No Paranthesis

Brighton, Top o' Millicent Lift, February 2008.  We got dirty looks from lifties for this picture.

since feeling is first

who pays any attention to the syntax of things

while Spring is in the world

my blood approves,

and kisses are a far better fate

than wisdom

lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry

--the best gesture of my brain is less than 

your eyelids' flutter which says

we are for eachother: then

laugh, leaning back in my arms

for life's not a paragraph

And death i think is no parenthesis

--e e cummings

Go Jiggy

A tulip's fresh opened petals;
A crumpled kleenex, still damp;
A card with sincerely expressed emotions;
A million pictures of her;
These are the sights.

The sniffling of your mother;
The barking of dogs at every additional doorbell ring;
The ringing-ringing-ringing of the telephone;
The singing of her broken-hearted friends;
These are the sounds.

A lifetime's worth of flowers;
A loaf of freshly baked bread;
A meaty chili on the floor;
A spritz of her Juicy perfume;
These are the smells.

The hug of your too skinny mother;
The feathery petals of flowers;
The curly matted hair of a dog
The cold feeling of metal from her necklaces;
These are the touches.

These are the sensations of grief.
But I'm glad for them.
I'm glad for the splashes of color,
In an otherwise expanse of gray.


Dedicated to Jocie Garlick.

goodbyes

a plane takes off
a car drives away,
and we save our goodbyes
for another day.

the letter unsent
the call unmade
we'll never forget
the games we've played.

and now i'm gone
and wish i could say,
but indifference causes
the words to slip away.

the upperclassman

he sits and stares at the new group of freshman,
each as fresh as they were the year before.
their hair as perfect as they are thin,
and he wonders why they aren't noticing him more;
he has the same generals and entrance level classes,
though this past year he's blemished again with glasses.

he goes through his usual routine,
asking out the youngest, prettiest girls;
he wonder's what they mean,
when they tell him he 'hurls.'
the slang is lost on his aging ears,
a thing he doesn't realize he fears.

for though the girls are as new as a daisy,
and he sits in the beginning classes as ever;
his skin is sagging and he's gotten lazy,
and the slightest chill can cause a fever.
for he's grown old without choosing from his dolls,
and now he's the sad old man, prowling campus halls.

--dedicated