Flipping The Calendar Valentine

From cube to plane to line to dot

And back again before I'm caught

The dot I plant above the lower 'i'

When I'm not referring to myself

But why is the 'I' capitalized and

The 'you' is not all the lower letters

Want to know where they stand

In relation to that indefinite pronoun

Which used to be 'thou'

A feeling of deep respect

But from cube to plane you cast off

Your mortal you and start

To touch something more intangible

And then from line to dot

You fade to naught but I

Stray Valentine

She would rather sit in the heat with me

Than sleep on the cool couch inside

Where she would rather curl and snore

Beside me that watch Jeopardy on TV

It's the nearness to me she craves

Always underfoot getting stepped on

And even when she's hungry

Sometimes she defers her food for me

If I'm in another room

But just as easily she can turn

And give me the cold shoulder

Despairing of ever reaching me

Seeing me more clearly than I see

But just as easily she forgives me

My black and white four-legged soul

Just A Question Valentine

How unique do we have to get

How special must we become

Each on our own aggregate earth

Alone but never alone

Isn't it this what frightens us

That we cling too much

To our single lives we forget

That what's going on around us

Is just a picture however colorful

Of our collective conscience

Perforated sometimes by lightening-flashes

That frighten and illuminate

That we are all the same

For Gustav Landauer Valentine

What does it take to be murdered

The retaliation for some deep rejection

What does it take to kill yourself

The retaliation for some deep rejection

Didn't the prodigal go out on his own

At his parent's strong suggestion

They knew his brother wouldn't make it 

They thought the earth out there

Would teach him a lesson

He couldn't otherwise learn

So they equipped him with a secret self

A kind of homing device

Planted in his brain

Until it died and left them

Long nights waiting on the porch

Now Valentine

One hundred pounds of disappointment

I can lift and hold above my head

It used to be fifty or more on a good day

But now I just hoist the cloudy heavens

With one unworried finger

And trust the rain will come

Whenever it needs to

I can settle for one moon

Not yet able to return

I can be happy

With one star's weight

On my heart

As long as it's you

As long as it's me

Every Night The Same Story Valentine

Perfection is profligate

These sleepless summer nights

We sit out holding one another

Everything seems holier more

Mysterious in the darkness

Claustrophobic with stars

Until it makes me want to shout

'Enough! I see you terrible

Monsters in the woods,

Humbaba and the rest.

Soon your dead bodies will lie

At the feet of my love.'

But we move closer quieter

Straining to hear that fairy tale again

Falling asleep before the end

Always Planning Something Valentine

When I look back on the careful planning

It takes a life just to get it here

Safe and sound in the middle of war

I can't help but think of paratroopers

Dropping out of the night

Across enemy lines

In the old newsreels

Which makes me think

Of seeds falling into the dark

Fields of summer

The moon just where

We planned it to be

And just one more town

To loot and burn

Before peace returns

John's Day Valentine

Many of the surviving paintings imply

They grew up together friends

Two boys plotting their escape

In a busy household

Where the women ruled

The fathers worked and worried

And the children were sent to school

And yet one of them became

One of the loneliest figures

In all of history's ruination

And seems to have spent his whole life

In a kind of festival of longing

He who knew from the first

But kept their secret safe

Until the heavens burst

Necessary Valentine

From the focal point I've chosen

Like a viewing-loft up in a tree

I can see the focal point you've chosen

Has the better of me seeing me

Not a likeness but an after-image

I can feel you holding of me

From what of you is so far away

And yet dissolved in me

All weddings are alchemical

In summer we fall off the earth

Like bodies rising from the beach

Floating above on invisible threads

And muffled leisurely conversations

Where only the necessary is said

Love sailing us out beyond the dead

The Course Of Human Life Valentine

I spend half my morning

Thumbing through yesterday's clues

For that one or two moments

When I might have been conscious of you

What only in afterthought

Too late is caught and mended

But now I know you'll be back

In the other half of my morning

As usual striking me dumb

Far from the miracle of speech

Unworried you will come

'It is I' you will say

And only tomorrow will tell

If I was listening well

At The Last Bus Stop Of The Sun Valentine

An enormous traffic jam of feelings

Rush-hours through me these days

A truly Euclidean cast of characters

When I sit and stare at the world

When I try to de-implicate myself

As really just an innocent witness

To all the kindness all the terror

It's just the unreality of it all

The constant dress rehearsal

For a still unwritten play

That drags me back to you

Wind and sun at the water's edge

And you my friend intangible

Body tangible soul

Will The Roses Ever Wake Up Valentine

In the central story

He that stinketh

Of sin and glory

Is given back his faith

He smells of roses now

That resemble wounds

Opening in answer to the sun's

Simple question

What have you done

For me today

Wasn't beauty enough

Did you really have to ruin it

Just to prove you're free

Don't answer brother

Just run to me

What About Losing Everything Valentine

What happens when your phone dies

In the middle of unknown territory

On your way to Grandma's house perhaps

What happens when the sun dies

And you're forced to consider the stars

When the darkness slams you down

Against a tree among ominous sounds

Struggling not to fall asleep

What happens when the sunlight wakes you

On the floor of some abandoned house

Do you rise up shaking off your fears

Lost soul standing at the window like a ghost

I wave to driving past

On some forgotten road

Directions To My House Valentine (for Bruce)

If you follow my winding thread

And go left at the light-filled lake

You'll have time for a few reflections

And there's an empty chapel of trees

Where you can change your clothes

And any one of a number of caves

Where you can make your last confession

But suddenly you'll run out of time

So far I've led you in the wrong direction

But just turn around and hurry through the woods

You'll come to a silent maze of houses

One with the front door ajar but no one there

I will have gone out to find you

And myself gotten lost perhaps

Uncertain of my return

So welcome sit and cool your bones

I've left some water for you on the table

On The Scarcity of Vulnerability Valentine

The strange habits of rabbits

That she would scratch a burrow

In the middle of the yard

And lay her babies there like gifts

To any passing cat or hawk

To have put all her stock in gentleness

A calm defenselessness seems dumb

As the empty tomb she leaves behind

We run to find the bodies gone

Already the grass growing over

Childhood's helplessness again

A fable buried in a breeze

Leftover from another world

Or (feel it) one to come

Finding The Secret Valentine

One time in our book study group

Where we took turns reading a few pages aloud

Our host starting us off in the middle

Of the final chapter she found

She couldn't stop reading

Carefully sounding every word

Except now and then to interrupt herself

"This makes perfect sense!" or "Why

Didn't anyone tell me this?"

Then rushing on to the next revelation

She was breathless at the end

And said she'd had to stop herself

From crying several times

"This changes everything" she smiled

And we in silence couldn't but agree

Emailed Valentine

I meant to tell you yesterday

While we  were on the phone

Talking about the commonness of trauma

And you were telling me about

Your grandson's delicately forming ego

Just then I swear a large yellow

Swallowtail fluttered right up

Beside me and I reached out 

My hand just as you were saying

How beautiful he's grown

How he loves motorcycles

And is working and saving for one

Just as that butterfly landed on my arm

But I couldn't interrupt you then

So strangely I felt us both ascend

Dependent Valentine

It all depends on

How much you want to know

About what's really going on

Behind the scenes behind the stars

The secret histories of strangers and friends

Or the truth of your own nature

Bullied by moods a little crazy

It all depends on

How much compassion

You can incorproate

In your daily routine

And how much 

You can safely ignore

Another Wedding Valentine

On a windy evening just after your wedding

From a fourth floor balcony on the beach

We watched another wedding below

Where the bride after the whispered vows

Pursued by all her young male relatives

Ran across the sand and threw

Herself into the waves so the groom

Could come quickly to rescue her

It was all a planned reenactment

We surmised of some old ritual

When everyone applauded laughing

As they ran up out of the sea

Dripping and shining as if

Absolved of all misery

Far Valentine

When my howling mind needs a full moon

Or bloody bone that it can chew on

I pick a magic phrase or random piece

Of bird-song to fasten on

Repeating it over and over

Until it takes on a life of its own

And a picture starts to form

Of total darkness a warm

Soup of infinite movement

At the farthest outpost of myself

Where I am nothing and no one

But where you might be waiting

With a cup of cool water

And a smile on your face

You source of all kindness

Having traveled so far

The Future's Goal Valentine

What is my strategic plan

For the next five/ten years

Given the lack of control I exercise

Over what goes on around me

Or especially what occurs inside me

But I can still strive to practice

Out of my sustaining helplessness

A sense of confidence in the future's

Goal to forgive the past

It wants so much to move on

Its goal must be to understand and love

All that keeps it from its goal

Of ever deeper understanding

Of this deeply suffering world

Grown Valentine

Like that girl or boy who believed

Fruits and vegetables grew at the grocers

Who had never seen an actual

Carrot seed and what becomes of it

Or yanked one from sandy ground

And bit and chewed its sweetness

Starving on some hazy morning

So we think we just showed up

On this earth and weren't grown

And tended by sturdy beings

With hoes and rakes and hardened

Hands and still they hope

To harvest us and sit out under the trees

Having saved all the seeds

Mockingbird's Valentine

That spirit alone is

That spirit alone is here

On a mission of matter

Out of fire and water

Through the mockingbird's air

Come Cherubim and the common

Hard-working angels and demons

Fluttering in our brain-cages

That spirit alone creates

Passing in and out of matter

I ignore at my peril

That the breath survives the breather 

That spirit exhales in matter

And then breathes it all back again

In The Country Air Valentine

I believe there is a whole civilization

Built up around cutting grass out here 

Not a single rainless day can go by

Without that hum of blades

That fresh froth in the air

So you can smell it in your sleep

And the lawns are huge and run

Right up to the edge of the woods

Which look impenetrable and cool

Separating the large and small

And abandoned houses from one another

Some have chickens some ponies or goats

But most have given up on a garden

Preferring to shop in town

And tend their perfect lawns

Ancient History Valentine

In the Fourth Punic War

Of the hummingbirds

It was red-throated

Hansel the Younger

Who triumphed momentarily

Though his throat

Wouldn't stop bleeding

He would beat no retreat

I believe his folks eventually

Settled somewhere in Kentucky

Miners and drinkers and fiddlers

Fierce and kind living off the land

A people who went to church

And worked hard as hummingbirds

Our Interview With The Stars Valentine

From here love the stars

Are always falling mostly

Forward sometimes back

While we are standing still

Watching them race past

Their circuits clearly

Marked out for them

While ours wander

All over the place 

Sometimes deviating into

Our own black holes

But right now love 

The stars are falling

Their invisible snow

A light that is always

Just starting out while

We are standing very still