The taste is of Raspberry Sour Cream Pastries

Not looking where I'm going,
I step on a patch of frozen time
and slip,
falling into a memory,
hitting my head
hard
on the sidewalk in Kalamazoo,
which must look like I remember
as memory cannot allow
for change.
I stand
and enter a world,
foreign to this version of myself
and wonder,
as always,
how has time
done this.

It Must be the Shoes

She stands,
beauty in purple shoes,
floating on her island of green,
unaware of the light
slanting in from outside her world,
cascading over her face,
casting sharp shadows,
parsing her world into boxes,
one of which
tries to hold her smile
but fails.





In response to We Write Poems

The Expected Fog

Clear skies
befuddle my brain
as it expected to see fog,
wet and gray,
where morning sun
burns through
just enough
to create watercolor filters,
toning down the harsh edges,
bleeding one color into the next,
creating a leniency of shape,
shapelessness,
calmness.
Rather than struggle
with harsh light
on brilliant blue skies
I invite the fog inside
where it is welcomed.
Home.

First Dirt

I imagine

the first dirt

you play in as a child

enters your bloodstream

through your fingers

and toes,

creating a bond

that cannot be erased,

though it can be changed

as layers of sediment

build

through travels,

compacting

this first dirt

into a layer of bedrock

on which

you stand.

The trouble is, you run into people

Architectural flourishes
seem to bloom in the spring
as heliotropic humans
raise their eyes to the Sun
and notice
what has been there for generations.
Ornate corbels
supporting cornices atop buildings
where cantilevered windows
open like petals
under the Spring sun.
Pilastered walls
supporting porticos
to nowhere
and
names at the top
chiseled in relief
evoke memories
of a time
impossible
to remember.

Over Apathy Falls in a Barrel

Disguised as rain,
apathy keeps falling from the sky,
striking the leaves
on the tree of good hope,
making them tremble
before hitting the earth
and dampening the ground
with
wasted oppurtunity.

Sandlot

"Baseball stories resemble wartime tales.
Some are told as they actually happened.
Others are told as we think they did.
Regardless of the specifics, all of them are true."
-- Dan Ewald

It used to be
that 7 year-olds
could slip out of the house,
just after dawn
leaving behind tells
(milk spilled on the table)
(dirty bowl in the sink)
for still sleeping parents,
who would know
(baseball bat missing)
    (glove too)
that their son
was doing nothing
other than spending
a glorious summer day
as it was meant to be spent --
shirtless
under the sun
on a makeshift ball field
with all of the time
in the world.