Drive

Drive

The lanes provide the illusion
        of choice while—really—the route

has already been decided.
        It’s more dangerous than flying

but less sensational—no clouds
        outside your window, no attendants

bearing soda crackers and wine.
        You will never feel the asphalt that

bears the weight of you onward—
        unless you pull over and do push-ups

on the shoulder. Rain is dangerous
        but revelatory: at night you seem to

be an icebreaker on a sea of lights.
        Arrival is never guaranteed but—

once it happens—feels inevitable.
        The other cars you pass along the way

have their stories, too, but you won’t
        hear them unless you tune in just right.

Of Juniper and Roses

Of Juniper and Roses

Roses shouted about sense and
sensuality, symbols and duality,
how time passes in this reality.

Juniper just sat and whispered
in the breeze of how to be green
even when no one’s looking.

I Too Am a Plane

I Too Am a Plane

This morning I too am a plane,
flying high in a sky blue for me
as much as the next mind’s eye.

I move through an air amenable
to the formation of sensible—if also
ungraspable—shapes and directions.

I leave no trail but the unveiling of
my word-cirrus—not as strident as a
sky writer but having the urge to say.

A ship on a sea seems less apt to me,
as when the wind rearranges all
signs and indications into a new

afternoon of meaning, memory will
yet find its way to condense and fall
to ground as—somewhere—significance.

The Ball

The Ball

The ball waits—
where it’s thrown—
for the memory of
two hands
and the readiness of
two feet.