In Irons Valentine

I say yes obsessively to you

With only an occasional no

So you'll know I'm not

A robot or an interloper

Which isn't true I'm both

And though we share a digital 

Heart that warns us of attacks

If you'd only remember

To plug in the charger

We could get some rest

From one another's 

Mechanical politeness

I could learn to dance

You could get dressed

Painted Valentine

It's not what is depicted

But how the paint is applied

The subject merely intrudes

On the way the color unfolds

It takes its time in the mind

Of the momentary Tuesday painter

Did he not set out to move us

And isn't it the fingers anyway

That matter in music and painting

You have to have the right elbows

Firm and agile feet it helps

To have worked in a circus

Or know someone who does

Released Valentine

The wind that teaches the trees to walk

And the shrubs that hurry after

I caught one and brought it home

And imprisoned it in my yard

A bush of several branches

I pruned back to a single one

And forced it into a trunk with three

Outwardly-reaching limbs

Taller and wider each spring

But each branch just gave birth

To another bush pleading

With pale blue blossoms

To be released from my idea

Of a tree this project of me

Hypothetical Valentine

If earth is the body of human beings

Water must be the body of angels

Isn't it their life we see looking across the lake

The exhilaration of mist and spray

We feel them in our blood

And way out those proud clouds

And lightening bolts out of the blue

Aren't they gathering up the feasts

Of archangels violent and calm

And finally the primal beginnings

Who focus their warmth in us

Whose bodies are our I's

Aren't they always starting over

Our Star Valentine

When it comes to explored space

It's serious how this earth is one

Of a kind and we alien humans

Are one with its conditions

This planet is our only body

Bodies that weren't even here

Before the Pleistocene

Knowledge of this can take us so far

Until it finally crumbles

The body is just the ash

Thrown out by the fire

Spinning up into dark space

Like the darkest star

Historical Valentine

A young black man named Darius

Gives a massage to an old white man

A tired ex-history professor

Who talks and whispers

Throughout the session

Between grunts and gasps

Stretching out the story of Darius

The Great (550-486 BC) 

Whose empire was the largest ever

Who conquered Greece even Naxos

Who built amazing palaces and temples

In the next session Darius

Spends the hour while massaging

Explaining how those bricks were laid

These alternating sessions go on

For a long period of time until finally

The body on the table is dissolved

On John's Day Valentine

She wrote her master's thesis

On the meditative life

Of a mountain nearby concluding

With a fairy tale about a lake

And what happened one night far out

I could never decipher

If she was entirely fictional

Or one of those passed over

But she accompanied me

All that day after I spotted her

In a strange town crossing the street

As if our meeting again had been arranged

Even though we had no future

Just the impulse to start again

Glad Valentine

I'm glad I sat on it and slept

On it and waited for it to rain

When rain was no more

In the offing than you

But here it is lovelier

For not being expected

I'm happy I followed

Morton Feldman's advice

About never knowing when

You're gonna hear something

Or see something freezing you

In your steps that stroke of joy

Lovelier for sparing your life

When it's still raining softly

And look there are still several

Indeterminate string quartets to go

Not Fair Valentine

I do not hope not to despair

Never to sit and just not care

About anything or anyone myself

Never not to give up and howling stare

Out the window when there's

No one there it's just not fair

That little dragon of despair

Who keeps slipping out of his cage

Begging to be taken for a walk

I've seen he means to eat the world

Greedy and pompous if I let him loose

My single hope is to have 

Honored him with care

And to resolve what is not fair

So Many Valentines (at Solstice)

It was in the summer of our disaster

It was as good as it was going to get

There were only those waiting for the disaster

And those for whom the wait was over

The blade had fallen or was in progress

Water depleting and fires raging

Replacements in short supply

And when it reached its highest point

The sun poured down its floods

Of heat just standing there for days

Opening its little doorway of escape

For so many wafted aloft to a summer

Beyond summer and disaster

In Our Time Valentine

Why are you watching that uber-gay movie

Striding into the room he scolded

Oh I forgot to tell you something

Urgently as I got up from the couch

And walked over to him

As he stood there wondering

What I would possibly say

And kissed him full on the lips

And said calmly no that's what

Uber-gay looks like my brother

It is given to us in our time

To unravel sex from love

And your scorn only makes it harder

For love to be born

Sister Sorrow and Brother Grief Valentine

If you guess the first three secrets

The fourth is free

Wit is luck achieved

The grub of consciousness

That must be seen to be believed

But it's already become a moth

With colorfully mottled wings

Like the emblem of a great army

Reconnoitering all night

But what can its wings say

About its diet or its sorrow

For its butterfly sister

On the other side of day

Heading for the flames

Drawn Valentine

I was a cheerful fearful child

Outgoing and mouthy and uncommitted

I never felt adults

Should have all the power

To say what things mean

A tree could be just the way

I drew it and I could go back

To living there if I wanted to

How did I lose that ability

To scamper over rooftops

In my new shoes and make

My sterner sister laugh with shame

I've saved that old phonograph

Now it's my turn to laugh

I Too Loved Linda Valentine

A fatal love at the center of her life

I confess something about your loss

Inspired me to move from 'her' to 'you' 

You weren't just out there living in the desert

Anymore but here inside another I and life

Self-assured as Persephone ever was

That glow that drew me to want to have

You as my distant loyal other half

Your face in the opposite subway car

As we sat waiting and staring

Steadfastly at one another

While Zeus and Apollo boarded

Found Valentine

If you think of a plant

As the chosen body and blood

Of an important being

If you think of an animal

Possessing an angel's soul

Left to roam the world freely

If you think of the mineral brain

Half in love with stones and shells

Arriving at its own clear thoughts

If you think of the seas and stars

Inside the organs of a body

Striding through another night

Then I know you will find me

Or else I will find you

Unanswered Valentine

Why did Jesus just not say to Judas

You cannot eat my body

Or drink my blood though

He knew he would betray him

What was the knowledge he had

Above any thought of escape

Does he not leave to Judas

The lost judgement of his debts

Judas must have been one of his first

Encounters on his visit to hell

I think he must have blessed him then

And thanked him for his part

Told him not to worry

And held him to his heart

Before Valentine

After the great event had happened

After everything had turned

Around and was unalterably

Changed for a long time

It was only a few who noticed

That nothing would ever be the same

And even today we still

Go about our lives getting on

Having forgotten how hopeless

The world was for us before

We received the thing we longed for

That sense of something deeper

Missing in the picture

The conviction there was more

Silent Valentine

Words where the I is silent

Like friend or ancient

As if it stood right there forgotten

Or accused offering no explanation

As if only silence could respond

To the surrounding confusion

Of a word without a speaking I

An I like the word's open secret

Unpronounceable yet visible cipher

Or take a word like Christ

Or Isis or business or decision

As if it was actually buried

In the language and I

Ever watchful for its return

One Valentine

Every morning I put all my thoughts

Into a round rather leaky container

And shake it up soundly

And set it down on the table

And sit quietly and watch

Which parts slowly settle

To the bottom dead-end material

While several layers are built up

From this foundation growing

More and more ethereal

Until finally there's no thought at all

Unless it's the clear one of you

Necessary Valentine

How necessary it becomes

To have wounds and scars

And a visible body to bear them

The world itself a wounding

Me scourging you scourging me

Because we are so proud of ourselves

And want still more of the other

Our motives are mixed distilled

Into medicines of pleasure and pain

So we're compelled to return again

And again forgetting the antidote

'Wound' what a beautiful sound

Of unknown ultimate origin

Some Valentine

Some people don't want

To know how something works

It's enough that it does mostly

Some people plant a sapling

In their front yard one spring

And tend to it for years

Some people have so many cars

They can only drive them once

Some people know all

Of human history but

Never learned to write

Some people are dolls

Inside of dolls building dolls

They want to take over the world

Summer Valentine

Now it's summer we can go all the way out

To Saturn's orbit where the heat stretches

Into a blue immensity of light

Is it ignorance or bliss that reaches

A certain limit and collapses

On a thousand sunny beaches

The beauty of bodies by the sea

One sweltering afternoon we walked

While everyone slept in their cool stone houses

The silent empty streets of Samos

Whispering to one another about

The marvel of a doorway arch

Or a courtyard garden where

Pythagoras finally gave up

Preaching to the flowers

We Are Valentine

We are who we are

But that's no excuse

We need to be better

So we can do better

Which may be less

Or more of doing us

Take me for instance

I would like to be

You or someone else

When I'm frightened

And feel I'm losing it

But I need you to bring me out

Of my little bubble sometimes

Because only love can do that

Despite Valentine

They called it a comedy back then

Even if it wasn't very funny

And often much of it wasn't at all

But just because it ended happily

Because everything worked out in the end

And they could stop there even

Though they sensed it might not last

Into next year's unwritten acts

It was considered a comedy because

You just had to laugh

Before you forgot how to

At its secret indomitability

The revelation uncertainly

Of its final victory despite

Name Unavailable Valentine

Why do you land on my neighbor's roof

And stare at me for a few minutes

And then fly off every morning

So I find myself waiting for you

As if we'd made a promise to someone

To stay in touch with one another

Though we're mostly strangers now

So much can happen in an epoch

But wasn't there a day you landed

On my shoulder and clearly

Spoke your name and swallowed

Me whole with your song

Or do I have it all wrong

Word's Valentine

The early theories of language

Proved poetic in the wrong sense

Perhaps they did not love it enough

To get beyond the fanciful to facts

Like the fact that poetry is real

Practical knowledge of the world 

We begin to grasp its prophetic

Implications in nursery rhymes

And the savagery of heroic couplets

Even as children to play at war

Even to believe in glory

But it's always a sense for language

That saves us in the end

Word given and word returned

Violet Valentine

Have you considered the Verbena

As I have staring and staring

Do you wonder how water works

Into the roots that sucking sound

In relation to the crusty leaves

Or how how much is not enough sun

To bring them to bloom again

How drowning roots and drying leaves

Have to negotiate under duress

Floods and deserts crossed

In search of a faithful gardener

Until finally their blooms rebuke me

What is it about violet at twilight

That brings me to my knees

Bargain Valentine

The roses are yours

But the vase is mine

The windows are yours

But the door is mine

The trees that drop their leaves

And the melting snow are mine

While you hold the firs and lichen

Blazing in the summer heat

The rain in the empty streets

At four in the morning

I will trade with you

For five of your mountain days

I'll even throw in my dead gold watch

All my time included for one more time

Advisory Valentine

You need someone who brings the music

To your life who forces you to dance

Even once in a while when you're alone

Or stretched out on the floor

Like Mahler after listening to Satie

You need cornets in the background

Announcing the arrival of a new century

In your life a new bar mitzva

Another quincinera last graduate

Of joy and silent astonishment you need

To settle down with your multiple selves

And work and cook for them

You need a wedding of vast proportions

To which everyone is invited

Corpus Christi Valentine

When you cry you are the moon

Is it you or the moon who is more unhappy

When you laugh you link up with the sun

Don't you feel that burst of light

Completely releasing you in a flash

Total freedom for a second or two

But when you see the changing stars

You know for certain you're lost

Unless you hold on to the one

In the center calling your name

North to its own country

That most distant intimate point

That dwarfs and lifts you up

And leaves you standing on the earth

Into the Woods Valentine

Another dissolving blog of clouds blows by

Horsetails between their legs

Pursued by a thousand tweets

Replacing real birds in the sky

More and more they're pulling us

Out of our bodies into the woods

But the paths are overrun with dogs

And children and the blue columbine

Are trampled on their last legs

But that's only on holidays

And every weekend so just pick a day

When you have nothing else to do

And go and visit your mother

Who is dying as we text

Guilty Valentine

I know I love

Because I feel guilty

For not loving more

When it stands to reason

It's the only thing there

Can't be more demand

Than what is on supply

I am guilty of loving

But not enough quite yet

Love has to compete

With such knowledge

Or all will be lost

And then there's lunch

Having come so far 

And starving