Continual Valentine

How can you put love
In a penny envelope or wrap it up
And send it off to the Arctic
Circle or to someone hurrying
Through the streets of Zurich
A love as sure as a snowflake
Hitting the fine hair of an infant
In the mountains of Bolivia
Can love reach that far
If it be rapt and pure
Can it fall into a stranger's heart
Stirring a dead fire
Or arrive on the beach at Inverness
With the key to an old address

Washed Valentine

Dee-da-dee dee-da-dee
Three times the washing machine
Sings come and get me
Your chores aren't done
Until you can sit in the yard
Watching two doves in the sun
Talking Polish or Ukrainian
Under the trees over the fence
Like days off used to be
When I was young I did the laundry
On an old ringer washer
Pressing the sheets into cardboard
Dropping them into a tub of cold water
To rinse and ring them out again
Then hang them on the line
Sometimes to freeze dry out there
Under a foggy winter's sun
Blood is the worst stain

Following Valentine

A trail of blood led me
Up the walkway to the gate
Where a pool of it was slowly
Shining turning to paste
I touched it and it clung
Until I wiped if off on the bricks
Enough to know the victim
Was in pain so I followed
The ruddy drops even if it was
To Calvary I would find you
But soon they stopped
The walk went on without
Another drop to be found
What demon crashed down
What angel hurled to the ground
Leaving only a sobbing sound

Hail Valentine

All the leaves are ripped in the yard
And many torn up on the ground
It must have hailed here briefly
While we were on the other side
Of the world visiting holy relics
And profane places and the largest
Falls in Europe where lovers
Leave small locks on the fences
That keep us all from leaping
The statue of marriage
Hollowed out in the middle of the river
At the bend in the rapids
Where the water muscles its way
Green through stones like a living thing

Enough Valentine

Why isn't it enough the light
Shines through the new leaf
So you can see the veins
And a sketch of a flower
Or it could be the face
Of anyone you love
But if that's not more
Than enough let every leaf
Mirror your hands
Climbing and climbing
An escarpment of sky
Leaves pierced by the light
Which seems never enough
Of the faces you love

Leaves Valentine

Its leaves are so large and long
It can only afford a dozen or so
Which appear out of one another
The stem hidden inside
So just as a new bud forms
A leaf at the bottom begins to shrivel
As long as it lives it maintains
This refined equilibrium
From which a kind of dancing
Might later develop except
Sooner or later it sends up a shaft
Its decision to bloom
So long worked on
Though it spells its doom

Beyond Valentine

If evil is self-destroying
And good is self-negating
Isn't it clear which will win out
In the endless end
Unfortunately it's not
To me at times that both
Must have their victories and routs
But that they carry us forward
In a continual back and forth
Lefty loosey righty tighty
We spiral like mountains or trees
At the behest of a greater will
Alive in the little and mighty
Something that's never still

Feast Day of Your Passing Valentine

I close my eyes
When you give me
The kiss of peace
Something lifts off
My anxious mind
A load of mercy
Like a beautiful cloud
For a moment I can
Barely perceive I hold
You in my heart again
Because you give yourself
To me and I
Somehow completely
Give myself to you

More Valentine

Every December the snails come back
To my private Capistrano
Searching for the ancient sea
That used to be here
If you want to speak to snails
You must kneel down
And make surrender sounds
Quiet embryonic keening
As you crawl along behind
Following its silver thread
You didn't know you could be
So soft-hearted under
That fragile exterior
And keep coming back for more

Sometimes Valentine

I like that you wait on me sometimes
And that you don't wait on me
I like how you can be free with me
The casual intensity of your kiss
When coming and going I miss
But it's nothing I don't survive
Without I've come to see
We must let love love us
And take our worthiness from that
However unworthily
Once love begins in something
It can never really end
It may be the only thing that doesn't

Our Valentine

Our Jesus was an only child
With two mothers and the other one
Came from a large family
And was social and outgoing
A friend to everyone
Even to his odd cousin
Who would often run away
To hide in some old garden
As if not knowing how to play
But our Jesus would follow him
And from a hidden spot observe
The younger one among the rocks
And flowers wrapped in a light
That flowed from his arms as if
It would embrace the world

Together Valentine

Minding my own grief
I hum the old tunes
Till you come by
With your stories of heaven
Which turn out to be
The same as here
Only without a body
Whose pieces you let
Go of slowly painfully
So I hum louder
While still we sit
Together in your name
Watching our memories burn
In some eternal flame

Taken Valentine

Mars is too taken with Pluto they say
Battling in the underworld
To get anything done today
So I cut my hair and shower
And feel immensely reborn
Starving I eat too much
But I keep my hands busy
Watching and straightening things
When I go out to sit down
I hear the rumbling of guns
The distant cries of children
Laughter from boats on the Seine
I feel sick with the world's pain
Even as the sun heals me again

Still Valentine (for Teri and John)

Only one small leaf left
On the Clivia bulb a friend gave me
But it's a hopeful green
And two buds have arrived
On the starfish cactus I stole
Years ago from a pal
I'm waiting to see them bloom
Well-named little stinkers
They catch the fall flies
And encourage the Clivia to grow
The yard is wrapped in a stillness
Only found in old paintings
Or in old friendships
Such as we know

Romance on the Rue Morgue Valentine

I like to play detective on myself    
When I have no clue what I'm up to
Some days I feel he's following me
And not the other way around
Which means we'll have to meet
To share leads on what's going on
You need to be more discreet
He'll tell me in that conspiratorial tone
You're following me too closely
People will think we're in love
I really don't like spying on you
But you've lied to me too many times
Not to know when you're telling the truth

Peripheral Valentine

Is it better to savor
One pure thing from the past
Or is it wiser to treasure
A few words that won't last
Or run around the periphery
Trying to absorb it all
The old town on the hill
The sense of being here before
Is there anywhere you haven't
Been asked the world traveler
How far do you have to go
To know you're lost
To know you're found
And just keep going on

Family Drama Valentine

Countries keep pursuing long divorces
While maintaining marital relations
Often the therapist sky is called in
To listen carefully to endless
Territorial disputations
Their religions are for remembering
How it all lovely started out
Each one trying to get the story straight
Each filling in some missing pieces
But losing the thread in time
Of common interest in God's plot
The true and only true religion
The one for the other heart
He buried in their bones

You Must Go To Zurich Valentine

Before you leave for Zurich
Make a list of things to take
And another longer list of things
To do before you go you know
There will probably be snow
But pack your suit for the spa
Why go to Zurich and the cold
When it's in the lovely 80's here
But when will we get another chance
No longer young and barely old
Zurich must want us for some
Unknown reason hopefully
To be revealed to us once there
Maybe a café where a genius will appear
At our small table and tell us all

Picture Valentine

The earth is just a picture of all
We have and have done to ourselves
The crumbling image of its soul
When it looks in the mirror-world
And sees how young it is and old
Each one in our foreign places
Until I immigrated to you
Leaving behind everything I loved
Your picture seemed so quick and real
You earth a woman and a god
How can you have so many children
And still be a virgin-crone
And stand where Ezekiel stood
Lifting his morning horn

Autumnal Valentine

I prefer the gospel
Of radical gratitude
To faint-hearted fear
I am unhappily happy
When I'm not too near
Myself and others grow
More dear I'm selfish
For them to move heaven
Forward and to take me
With them earth not far behind
I want everything to succeed
The evil no less than the good deed
Let it all run to seed

At Your Knees Valentine

I really want to be like Mary
And curl up at your knees
But my overbearing Martha part
Has to hoover the last crumbs
We lift our feet for her to wash
And dry them with her tears
She whirls around our little island
Of eternal peace and quiet
Even if I still don't understand a word
You say the light in your face
Is all I need to see
I call to Martha come look
For a moment into your eyes
But she's wrapped up in another book

All Saints Day

When we treat our unevolved part
Without a compassionate heart
When we add to the ignorance
Of our senses a load of guilt
Knotted on our backs for centuries
When we refuse to respect ourselves
For being born as who we are
And where we live right now
You reading this
Me writing this
Isn't this the one
And only sin we could commit
Not to feel gratitude and praise
For all our days