched so often, 
so casually.
We learn it early and well
or we die
young, curled up
in our own ashes.
Do not mistake
apparent ease
in handling it
as a form of
acceptance.
We still
hurt, we still
now and then
scream with the hurt,
still have problems
with grip and 
feeling — and for me
at any rate, woe
unto those who offer
to shake my hand
while still holding
a burnt match, for

I will accept.