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Category: Poetry

Poems, thoughts about poetry and links to places that have published my poems

Miles (Never Once Imagined)

April 12, 2006 • • 7 Comments

Leftovers from a road trip in the early ’90s…

Cars near Meteor Crater

Miles (Never Once Imagined)

And we drove for miles—
And we saw those miles—
Drifting out toward space
Layers of desert air so far beyond the mountains
I saw the miles quicken,
Rising up like a beast from the steam of the engine
Outside Albuquerque
Again near Palm Springs
Jeep racing without roof, without doors
Away from Vegas with just eighteen dollars
from one-armed bandits
Leftover pizza hut and half a cup of jingling quarters
There were miles more to go
And others to go them with
So we only stayed in LA for three hours
In the desert that night we both finally saw
The miles to the stars
Humbled to behold and freezing
In the imagined terror of a Mojave midnight
I never could have imagined all the miles still to come
Nor the people with whom I would travel them
Just then
Just there
Everything was right
We had mountains to climb and never once imagined
We would change our minds

Driving to Denver on a Foggy Morning in 1994

February 23, 2006 • • 1 Comment

Hypnotized by wheels rumbling all through the night

Outside my car, North Texas, transformed, a foggy ocean—
deep, impenetrable, broken by ghosts of signs that manifest mysterious—
and vanish

Punk rock radio, blaring sonic wind, pushes outward—
a star core against the pressure of the fog—
infinite silence

Worlds unseen beyond the mist lead into other destinies: farm and field,
town and school; fast food off ramp and neon light—
Wichita Falls

I accelerate, but I am not moving

©2003

Dream Ships

October 22, 2005 • • Leave a comment

(an old poem…)

The broken ships lay torn under black cliffs
Nailed to shore by Sea’s relentless hammer
Dead Gull silhouette floats in glowing phosphor
Blown about by Gale’s unending power

Water shudders under Sky’s turbulent embrace
Gray battles Grey at Horizon’s obscured line
No life on the Shore of Ghosts, no life here
Except me, the phantom-dreaming me

I stand alone and watch this scene buried in dark night
My breath the only life among the wrecks
Trembling under waves, my feet give way
The deck shakes, rocks—I try to look around

Feet carry me across upended planks
A funeral shroud of sailcloth clings to Mast’s broken arm
No recent death appears in this ancient scene
Everything here has always existed before me

I ask, “Why bring me here? Does this pertain to me?”
From Childhood’s nighttime terrors to Adulthood’s fever dreams
I’ve walked these planks all my life, a thousand times,
Asking only, “Where am I? What does this mean?”