On white stands: azure/turquoise branches, flow and knuckle taken by poured bronze— bent, welded, gripped, held, colored— artifacts, works in progress, ship's ribs, basketry, child's play. Hands dream as they fashion, remember what they feel (her thin shoulder, a 9/16 inch wrench). Let go. Follow the sculptor's trade. Find and shape what is not known until it's made.
For John von Bergen
Elegy For Simenon
Fresh air, faintly salty, smell of bark and fallen apples, small pond, lily pads, dark water. White blossoms tinged with ruby, floating, heavy with light. You enter one, still searching. Slowly, petals fold around you.
Deer Isle, Maine
Unfinished
Your hands for clothes. Your legs, home. We
For w.cat
Married twice, once in a church, once in City Hall, each good in its way. Now I choose the shade of a live oak tree, veils of Spanish moss, a hundred cicadas singing in the branches. You are in the north, but still we join beneath this green and raucous dome Mated. Complete. Mindful of those alone.
New Smyrna Beach,
Florida