Once Every Epoch Valentine

They say the poles are shifting

And the earth is bound soon

Toward a global disaster

Of Atlantean proportions 

A new perilous way of life

For those who survive

They say we must assemble

All we would take with us 

When we're lifted from the earth

Even now a quiet few who know

Where safety lies are heading out

As before only a remnant 

Carrying in their pockets all the seeds

Needed for a new persistence

Looking Ahead Valentine

Because they circulate

In ceremonial arrivals

We can see what's coming

How they're planning things out

The possibilities the opportunities 

Given certain circumstances

So we can't say we can't read

The future already written there

At least the outline the figures

We will have to fill in 

With some sort of meaning

Each one in its own way 

But just to know they're there

May not be enough anymore

We must go out to meet them 

Once Valentine

In the morning once I've settled

What's for supper I can relax

On the patio for an hour or two

Even as a boy I cooked

For my father when he had

To go in early while the others slept

Eggs and toast

The way he liked it

Though I never understood 

How we two were thrown 

Together under the same roof

So completely unlike one another 

Me a boy cooking in silence

He a man eating in silence

Was about all we had to say 

 

One Bee Left Valentine

What good gardener can plead

He deserves these roses or any flower

Even if he does his part in seeing

They have everything they need

He has not conjured them

But knows someone does

Someone orchestrating all this out here

Into a commotion a blessing

Of unforeseeable petals

(You can breathe their souls) 

A good gardener knows to stand

Even if he's forgotten what it means

In the field when snow is falling 

Praying he'll be here waiting

Patiently when you return 

After Reading The Stars Valentine

To know now

What you didn't know then

At the end when

You find out the story

Wasn't what you expected 

With all its twists and turns

But what use is knowledge

Of the past if you're

Only young to repeat it 

If you get no time

To amend it no room

To say I'm sorry

To break down with gratitude

For all you've known 

Finally Valentine

As it happens

My last gift

Is to grow old

To look back and behold

Out of so many possible lives

I chose this particular one

To have and to hold on to

So many wrong turns

To get to this look-out

But death leads me on to the peak

Of the mountain looming above me

Where all my lives are waiting

The landscape spread out before us

And we can finally have lunch 

Why Valentine

Why do they have to close at night

Is it only the light that holds them open

Have they no will of their own

When darkness invades them

But as it's coming on I watch

Is it for a deeper dreaming

The petals fold into themselves

Almost imperceptibly

Into small white buds

I never really witnessed it before

Like watching a child fall asleep

Sailing out into the darkness

Taken back over the abyss

As all of us must go alone

Is it their willingness to go

I admire or the trust they place

In everything around them 

 

Is it Valentine

I think a great tenderness

Is up against a great coldness

All around us and inside us

Or is it a great longing

Up against a great disappointment

When life crushes us to bits

Or is it a great smallness

Encountering a great greatness

The dragon-fly indistinguishable

From the gleaming purple flower

Or is it a great fear that rises

Up against a great love

So feast on this my love

The devil may win every battle 

But must lose every war 

Like a String Quartet Valentine

Let's give the seasons back

Their original holy names

If we're ever going to understand

What this world is up to

Let's call it Gabriel-time

When the earth holds death

And life together sleeping

Under the ice and snow

And Raphael-time when 

Birthing heals the dark woods

Every flower a medicine

Lifting our eyes to Uriel's eyes

Long staring at the sun

Falling there into Michael's arms

The new-formed music of the earth

Breathing us in and out 

Not I Valentine

Whatever else is going on

At any given moment in time

I know that you are living there

In the caves of my soul

Arranged along the beach

My fear of darkness and of death

My fear itself the monster

Threatening to devour me

Roaring against the roaring waves

That insist I will not make it

If I go alone without

My little stone of love

Leaving myself behind me

For someone braver to come 

Windy Valentine

When the little iron bells

Hanging from the trellis ring

I know the wind has reached

A certain limit to its patience 

And starts to whip its way

Like Jesus in the temple

Through fields and empty places

Building a mammoth wall of dust 

Vesuvius heading right for us

Years later when we've dug

Ourselves out of the debris 

Will we have learned

We ourselves the wind

We ourselves the fury 

Lord of the Elements Valentine

Yes we have these four great gods

We call the seasons working 

But don't you feel a fifth

Mood that moves them all along

When each has made its attempt

To build the earth again

And stands there waiting

For a few expectant days 

Let's call that season Silence

As when one is in the presence

Of death or love or both

Waiting for time to start again 

And then suddenly it's fall

Or spring or whatever that

Fifth god has planned 

In The End Valentine

In the end summer

Holding out as long as it can

Hating goodbyes one morning

Just walks off into the woods

Where its last flames are flowering

Did it over-promise in the sense

That its beauty could save us

Languid lakes and sultry days 

When all along it planned

This dramatic conflagration  

Did it fail to remember 

The gods' shower of stars

Falling at the last minute

Would ripen all its seeds

Tiny but courageous

Full of a further summer 

Further Valentine

I'm still waiting

For these purple flowers

To say something anything

They are so full

Of themselves but not

In any arrogant hurry 

To stand back and

Behold their beauty

They murmur to one another

Their purple thoughts

Each feeling some sorrow

Mirrored in the other

I try to read their lips

I'm sure I will hear them

If I just lean a little

Further in 

Not Night Or Day Valentine

It's late but I can't sleep

Listening to the welcome rain

Drumming and humming on the roof 

So I get up and go outside

The rain has stopped

Everything still and solemn 

The night brighter than it

Should be it's the moon

Filtering through thick clouds

The limbo light of an eclipse

Everything visible but gray

When I walk our and stand

In the middle of the empty street

O moon what should I pray

O rain don't let me sleep 

The Alba Madonna Valentine

The three figures in the painting

Aren't part of the landscape behind them

How did they get there

Perhaps because it was

A beckoning summer's day

They've taken a walk together

Into the flowering fields

Where she's found a place to rest

Her finger tucked in her book

While the two boys run and play

The older one passing a curious stick

To the younger one eager to take it 

While the mother looking on this gift 

What could she do but stare 

Feeling what would come of it 

Sighing In Summer Valentine

Our summer takes centuries

Longer than memory it just

Keeps dreaming on and on

While everything is being lifted

From the earth to what

Does it sacrifice itself

That's the question 

Shaping everything into a seed

More heat than light

All it needs to carry it across

Where do these flames go

When fall blows them out

They go on burning 

In the ground