One More Valentine

Music is the slyest art

Seeding all we see around us

The very air who breathes us

Full of voices and violins 

Waiting for us to learn the words

Of rejection and joy and sing along

But who can believe this music

Feeble words give rise to

From an orchestra of unending love

Only reaching us in an echo

What it does once inside the brain

Is some powerful magic

Working its way with us

Just one more dance 

For the Feast of All Daughters Valentine (for Dan)

I'll pour you a glass

If you cut me a slice

Of that fresh-baked bread

The wine keeps but the bread stales

If we aren't quick on our feet 

Us two old men blessed

With daughters who love

Their fathers aren't all

Children strangers at first

Adventuring great distances

Their time come round

For our paths to cross again

Weaving who we're becoming

So let's toast to the miracles

It's you and me they found 

Out There Valentine

In the first five stages of life

With two more reserved for later

If you persevering make it there

Love terror beauty grief

And finally getting over yourself

Having a self to get over

And for a few moments

You break free from defining time 

And enclosing space and float

Of course it's a dream

Which only makes it realer

Than the things around you shining

No use going out there if you

Don't bring something back 

Lines Valentine

I learned today

We have this line

That runs right through us

From the depths to the heights

And back again in time

Taking a few steps forward

So that another line appears

Passing through the heart and lungs

Thunder and lightening

On the horizon's shore

And if we stand still

We can almost hear

The hard battles of the gods

Going on inside us 

Up Valentine

This rainbow is either

An early sketch

Or a pending version

Of our staring minds

What we were

And must become

Even without the rain

It stays hanging in the air

Visible only to those

Who tilt their heads a little

Into the cloudless air

To see the sun rising

Through the dark earth

Waking all its rainbows up 

Working It Out Valentine

You'd think my vast ignorance

Would induce in me

A deep aghast of humility

At all the horrors and glories

We hide from ourselves one another

In this fairy-tale of my life

The trick is to give up

All my wishes when

The genie floats out of the bottle

Pretending to know 

The one thing worth knowing

Until we sit and work it out 

Me and my cagey double 

The Doves of Summer Valentine

The sounds they make

Don't look like they

Would come from

Such sleek bodies

Elegant and yet

Their wings creak

Taking off suspended 

As in the old paintings

More speech than song a sigh

Undeniably sorrowful

And yet comforting

To sit here listening

You who are they call

A warning and a lullaby 

Solstice Valentine

Make up your mind

Are you going forward

To the omega or backwards

To the alpha do you prefer

Origins or conclusions

When it comes to the same

One mind one heart 

Beating behind it all

The round earth is flat

In places that go on and on

Until you come to your mountains

Either way did you really think

You'd ever get out of here

Without having to climb them  

One Life Valentine

One life is enough

Some say especially

If it was a very hard one

It can take a long time

Before it makes a kind 

Of sense after you've rested

For another long time

But you wake up one morning

Finding you're still alive

And in the distance the moaning

Of the earth calling you back

A hundred unanswered messages

All saying the same thing

I love you I'm sorry

Take me back 

Everything Valentine

Grown old I find

I've won heaven's lottery

The prize of days gone back

To the worlds of birds and flowers 

Where it all begins 

Here in the scorching desert 

How do the doves survive

How long does it take to adapt

And enjoy it or not

Some bird who shall go nameless

Is actually singing in this furnace 

In a tree in my yard

The sun is losing ground 

But I have everything I need 

Look Valentine

I think the very rich

Are more afraid

Of dying than

The very poor sitting

At the same table

Served the same

Bread of life

Unconscionable

And yet persistent

If only a few survive

The wedding feast

But look here he comes

Bearing the best

Wine for last 

Moon-Eye Valentine

Gasping for words because

The experience isn't enough

Take this sunlight which seems

Always pulling the wool

Over our eager eyes 

So we don't notice that

Other light behind it

Except what the moon transmits

Sending down reinforcements

To besieged lovers and trees 

But if this light we see

Made these eyes to see it

That other light must also

Yield up its deeper sight

It may even come tonight 

Offering Valentine

Doesn't it help to dance a little

On the world's bouncing ball

A happy dance or a sad dance

If you can keep your balance

At the pivot of your soul

Finding yourself inside

The thought that's thinking you

Reaching out through darkness

We give words to everything here

So it's good to breath out

Into the endless nameless stars 

Once in a while and whirl

When your angel's hand is offered

And she has that look in her eyes 

Season's Valentine

When you begin to calculate

This beautiful natural world 

No matter how much we love it

Can only be half of the equation

We're searching for an equal's sign

On the other side of which

We can imagine all manner of forces

Working under its invisible cloak

And it becomes so clear how much 

Heaven needs the earth 

To unravel its own becoming

What else are the seasons for

What need would we have of flowers

Left to our own devices