Poems from July

In my more truthful moments, I have to admit
I am savoring this summer as a chance to do nothing.
I am holding myself at a bare simmer
letting my flavors blend
the one absolute I gained in college was a belief in living slowly
Besides,
Here everything is glowing with summer's kiss
and that is not to be missed.
I find myself often in a contemplative mood
Seeking spaces beneath trees, airy solitude
I find myself staring at everything
as if my eyes are just starting to focus
I find myself enamored of the present
and pondering the past
I keep telling the future,
"We'll do lunch next week..."
Right now I am all booked up with the now
She is so beautiful and I am in love with her
I can't tear myself away from her for another blind date
that is likely to be a disappointment.



The man one bench over
with shimmering white hair
one arm gracefully resting on the back of the bench
one leg crossed over the other
looks like Elie Wiesel
looks like everything good about New York
contained in a body
and sitting next to me here
making my city poised and refined
by the simple fact
of his presence



the absurdity of trees.
no. absurd
is the wrong word
tenacity?
virility?
it is only that
trees exist
and have, and will
trees are the thing we want God to be.



blue gleaming gold
against smooth-polished orange
the last of the sunlight
blowing on our skin and through our hair
the click and clack of stones
beneath our sandaled feet
and our fervor,
quasi-delirious
picking up stones and hurling them
across and against the insistent waves
I pick up a lenth of driftwood
I trace in the sand
a flower, a face,
thinking of the monks who do the same
and then watch it being washed away by the tide
the intransitory. life.
the day that ends
but begins.



well.
the summer has ceased to be summer,
suddenly.
with the insistent rain
comes a chilled and clammy reminder
that this summer will end
and what then?

the future looms,
it looms
dark and cloudy and huge
all that makes up my life now will end
and what then?

I have unclasped the last
pretty bauble from my collection
the last sweet kiss of desire
I stand alone
and disoriented.

I stand.
very still.