Not grabbing

but reaching

Not pushing

but pulling

Not telling

but listening

Not beginning

or done

Not mad

but then joyful

Not sad

but then hopeful

Not before

or then after

In this present

—begun

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2015)

I’ve walked at a peculiar

angle

As I’ve laughed at peculiar

circumstances

I’ve aged in the most peculiar

of vacuums

And went on to love in the most

normal of ways

I’ve worked in a spirit

of defiance 

As I’ve traveled the many miles

from compliance

I’ve lived within the confines

of the moment

And written those things I

could never speak

I’ve seen the footsteps of

giants

Made by the intrepid feet of the

smallest of men

As the mirrors of my past have risen

in blind reflection

I’ve come face to face with

the only adversary I will ever fear

I’ve asked the age old questions

knowing there are no answers

I’ve taught the unschooled a language

they will teach again

I have vowed to seek recovery

for what the iconoclasts have broken

Until truth reclaims from power

—what was heaven sent

(Philadelphia Airport: August 1st, 2015)

Each word cutting through

ten pounds of flesh….

The Muse

—killing me with her love

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2015)

Poetry’s sacred

prose not so much

One to be read

the other to touch

The verse spoken freely

in a nighttime array

Phrases more conjured

to outlive the day

The medicinal magic

that hides in each line

Lifts my body to flight

in a nocturnal climb

The prose gets pounded

and pounded again

And its linear sense

I find hard to befriend

As twilight appears

from the corner of my eye

The couplets on fire

I look to the sky

With my very last breath

not taken in vain

It’s with meter and rhyme

—I call to heaven again

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2015)

If I could be of simple mind

and simple faith

And hold your love within my heart

for just an hour

On bended knees my arms would raise

toward heaven’s gate

Like petals reaching out

—from a morning flower

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2015)

When the spirit listens

 —the heart forgives

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2018)

You can take away health,

   you can take away riches,

   you can take my ability to see

But it will only cause me to feel

you more

   —as I cry from bended knee

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2015)

I’ve always been good at making an entrance

   never choosing to stay

I’ve always been good at passing through

most often forgetting the day

I bypassed adulthood, becoming a child

as your legions mocked and jeered

And answered those voices calling out of the wild

—embracing everything you fear

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2015)

Poor in stock but rich in spirit,

my clock does bow and sway

In rags and tatters all unstitched,

with joy do I still pray

My flesh is weak, my home now burnt

just embers to remind

That within this trouble and burning ash,

on the hour

   —my heart still chimes

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2015)

I was twenty,

and you were nineteen

that day along the mall

When I heard a guitar

from deep inside

that round auditorium hall

Up on stage with legends

Son House, Muddy,

Johnny Winter too

A red haired, freckle faced,

blue eyed girl

commenced to sing the blues

You started with an apology

saying you were outclassed

and over matched

But once that voice

left your heart and flew

….in nothing did you lack

I followed you out

that afternoon

in the late State College Fall

And after fifty years of looking back

every moment

I recall

I walked you to the bus

as you said:

“We’re in Harrisburg tonight

“Why don’t you come,

it might be fun

from there I catch a flight”

The bus was full,

my eyes looked south

as I hitchhiked down #322

Fate unexplained

life forever changed

—that special gift from you

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2018)