A Light Thought In a Dark Day

I’d like a light thought in a dark day

The sort that you can linger in,

A thought to dip your toes within

A point to put your finger on,

A glinting dream, a glad migration

A merry moment of the mind,

A pier without an edge

A cliff without the climb;

A thought to pick out of my pocket

And throw out on the path

The sort that breeds where e’er it grows

I’d like to pick up one of those

Pierre

A Swede by stately heritage

Tho Frenchman by the makers’ hands

Was more than sold for less a grand

He’s like an orphaned dog, a sage

She cleans Pierre with careful care;

He was waxed with pine tree sap

And where once he had a tick to tap

No longer rattles like a snare

His accoutrements are cold and chrome

His contortion bears a stolid air

He breathes out the city’s sullied air

And tucks away beside our home

He roams wherever we roam

And when he tarries at a halt

She isn’t addled by his faults

But learns the way he’s knit and sewn

A progressive work is his stave

We will learn him till we know him

And even if his chance is slim

Everyone wants to be saved

"To An Impetuous Snowflake" (On Her Birthday) by Nina Ricci

I. Dedication

Ten years

Adjacent storybooks forced to a far end,

Seven shelved reference books

spread to meet the first ten

And the latest past, a chapter book

a required text, a must-needs read

was volume 17 of your anthology



II. Bookends, dividers
Years are markers to sort and order time

There are no portals entitled to enter

-no swing-hinge doorways:

we are door-makers

We walk long halls,

not that they are long,

We just get stuck, or stay lost, or slay time

Long, because our indirect steps and

latent footfall, we are

Lackadaisical.



III. Memories

Clips of confetti fluttering

catch our eye, a pence of what was-

They are dramas re-mastered

sequences quantized,

the shorts we store-

Those that inform on ourselves-

Impressions kept



IV. Reveries

Films we spasmodically score

set to the music we dream by

Reticent elaborations-

Thought-spun illusions;

Be careful of them.



V. Commencement
On the first chapter of your 18th book,

Do not scribble on the page.

Take notes, stick post-its.

Have confidence and confide in

The Caretaker,

Most dreams are pipe schemes

Ask for a bearing and row


Don’t let sincerity be a dullness

You won’t knock off your shine for

Smile at violets,

To an impetuous snowflake

On her birthday

Whispers From The Engineer

It was a train ride and I held the brakes                     

I turned the nozzle, I scoped the lines                                   

I turned the curves and pounded time                                   

As we shuttled past the railroad stakes                     

The engine ground, the piston pined

And whined within its steely gates

I counted stocky wind-turbines

Flailing at us from a ways away

I shut an eye, the other fluttered

Signs were bland and very vague

Little ladies talked and tittered

Men read pamphlets children played

Droning, droning ever forward

In the milky, sleepy dull

The coals cried dry and wispy whimpers

In the cistern’s muggy lull

I watched a light show from my window

It was the train light’s flashing X’s

I was dazzled then my vexes

Faded black and faded slow

I went where most people go

I didn’t know anything anymore

But they did, all the rest on board

They saw us heading past the shore

We danced on tight ropes not ballast

I knew nothing of our waltz

I tell you it was not my fault!

I was not conscious of our stance

I felt a rush that woke me up

A siren squealed and jarred me

My heart burned hot, my blood caught fire

I cast the light upon the water

  

I could see the end I could hear them wail

They clutched their children by them

They prayed to God to save their lives,

I prayed to God He’d hear them

The water caught us, cold and fast

We stayed afloat on perilous pillows

We were blindfolded under steaming billows

And sunk into the watery pasture

Pleas and calls drowned out forever

They departed to eternal stations

Save me, I was carried on the waters

By a Hand with expectations

Where the locomotive sank

I now return to squat

Bowing towards the wreckage,

Stooping on the dock

Whispering rueful sentiments

Mixing my tears with the ocean’s salt

They’ll not hear but I wish to tell them “Sorry”

For, in truth, it was my fault