Cold tile roof

The cat was absent at breakfast,
a first,
and
unappetizing feeling found me.

I sought, and called softly
in the pale predawn air
which carries things
a bit too far.

I heard his pleas
directed at me, but could not see
him,
anywhere-

Curiously
his green flashing pupils
caught my eye
in the mortuary moonlight
looking down
from the rooftop
yelling, cat calling down
at bewildering me.

After I rescued him,
again,
climbed the ladder
convincing him
his life was secure in my hands

we humans,
wondered how
or what
lifted his seventeen-
maybe twenty-pound body
up
and exposed all
forty-degree night...

Perhaps it's all a metaphor,
like when survival
is not a skill
but we do it anyway.

And it dawns on me,
that in reality,
rescues often
go the other way.


Painting by Camille Pissaro, 'Red roofs, corner of a village, winter time' c. 1877 in Public Domain. 

One a.m.

Under an unforgiving winter
full moon
light,
bonded
I become
by these rules,

heavier than gravity
or speculation.

Disheveled sheets show
lasting impressions
in icy blue hues.

The sky reflects
jagged pieces
like a shattered mirror,

Fragmented
by this time
life traces the artwork,

Homer hovers above
A tired lady remakes her bed,
tucking in the corners
mitered under the mattress
as taught-

as if poetic justice
could be concealed by folds
or heat could be
contained.

Art is often a window
to what we are about to be-
come.

Cliches cling to us.

See,
beauty was always drawn to you
in long strokes thick in color
and time-
You would not look-
until Now.

It would always be shown
how moonlight erases any line
untrue
to round forms,
like heavenly bodies

tumbling through
mortal moments
both heavy and light
in alternate perspectives.


Painting by Winslow Homer, 'Moonlight' c. 1874 in Public Domain. 

Combustible

Blinded and spotted
with double vision
of two
dancing around
the ring, the pit, the issues,
the pyre and flames,
the names
we use
in Love...

The elements
were all presiding
outdoors.
The smoke moves us
around
the light flickers
and pops as it catches
on...

This orange glow,
we know
the truth is
coming together
these cold nights
bonfires seeking
vanity
are explosive,
knotted and ingrained.

We agree
wholeheartedly,
we are only we,
individually.


Painting by Paul Gaugin, 'Upa, Upa (the fire dance)' c. 1891 in Public Domain. 

The shortest love story ever written

Sometimes I picture
Us,
sitting down,
                       shoulder to shoulder
and looking down
at an open book-
reading the same lines
but not understanding
each others words
So I will point
                        to a picture
Instead,
you smile
while I cry.


Painting by Pierre Auguste Renoir (1841-1919), 'Couple reading' c. before 1919 in Public Domain. 

Forgot to tell me

We get just One
-Go
at It,
Oh, and you get less than
10
decades
to try to get better-
Why
tell you Now
 to mince words
or splice genes-
I mean,
This is Us,
the One and only
One must focus
on the Prize-
it is wise to use it
All
Now,
I suggest
you rest on those laurels
Later,
when there is Time
that does not matter
or count
Anymore or Less.
I guess
I needed
to read
This
before it slipped my
Mind
for good.




Painting by Karl Bryullov (1755-1852), 'Sventlana at fortune-telling', c. 1836 located in the Nizhny Novrogod State Art Museum in the Public Domain.

Succinctly

I apologize

for taking so long-in words

To find the missing

Artist: Salvator Rosa (1615-1673) 'Diogenes searching for an honest man'-), c. 17th century in Public Domain.

crisis

Crisis:

(“a decisive point in the progress of a disease, 

that change which indicates recovery or death” Latin

also from krei-root (to seive), krinein, to separate to 

distinguish to discriminate-Greek)

jolted me awake, outside myself

only to find myself-upright-

reflecting inside squinting

the first S of this ultimate

silence in a feminine sunrise,

and savoring the final T

of the next fiery sunset,

                       this too shall pass, 

green flash-

I spin, and reel and feel

too thin, out of alignment,

this mis-a-line-meant

Crisis 

            was coming,
bones were showing

and there was much to do

about what cannot be undone

in one revolution
nor by
            coming back
to room temperature.

Painting by Ross Turner (1847-1915), "Sunset, Cape Ann, Mass.' c. 1861-1897) in Public Domain.