Stillborn

Raw

Intelligence…

Like dry

Cement

Sitting unmixed

Never used

To make

Anything

Real

 

Raw

Intelligence…

A flashing

Neon light

To its own

Potential

Bulbs

Burning out

One at a time

 

Raw

Intelligence…

Its shadows

Forever littered

Along a

Lost and

Forgotten

Past tense

Alleyway

 

Raw

Intelligence…

Like shards of

Glass

In the maelstrom

Reflecting a story

Of what

Might

Have been

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: June, 2016)

 

That Final Breath

What describes a Poet,

 let me count the ways

 

To once describe a morning,

 emerging through the haze

 

What describes a season,

 its leaves from green to brown

 

What describes a heartbeat,

 when your lover can’t be found

 

What describes a reason,

 with excuses cast away

 

What describes a child’s laugh,

 joyous on display

 

What describes a place called home,

 to a soldier sent to war

 

And what describes that final breath

 —to an old man wanting more

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2019)