into the open middle blue
                                 up through the
                                 high top.
                                 under the
                                          bent neck.
                                 upending bends
                                 still below-
                                          motherdie.

                                  cow killing grove
                                  of mini trees.
                                  so many
                                  butter-cups creep
                                  across the place it
                                           hadn’t grown.

Bobby Sue come home from the dance
with a torn dress–
the blue shiny one momma sewed her
by hand

Bobby Sue opened the door real quiet
and just stood there a minute
then looked up and seen me
and started walking toward the stairs
to go up to her room

“Momma, Bobby Sue is home”,
I yelled, and momma come in the room
Bobby Sue looked away from momma
Momma seen her torn dress
“What happened to your dress, Bobby Sue?”

Bobby Sue looked up at momma, and they
was tears in her eyes
Momma’s face turned plum red and she
slapped Bobby Sue right across the face
they was both quiet, then they fell into
each other’s arms, a cryin

My daddy come in, took one look, and said
“What happened?” Momma steps back,
and points to Bobby Sue’s dress
“Just look at your daughter’s dress.”
Daddy took the Lord’s Name in vain–
loudest i ever heered him do it

He left the room, still cussin,
and come back quick with 
his shotgun and a box of shells
Momma don’t say nothin
and Daddy leaves, slamming
that door behind him

Momma notices me standin 
in the living room and says,
“Get to bed. Right now.”
I don’t want to get smacked,
so I go on up to my room

Later on, I hear Bobby Sue
cryin in her room
I go and knock on her door,
but she don’t answer

Next mornin at breakfast,
I see Bobby Sue and Daddy ain’t there
“Sherman,” Momma says, “You will have
to tend the farm today.”

“Okay”, I says, and scoop up some more
eggs. “Everything okay, Momma?” 
and she says,
“You better eat all them eggs, boy.”

Redamancy
(for love)

We may never finish
this game of petals
from the daisies we discovered
together, so that even
in crazy weather,
our lives, tangled in troubles, forgot,
I hold to the possible forever bloom
of “she loves me” and never,
“she loves me not”

Inspired by an exploration of the word in The Cabinet of Calm (Soothing Words for a Troubled World) by Paul Anthony Jones

your ethic is unfathomable.

I can only imagine how you wake up in the morning- determined, but demolished.

rest, a stranger.

relaxation, an alien.

I w̶i̶s̶h̶ want you to live.

I want to live with you.

through experiences, at least.

I feel like I know you, but I only know of you.

I know of what the world [your mother] thinks about you.

I’d love to know what you think about you.

what you think about me.

do you think I’m selfish?

do you think I’m high maintenance?

do you see nothing but — me?

do you see what I see in me?

do you see what I see in you?

I see everything.

I can’t stop seeing.

Erasure from The Peckerwood, Volume 5 Number 5. June 11, 1938
Company 1559, CCC Camp F-9. Stanton, Kentucky.
https://www.kyhistory.com/digital/collection/RB/id/7744/rec/34

Study                                           sky.
The subject                                 sky.
The education–a
view. A different                       point
colored
by a prayer. 

evening distress
swelling restlessness
nights mounting pain
tension remains
how do I calm
where is a balm
to cover the sore
that I might once more
rest in Your peace
to have sweet release
tranquil in joy
thanksgiving once more

Who can blame the ear
opening, as it is, into its own sheer truth?
Mouths open. Last words flown up into the trees.
I can still hear the way those lines reverberated in the air,
that great vault we spoke of,
the way the unsayable rests at the back of the tongue,
primal cry of the human, raw and plain.  

I couldn’t name it, the sweet
thin buzz of hunger, constant hum,
the song inside the song
holding something that requires a great tenderness.
Isn’t that the language of the holy,
the delicate mechanism of the heart,
mysterious in its workings, its oiled
naked intimacy?
All day long it continues, each kindness
like a flower opening frame by frame.  

The world is such an unexpected feast.
Make a small altar to it,
a bed of memory
filled with that first, unspeakable light
into which the sparrows of sorrow tumble.      

* Cento using lines found in the poetry collections Only As the Day is Long by Dorianne Laux & Bonfire Opera by Danusha Laméris

You fall in love too easily Frances said to me,
The blue note of her parting song a blow—
There will never be another, she.

I landed high in Paris singing, my heart freed.
Not so stateside, such ways disheartening and low.
You fall in love too easily Frances said to me.

Yes there was a French girl, one Juliette Marie.
She loved me as a man and as a Michelangelo.
There will never be another, (she

always said to me Miles Davis stay in Paris,)
but the times we shared set me off to go.
You fall in love too easily (Frances said to me

why didn’t you stay?  To the vineyards to flee?)
It is alone, ma belle—forever I count time alone.
There will never be another, she.

Someday my queen will come, and we’ll agree;
Perhaps I cannot hope to be her beau.
You fall in love too easily Frances said to me.
There will never be another, she.

I’ve always been a fan of dragonflies,
I’ve always been happy to see them,
I feel safe when they’re around,
As if they are little guardians,
When they are around I can relax,
Always curious and friendly,
I welcome any dragonfly at anytime,
For dragonflies never fail to brighten my day