Writing
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Daedalus Rebukes Apollo
He shapes a second set of wings for the boy
in the cool hours before dawn, working
by the light of a softening candle. His fingers
raise ridges of feathers along the harness,
reform in stone what the sun melted.
Sun-struck Icarus spirals toward Apollo.
Categories: Poetry, Uncategorized Poems
Name Thief
I have this memory: locked out
of our apartment, you wrapped me in your arms
and sang my name like a charm against shadows
while we waited for someone to arrive with a key,
Categories: Poetry, Uncategorized Poems
Nike at Ephessus
Nike, what is this? You slump against
a boulder, stretch your arms up to finger the pockets
of passersby and proposition tourists.
Categories: Poetry, Uncategorized Poems
Spreading the Ashes
A phone call:
she admits the ashes remain unspread. She couldn’t
feed him to the world’s largest alligator or toss him
out to sea like fish guts from the pier.
Categories: Poetry, Uncategorized Poems
Invitation on K’s Windshield
I have never told anyone how my mind wandered,
considered the light angles from nearby park lamps
and the odds of being caught in the open.
There were six blades of grass around my big toe,
three wrapped around the little.
Categories: Poetry, Uncategorized Poems
The Garden of Fugitives, Pompeii
Now give them names. The boy crouching
on a barrel, face locked behind his fingers,
could be your son. The woman curled
around her stomach, making a hollow
between her knees and breasts, carries
your brother’s child in her belly.
Categories: Poetry, Uncategorized Poems
I’ll decorate the whole house with particleboard if I have to
We talked about you, Catullus, while we counted out the screws
and nails and decided to read the directions in Spanish.
We sorted parts, identified left and right panels, threw the box
across the room and left it there.
Categories: Poetry, Uncategorized Poems
I did not think I’d hear from you
Since you ask, I sold the spaghetti maker
last fall, at a friend’s garage sale.
A college student bought it, my friend’s orange couch,
and a block of wood we had been using
as a makeshift table.
Categories: Poetry, Uncategorized Poems
Nearing Winter Solstice, Anchorage
We hallucinate in the dark, unclench
our fingers to reach for wax wings,
knowing there is no sun to melt them,
nothing to stop our swift flight south.
There is no god driving a flaming chariot
across the sky, opening night’s curtains.
No suns may rise: only setting suns,
ever setting, perpetually setting suns.
Categories: Poetry, Variations on Catullus
Signposts
Three streets ago if I had said turn left
we would have been there by now.
I think this is my fault and I think
you must have seen the signpost, too.
Categories: Poetry, Uncategorized Poems