Pleiades

Reward of constellation,
Rising sun--
Rainy ones, sisters--
Resist definition
In numbers, as father
Atlas suffered.
Hunters, suitors
Stalk because
Orion does stalk,
Brawl the stunned beast,
Make dogs of us all
And bring us to our least.
These were ancient
Greeks, real, devout,
Who knew worlds
Heal inside out.

Atlantis Underway

Cherubs study
Marble lilies
In their hands.
Statuary makes such
Permanent demands.
Life, fur and chalk,
Clutching a
Mossy rock ringed
In water, ancestors,
Sons, daughters
Composes, annuls.
What is seen above?
Fog and gulls glide
The good we do.
What we love
Remains inside.

Blepharospasm

Positive thinking
Leads to insomnia.
Anything complicated
As a brain begs
To fly apart.
Faith is a
Different art:
These immortal
Sparks in fur
Are cats, sleeping,
Seeking their
Containers' shapes,
Curled in baskets,
Pie-tins.
Now awake, escaped,
Sprung into passion
And care, and
Like me, uncertain
And losing hair.

Seven Words In Search Of Punctuation

One looks
Into it
It looks
Into one

What is
Created
Created
What is

One is
Created into
What is created
Into one

Dream Trail

Down a narrow
Track to water,
Winding under trees,
I like to think
Something happens
At the end -- a
Pool fringed
In reeds--
Something important
In a way we
Don't understand.
It emits a mist
That disappears
On land --
Indeed, miracle
Enough for me.

Needs Must

I have risen early
To no purpose,
My opinion
Not required.
Old enough
Surely -- I should
Be resigned to
Under-rank design
Outlined in
Fallen apples--
To know art
And novelty tick
Away in others'
Needs, that what
I think, feel,
What I do
Recede.

In My Stove

A log can burn,
Release years
Of gathered sunlight
From its rings.
We also burn,
Metabolize the
Ageless light
Of things--
Far fires,
Stars unknown--
And to the
Light of stars
Return our own.