I was a ghost

Running nearly through a world standing still

I wove a path             from tailgate to hood                and car to car
                                     through the traffic crowding the crosswalk
In your passenger window
                           I caught my reflection beside you           I was a ghost
broadcast across the distance                   of the traffic light in your eyes

frozen in the blink between stop and go

as the sun fights for life

These two weeks are made-to-order sunshine
                              mislabeled and rerouted from Arizona to the NW

Even in light of the rain last night
                                                      this afternoon gouges itself on blue
                the clouds tauntingly distant
                                   the sun mockingly optimistic

two weeks to remember what summer means
                                                       as the sun fights for life
two weeks to pretend itself into spring
                                       before the veil descends once more
How can I enjoy the moment when its fleeting?
How can I honor the season                        when it is only a ghost?
           I become a mockery between darkness and storms off the Sound
                                         dusting off sunglasses emerged from hiding
                                         letting t-shirts revel in the sweater-free air

                       looking over my shoulder at the mountains

                                                                what secrets are you hiding?
  what monstrosity lurks beyond your peaks
           waiting for the dead of night to steal into the city
                          and pound against rooftops with waterlogged fists?

Li-Young at the shrine of words

I saw Li-Young Lee last night
whose words title this page
    I traveled to the Seattle Center
    to pay homage to an inspiration
         When I met him four years ago he was
          just as lofty and etherially minded as his work
                       Even last night he was ever the poet
                       at once parrotting Buber in his poems
                       even his interview staged for the audience benefit
                       was also only I and Thou...
                       while hoarse and complaining that
                       he'd eaten peanuts                 he never eats peanuts
                                                                 he's allergic to peanuts
                       and they were good
I see my own struggle
the way I drift in and out of my poetic mind
way-laid by       TV       Radio        Music        e-mail and other genres
Li-Young is enlightened
                      or stuck
                                     existing solely within his poetic perspective
Is the perfect artist the perfect human?
Can the perfect human even perceive art?
Who am I?

When the weather is the day unwound

Meaning to be energy
I wait watching the gray sky diffuse
un-fused struggling to light the day
the bushes still concealed in leaves
are all brandishing Beckett
in the wind tauntingly rainless
Given into this aging armchair
the Panderbox caterwauling to the windows
I may as well be a seagull
buffeted by the air-currents
churning into an Escher staircase

The mindset of clouds is sky

blue

and vast to be conquered

the clouds will precipitate their armies

when the lake storms

and I’ll embed myself in the conflict

while rain pelts suicidal into puddles


I walk rain-cloaked through a world gone gray

scribbling my own personal Williams

to impending clouds