poems

“non piu mesta”

I heard them say
her child was her cancer
one life steals another.

The truth
always hurts.
Now golden flies swarm
over dead flowers
in dusk half-light.
An angel, on a gravestone
balances
between life and death.

Non piu mesta.
No more housework,
you would think.

Her grief is placed
on a shelf,
not quite behind the clock.
Another item,
not quite out of sight.

Through a dark window
we see only by our own light.
So I watch,
in the shadow of her home.
The days, I think,
are shorter now.
Watching life through glass,
unknown.

Hope is a killer,
lest we forget.



“My time”

Heavy rain against windows
when I am born.
I come to life in a small home,
poor but always
climbing.
My mother struggles
with a new life
not her own.
My father gone, unsure
of the future
and its ownership.
I am five years old,
so I cannot understand
my mothers tired eyes.

In the night she wonders.

We move home, and
I find it hard
to make new friends.
Father returns, to make
a place for himself.
He does not see
it has always been there.

There is no time
only motion.
It exists, only in memory.
Eyes closed, I watch
its work.

Now I am a man,
I must follow
certain rules.
Find a job and find
a home.
Have a wife and have
a child.
Try not to panic.
Try not to leave
and try to understand.
Really, my boy,
try to keep up.

I am a link
in a chain,
connecting past and future.
Just another little piece
of a puzzle.
And now
in my chair,
even the air seems old.
The taste
of hourglass sand.
The ones I cared for
care for me,
the family contract.

I don’t know
what I’ve done.

My last thoughts
are my fathers worn gaze,
which once I thought was anger.
Then