Its Own Valentine

True words were put

Into my mouth 

I just spoke them

False words were put

Into my mouth

I just swallowed them

By the time I showed

Up for myself

I was struggling

To sense the difference

Can only a true mind

Find the true word

And know to speak it

As its own 

Sarah's Valentine

Wrapping up a long love

Now you can carefully

Step back and behold

All the faces of the children

The years have taught you

And slip back into

That younger self

Still waiting for you

On some London corner

No one retires

From their childhood

Time comes to resume

The art of it

A beautiful scarf

Can make a start 

When I Was Young Valentine

I turned up late

But just at the right time

What was another castle

Along the way the air

Was full of them 

Some kind of celebration

Was going on great dignitaries

Were being seated in a long hall

A solemn mood prevailed

I stood in a corner

And watched while

We all were lifted

Into a kind of glory

Momentarily unquestionably

And then the hall was empty

And my horse whinnying to go on 

So Much Valentine

When he's in the mood

I let Lucifer rage on

Or is it his shadow half

He has so much to say

That speaks to me 

So much makes sense

About the insufficiency

Of the earth our paltry

Lives our mineral souls

He keeps forgetting

You are in the room

He doesn't notice you

Half-smiling waiting

For him to finish so we

Can resume our chat  

All Of You Valentine

There is a lot of copulation

In the world mostly seasonal

And a lot of cupolas

Scattered among them

And hidden narrow streets

In the cities of music

Leftover from the Romans

Who lost the refinement of the Greeks

When love got confused with passion

What to make of a body

Which is our whole concern

Why else come to earth 

But when I say I love you

I do mean it all of you

Our bodies bundles of light

And our trembling souls 

Potential Valentine

Heaven is not yet Heaven

The earth is not yet Earth

And the doorway moon

Creaking on its hinges

Ever in need of repair

How hard the sun strives

To become Sun one day

And the stars like children

Still rushing off to school

How could we all not

Have so much more to be

To say to do to touch 

Eternity just our potential

For an actual life 

Anyone Valentine

Smarten up young man

My mother would say to me 

I still hear her voice

Pretending sternness 

As if eighty years stopped

Nothing between us 

Now I see her

In three phases

Closest to her

When she was

Seventeen and had

Just lost her mother

In the second she

Betrayed me or so

I thought in the third

An old woman

Anyone would love 

What Was All That Valentine

What if we meet up again in passing

On the day before all the other days 

Or on the night after all

The other nights

I know I know you

Give me a minute

But you say your name

Yes now it's all 

Coming back to me

Pictures of you still hang

In Florence so many

Variations of your face

The empty slate of love

Let it be all my pleasure

To finally meet

The real woman

Behind it all 

Intrusive Valentine

Forgive this intrusion

On your grief dear world 

But the resurrection 

Has already happened

I can insist on this

Because every night still gets

Filled with dreaming stars

And every morning I wake up

To a new revelation

Which otherwise wouldn't happen 

Another piece of the puzzle

Slides into place

Love takes its time

Moving us rejecting us

Into its perfect picture 

Looking Back Valentine

I nominate 'Strange Fruit' to be

The best poem of the 20th century

Or at least the most  universal

Who knew the Statue of Liberty

Could sing in the voice of Billie Holiday

I see her traipsing around the world

Visiting every country

People flocking to hear her sing

How she calls them out

The malicious the incompetence

Buried in each of us

Liberty's broken heart

Broken to be mended

Stitch by stitch by love 

Copper Valentine

Brimming with joy

The copper butterfly 

Can hardly

Contain itself 

How can you

Just sit there

Don't you have 

Enough body 

To dance your

Grief away

Let me show you

How to swirl

And dive 

Into this rippling

Sea of joy 

Ginny's Valentine

She had the gift of laughter

Which is the one gift

We all need while

So many do without it

But how quickly laughter

Turns to tears we cry

For ourselves left here alone

Carrying around with us

This great gap in  our hearts

How can you be invisible to me

When I see you everywhere I look

But there is no loss in love

Once given it goes on and on

We take comfort in your laughter 

This Morning's Movie Valentine

Just waking a black beetle

Flops down on the pavement

Staggers a few steps forward

Then flies off over the roof

Beautiful sapphire wings

Catching the sun for a second

A black cat saunters by

Stops to stare at me

With such sad eyes 

Then saunters off 

It occurs to me

The stars behind this blue sky

Are never not brilliant

Never not shedding their light 

From Far Away Valentine

In this morning's conversation

With my angel I asked

If she could trust me  

To be on my own 

For a few hours today

And not fall apart

So she could go and stand

With you dear heart 

While you go through

Your crisis in case

Your angel could use

Just a little more light

While you decide

Whether to come or go 

Taken Valentine

Our fallen tree left behind

A single sapling we will

Have to move to where

Its mother stood and grew

Such shade and flowers 

For so many summers

All that work just to induce

That particular blue

Only possible in our yard

Through those particular years

I mean the soil had to be

Just the right mixture of iron

And mercy so even the sun

Stands back amazed

Taken by that blue 

Sooner Or Later Valentine

What if every morning on waking

Sitting on the edge of your bed waiting

Watching the echo of your dreams

And that other world fading

Where did it take you

Settling back into your body

Out of the air into a stone again

You fall awake you open up

The little scroll that holds

The secret message of your life

Always the same words

I made you for today

I gave you my life

But sooner or later you

Must be responsible for the world 

In Media Res Valentine

We go to the moon

Just to fly by

To peer into its

Darker side

Are we surprised 

We go to war 

Without knowing why

Children still playing

With swords

We go to lunch

With an old friend

Who has written

A new poem about love

And is so excited

To give it to the world 

The Other Half Of The Story Valentine

Once a bird

A chickadee maybe 

But here you are

A brilliant woman now

How we are always

Being worked on

Working on ourselves 

But in your life as a bird

You were always my daughter

Sharing your happiness with me 

Happy to be here in the world

That spark of life

No one long can stifle

When you became a bird

What I Know Valentine

I think I know you better

Than anyone else in the world

I think I know you deeper

That you know yourself

Or I know myself

For that matter some days

This love of learning

More and more about you

And you working so diligently

To get to know yourself in me

I think you know I know

There is something past love

I call it friendship

Where love is known 

Hard Valentine

When you get enough of time

One long series of embarrassments 

In which now and then

Small miracles still happen

Resounding flashes

That confirm eternity

Still running alongside us

We are so expendably immortal 

Isn't that we came for

To spend the wealth

Of our fire burning up

The imposter in us

The world is so hard to love

We keep coming back to fix it 

Surviving Valentine

Aren't there souls in heaven also

Who go to bed hungry for a time

Because those they love on earth

Don't believe their lives go on

But at least there on the shore

After a long night waiting

Old friends rush in

To meet them surely

And give them a place

To rest and to adjust

To heaven's air and light

And bring them cups of mercy

To share with those they love

On earth as it must be above 

Clear Valentine

The gold lantana has blossomed

Among the nameless purple flowers

When I looked them up

It said elegiac and sublime 

But they prefer to never die

Never not be flowering

It's clear they were waiting

For the gold umbels

To come among them

As one waits for 

One's love to come home

Love that started out

So meek and humble

Look how powerful it's grown 

Overlap's Valentine

Where is the overlap

Of the world that passes

Through your mind 

With the world that passes

Through mine where is

The place where we embrace

So far in the distance

We forget that's where

We set out for

So long ago one day

We'll realize we're going

Nowhere unless

We take the whole world

With us in our arms 

Ours Valentine

Sometimes I think our bodies

Are like clenched fists

We hold so tightly things

Of this ephemeral world

Is it because it's all so fleeting

We get a little frightened

Nothing's really there

While everything's hurrying on

To the next seemingly

Inevitable step in the plan

Only in that little moment that is ours

Between being pulled back

Or pushed forward 

When we think of those we love

Does the world begin to make sense 

Alchymical Valentine

Fire standing next to ice

The ice melting into water

Extinguishing the fire 

Thus a puddle's made 

From what's leftover

Leaves and ash 

Houses falling

Caught half way

And that enormous sun

Floating in over the water 

And I have not kissed you 

Yet today what light is left

Whatever has happened

But at least there's always that

To look forward to not miss 

 

Good Friday Valentine

You will be handed

A bowl of porridge

Because you are an old horse 

Making it through the winter

Which is the summer of your years

Since it doesn't snow here

And the beach isn't far away

There is a pattern to all this

Like a quilt thrown over

Your back and the bit 

Sinking into your teeth

The last days ridden

Faster than the first

And the porridge sweet 

Here On Earth Valentine

There is a swaying tree

Eclipsing a cloud and me

But now the cloud's

Moved on to other trees

Fleeing from the crows

A swallowtail crosses

Left to right and for

A moment after

Reminded of something

Everything pauses

As if to embrace

Everything separate

Then turns slowly 

And waltzes away 

Seriously Valentine

Did you seriously believe

We could get to some resurrection

Without passing through the cross

Did you really think it was all a story

In which you played no part

So far out on the periphery

Of your closed private life

The myth there is glory

In love's suffering and sorrow

Was it all lost on you

No worries every year

You get another chance 

Or did you seriously convince yourself

Spring could possibly forget

And not come back for you 

 

Night Watch Valentine

Go to bed old man

The full moon says

I'll keep an eye for you

But I just sit and stare

Right back at it

Swaying in my chair

Neither warm nor cold

Neither alive nor dead

Weaving through the poplar tree

The bobbin of some destiny

We all will share

But just then bright Venus chimed in

Over my shoulders flung 

One of her favorite songs

Begging me to stand

And sing with her alone

Whatever memory can stir

Whatever love intends