(For Joe and Kate’s 50th anniversary 
in Kaw Point Park at the junction
of the Kansas & Missouri Rivers)

Turn around and see
the swift merge of water
and the skyline of buried tribes

Read the river’s liquid skin
the slice of current’s knife
the depth of double flow

Mark the end of meander
the written word of floating leaf
of dancing twig

¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤

Turn back again and see
the shore of asphalt shaded by mulberry 
where old men take their slow gin

Watch the jigsaw of our merriment
at the long intertwine of our kin
This is the place saved by them

and this is the place that saved them
where the sudden air is light
and birds do a ballet on the sidewalk

Shhhh. 
Tiptoe.
Don’t interrupt their
Slumber.
Send them to sleep with
Dance Battle Lullabies
Infused with 
TikTok Politics. 
Two Minutes of Hate
Reduced to 34 seconds.

“Read!  Write!”

Why should they? 

“To Think! To Express! To Create!”

No Need.  We will tell them wnen to wake up. 

drip, drop, trickle
mist
raindrops
puddles
mud
water everywhere
on the leaves
on the ground
over the rocks
on the path
slooshing
down the mountain
into a pool
my hair wants to curl and frizz
my skin yearns for moisture
all from watching a video.

We sit side by side on the sofa,
the home health nurse, nine months pregnant,

and me with my swollen bandaged knee.
She tells me to press my bare foot

against her shoulder
just above her bulging belly.

Tentative, uncertain,  I follow her lead.
Push she says.  Slowly I extend my leg

against her body, warm and yielding.
Is this okay I ask myself?

Back and forth, a sort of tai chi–
moving in sync toward healing.

Let’s imagine they are benevolent.
Let’s imagine they are looking for something true.
Let’s imagine they almost find it here.

Perhaps the smoke will still be drifting, walls of it charging
untethered across the charred landscapes, the only remaining
witnesses, our own unblinking dead. Perhaps by then the fish
will all be belly up, hot acid ocean still moving with the moon
like a holy ghost against the silent beaches.

When those travelers arrive to inspect the rubble,
may they find our music, evidence

of the souls we carried. May they find our stories
and know we sought to understand each other.

May they find our paintings, photographs, our sculpture and poetry,
artifacts of our longing, our seeking, our endless hope. Proof that we tried

to love this place, however clumsy, however fear-driven and hate-stained, still

may the art ache with its fierce love, its faint pulse still echoing.
May this love be our final song. And when

those beings from beyond see, perhaps they will weep. They will rage
and fall down awestruck. They will see it all so clearly.

Then whatever organ equates to a heart
will stir, and so rise, cradling our ashes
in what might be thought of as hands, our ashes
that might be thought of as us, held in tenderness,
in what might be called redemption.

Is there something exciting
about sweeping away
bits of leaves and grass
and little toy strays?  

Do you feel
a sense of accomplishment
in the chaos
of two older siblings?  

Your hands grip tight
like nothing else matters
pushing bristles past
table legs and a-dult sneakers.  

Was there ever a thing
that brought me such joy
at two and a half years
feisty and growing?  

Now?
Is it possible to hold on with gusto
to feel such delight
in something so simple?

The scales will not balance,

neither logic nor evidence shall 

heal their sight, those who have made

holy robes of the emperor’s 

invisible clothes.

Believers spend their gold on a

branded bible, patriotic documents its 

companion texts, a deluxe 

fuck you to the separation of 

church and state, a badge of

awareness highlighting the perceived

persecution of their faith, their 

coins counted in the temple by the

snake oil merchant to defend his honor from the

relentless witch hunt by the deep left state.

Discernment is abandoned like 

dangerous secrets left carelessly in a 

golden water closet. 

spread like a broken arrow across my bed,

flat, low, legless, window ajar to grey heat of night-shroud summer, i remember that

there was a child once upon the top bunk could touch the ceiling without fear

had legs like wheeling mills, spilled baby fat-shaped across cousin-shared sheets.

this kid passes over like a ghost,

resonant in the pillar of silence before cricket harps.

List any substances the dreamer consumes on which you rely. 

In any given week, how often do you take advantage of the dreamer’s exhaustion? 

How are you coping with her interrupted sleep?

Estimate how many dead birds have you sown in the field in the last three months. 

Estimate how many car crashes (real or dreamed) you’ve instigated in the last three months.

Describe your most effective method for leaving the dreamer feeling abandoned upon waking.

On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being least effective and 10 being most, rank yourself in terms of prolonged daytime reverberation.

Which gives you the most trouble: altering settings, drowning, blurred vision, or overlapping faces?

Of which link have you made between the dreamer’s past, present, and future heartaches are you most proud?

In addition to wider access to waking hours, is there anything else you need from us?

(after “Diagnostic Quiz for Human Ghost” by James Fujinami Moore)

All I’ve ever wanted was everything
you can fit in a green electrical box
Maybe we could make the whole place run
Maybe we could risk the shock
If you’ll cry in front of me,
I’ll sit on hot steel with you.

All we ever wanted was a chance to be seen on blow up screens
evading paparazzi with grins on our faces
Instead, stomachs feeling molten pink with cotton candy
Sugar lasts a moment but the aftertaste, long and dank
Going back home and screaming in the middle of the night alone
But even the walls barely shift, maybe they sigh
They’ve heard every word before.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

I am stepping past the subway threshold
onto a car of ghosts in mustard-colored suits
when your name rises up from the steam
bears no message, only erupts through my throat,
a thick embalming fog.

I miss warmth. There is no warmth here
only heat and its absence
I don’t know what your hair looks like now
or what singer you decided to fawn over this time
and you don’t know where I am, and I don’t know where you are—

—Train grumbles to a stop
I rarely get knocked off balance anymore,
but a little girl in big sunglasses, a poofy purple coat
nearly knocks me over running through the car
Takes the glasses off, looks straight through me,
Asks: 

“Did you ever dream you were famous?”