How do you play a melody

deep inside the words

to sing each letter off the page

and free them like a bird

 

How do you write the lyrics

to a mute and silent song

that lives inside the spaces

where true music’s never gone

 

How do you play a rhapsody

of couplets in your mind

releasing subject-verbs to be

forever to unwind

 

How do you pen a chorus heard

with what the verse has shown

and give each note a deaf refrain

—within a single poem

 

(The New Room: May, 2022)

 

When death sent out its calling card

the heavens came in view

Psalms to reach the Angel’s ears

one voice had broken through

Grace within her every word

each feeling soul infused

Patsy singing from above

—to bless the chosen few

 

(Remembering Patsy Cline: May, 2022)

Rest assured in the knowledge you are

—without having to know why

 

(Dreansleep: May, 2022)

Loneliness visits

when stranded alone

Confirming the emptiness

—lost to bemoan

 

The darker the moment

the thicker it spreads

To lie and to cover

—my spirit in dread

 

It blocks every motion

I make to get out

Its shroud to enshadow

—within and without

 

As somber it tenants

it knows all the while

Its life but a memory

—the moment you smile

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2022)

 

Ten siblings

though an only child

Divorced fraternal

 bastardis wild

 

Ten reminders

of what I’m not

Isolated

 dropped not caught

 

Ten siblings

that share my name

Whose backs have turned

with eyes that blame

 

Regret incessant

to live outside

This name a prison

—wherein I hide

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2022)

 

 

I knew it long before the end

my affairs to order fast

The days once promised now recalled

my future is my past

 

Each day times ten the countdown on

as memory wanders back

Tomorrow once was like the stars

 that time would not attack

 

Into this funk I drift away

each phrase might be my last

The river calling out to me

the falls my soul’s repast

 

With T’s all crossed and dotted I’s

I hear the trumpet blow

and carried on a distant wind

—into the fates I go

 

(The New Room: May, 2022)

 

Reaching for the universe

 fate extends a hand

Shortcut to Andromeda

  route at its command

 

The speed of light exceeded

all flashes turn inside

To burn and bend eternal

where life no longer dies

 

Each star laid out before me

 whose orbits spin and weave

Their presence all revealing

what black holes can’t retrieve

 

Inside there are no limits

or borders to constrain

The words forever calling

in voices—time reclaimed

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2022)

Boiling away the edges

letting the core expand

Limitations drifting free

clarity at hand

 

Horizon coming at me

sky and earth as one

Sunsets in my memory

answers on the run

 

A token for the master

a pittance bye and bye

Value placed in what is not

scientists decry

 

My width and breadth immortal

the universe set free

To roam forever in my heart

—your eyes too blind to see

 

(Saint David’s Pennsylvania: May, 2022)

Heaviest is the heart

—that wears the frown

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2022)

Leaky Poets

dripping Prose

Words secreted

left unchose

 

Wanton memories

twisted lies

Moment’s bartered

naked I’s

 

Love on steroids

feelings burn

Swelling heartache

pages turn

 

New tomorrow

old reprise

Armageddon

death’s surprise

 

One more time

into the breach

Last wave ceding

from the beach

 

Leaky Poets

undisclosed

One word answer

—no one knows

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2022)