No Day I Do Not Die Valentine

There's a place on the back of my neck

Where I still feel the axe

There's a part of my legs

That is always warm

In memory of the flames

And marks on my chest

Where the arrows passed

Through several exit wounds

That still itch and must be scratched

And a lot of internal damage

From twice being buried alive

Yet somehow my body my friend

Keeps coming back for more

And somehow my heart survives

Word War Won Valentine

My page as I turn it

Catches some of the blue

Emptiness of the sky

Above its field of words

Like soldiers marching

So their black uniforms

Glisten in the sunlight

My page as I lift it

Flutters its white flag

Laying down its arms

These words my weapons

Letting the blue emptiness win

Dispersing all my armies

Into the speechless wind

To fight another day

Choosing Valentine

Does the dream reflect the day's 

Conscience side risen from the depths

Does the earth reflect the warring heavens

The way the moon reflects the sun

And the sun eclipses the stars

Light and darkness carrying on

Lifting up and settling down

Which we associate with the weather

Though they started out as gods

The great light and the great darkness

Still working behind the scenes

In their manifold distinctions

So we here feel caught

In a perilous conflict

Like children having to chose

Between parents loving them both

Standing Back To See It Valentine

If the stones wake up in the plants

And the plants wake up in the animals

And the animals wake up in us humans

(After a long interlude of birds)

And we humans wake up in the ethers

(After that we lose the thread)

Doesn't this adequately prove

There is no end to waking up

And therefore no end to dreaming

That the stones long to break open

Even if in some hidden flower

That the lily aches to become a tiger

The eagle to occupy a child's

Waking limbs some coming morning

To Dream Or Not To Dream Valentine

I don't dream anymore she said

Too much drama and confusion in heaven

I've taught myself to see only darkness

So I can get some distance and some rest

But don't we have a certain responsibility

To our dreams drawn back every night

Compelled for a third of our lives

To that deathless land of spirits

To experiences we could never have

Awake on earth in our senses

And don't we have a duty at least

To visit the grave of the dream

To find out who we've been

And where we're really going

Unprepared Valentine

After a period of researching my dreams

Of writing down their curious dramas

And carefully comparing my sketchy notes

With other serious dreamers

I can tentatively report

The majority end sadly

The sleeper waking relieved

Rescued at the last perilous moment

Like a traveler who has vanished

Into a nameless dangerous country

Innocently curious but ill-equipped

Who doesn't speak the language yet

Or see how everything's reversed

So many report getting helplessly lost

Or being driven around by a friend

Searching for something familiar

Dropped off finally at the border

Waiting Valentine

Can I have a coffee first

A waiter brings a steaming cup

In what appears to be a waiting room

People chatting on comfortable chairs

I'll be right back I say to no one

And enter an empty public restroom

So filthy it looks like all

The toilets have exploded

But I still have to go and when

I get back still breathing a large

Dozing woman has taken my seat

This puts me out on a busy street

Frantically searching for something

Rifling through a stranger's car

Until something tells me

I shouldn't be doing this

And walking off before anyone sees me

I become aware of cameras everywhere

And when I get back the coffee's cold

The room empty the doctor gone

And I have only myself to blame

Waiting for someone to call my name

Simply Valentine

Coming back from an amazing dream

Depending how far out you've gone

Into that other more fluid world

Last night I saw two silver birds

Merge together into a distant sun

Have you noticed there's a space

Between there and here as you return

Where things get muddled torn apart

The closer you get to earth

And you feel a little like screaming

Caught between two opposite worlds

This hard one you walk through

In a body tightly wound unraveling

And that other where you simply fly

Climbing Valentine

Climbing a steep mountain path

I met a stranger coming down

And stopped to chat to catch

My breath and laughing ask

Was it worth it to go on

Would I make it to the view

Before darkness beat me back

I don't remember what he said

When he offered me a bottle of wine

And a small box of biscuits

And a couple of other gifts

He hid behind a little bush

But immediately distracted I went off

To find a sack to carry them in

And found one ridiculously large

Unsure now how to get back

To where I'd left them on the path

And worried would they still be there

And wondered did I really dare

To climb back up that narrow track

Lives Past And To Come Valentine

Reading is better than sleeping

But dreaming leads to a deeper reading

Of reality's hidden meaning

Of the world's secret text

Here eyes ache head hurts

But there eyeless and headless

Words tremble into beings

Take up their beds and walk

Out past language and thought

Into a single silent flame
Where we moths are caught

Waking in death's little dream

We hover sizzle are consumed

We children of the sun and moon

Returned to read the earth our home

A Bus Named Terror Valentine

Caught on a crowded bus in the middle 

Of crazy traffic hordes of people

Rushing around I had no idea

How far I was from home

But pushing panicked toward the opening

Door I bumped into an old woman

And turning to apologize

Her gray eyes peering up at me

She said don't hold yourself

Too tightly to the minute

We're going nowhere and we

Will surely get there

And immediately my terror

Fell apart and calmly I sat up in bed

Night Passage Valentine

A low moan in a tangled bush

Your path obstructed by a stream

Thin clouds lapping in the breeze

A voice shouting in a dream

That wakes you up and makes you walk

Through trees to a rocky beach

Where the moon's sleek raft

Crosses over the starry lake

And again you've arrived too late

To catch a passage on its light

Stranded here and half-awake

And turning back you find

A woman weeping in the woods

Her face the first pale trillium

Brightening the fading night

After The Play (for Glen)

It was only in the morning I woke up

With a renewed respect for evil

Its cleverness and sheer hard work

Its dedication to its intentions

I still believe it all begins

With some fundamental misunderstanding

A sense of injury envy fuels

At not being appreciated respected

Which finally leads to violence

Leaving the good stunned and silent

Their only weapons reason and love

Unsure how far those will get them

Each one standing alone on the stage

With only forgiveness to protect them

Exiled Valentine

An empty mountain and an empty sea

With an even emptier house between

I went there in a remembered dream

I climbed the mountain where nothing grew

I swam in the sea and came out blue

I made a small fire in the house

And fell asleep waiting for you

And woke to find you'd come and gone

I could tell because the sea was warm

And the mountain loomed taller in the sun

And I knew I'd been abandoned there

With nothing to do but climb and swim

But every night you'd bring me food

And one day you'd return for good

 

Historical Valentine

There's something about human history

That reads like a good murder mystery

The real murderer still at large

The mastermind pulling the strings

Who could be the wily detective himself

Making sure the case goes unsolved

Appalled as the bodies pile up

Announcing to the press he's hot

On the trail he will soon be caught

He's following several persons of interest

His agents working day and night

But the centuries roll by

While the real murderer smiles

Passing right under our noses

Skinny Valentine

When you showed me an old photo

Of a beautiful young couple

For a few uncanny seconds

They were strangers to me

Though I knew I knew them

We were so skinny back then

My daughter and me with

One of her old boyfriends

They'd been living together

For a while and she had

Wanted me to meet him

He flew planes and soon

Flew out of her life

Ephemeral as memory

Rainbow Valentine

Every now and then for us refugees

They lower another rainbow bridge

The angels who work for a living

So we may bundle up our sins

And hurry across before it melts

Often we only see it from a distance

And wonder-filled are strangely

Grateful to stop and stare

As if at the birth of the colors

Those hard laborers of light

Drifting in their little boats

Just to know they're there

Still lowering their nets

To catch our night

Meditative Valentine

More and more I feel my mind

Resembles a static radio station

Receiving two opposing signals

One that wants me to wander around

Going from thing to thing

Until I finally fall asleep and one

Who returns to push me awake

And tells me to pay attention

To put my life in my open hand

And watch what happens when

I am not the center of the world

But immediately that reminds me

Of some other thing I have to do

And off I go chasing some distraction 

Until suddenly you intervene again

who are you anyway to yank me back

Admonished and momentarily redeemed

Eastern Valentine

Sometimes crowding in on me

So I can get out of myself for a while

Impossibly I circumnavigate the world

I fly east over great harbors and towns

And somehow even from this height

I can see the most intimate things

A girl blowing her nose on the way to work

A man carrying the dead body of a friend

A rainbow crouching in a lost valley

And sometimes I feel I won't be able

To come back so absorbed I get

In the trillion lives we're living

Out there in the middle of nowhere

Where I feel I might be found

Still Here Valentine

I'm still here trying to figure out

How the ample sunlight is a kind

Of thinking up of the world

A mind full of eager ideas

And penetrating meditations

How it feels its way along

Researching through the night

Coming up with yet another

Clear theory of the morning

Filling in and painting out

Pyramidal cities and mountain paths

Until there is nothing it hasn't

Thought of considered touched

No creature it hasn't come to love

Promised Valentine

In a little while I promise

I will ascend from this chair

And go and take some pictures

Of my narrow yard to send you

In return for the ones from yours

Is there something in our blood

That cannot live without a little

Color in our lives that needs

Taking care of watering and such

Or is it just nostalgia for the future

Which the flowers represent

Our green hearts slowly turning red

The scent in the air opening up

To a whole other life

His Gaze Valentine

If even his most intimate friends

Don't recognize him at first

When they meet him again

Only a few days later

Wearing so youthful a face

How will we not look

Into a stranger's eyes

Passing him on the street

Sensing only later it was him

And we have missed our chance again

But luckily for us he's dissolved

His gaze into the air and earth

An ocean that stares back at us

Or a tree awaiting our arrival

One Who Made It To The Other Side Valentine

Pass me now your Easter eyes

The flowering ones you use

To illuminate the fields and woods

The light that pierces through

From inside the earth

Finally released and felt

The world as it really is

Spread out your risen smile

Over the mountainous sky

Give me your leafy hands to kiss

Let me stop to cry

Whisper to me your secret

Of how not to die

Holy Saturday Valentine

There is something there

But I don't see it

And then suddenly it appears

How could it be there all along

But I didn't see it

Unless seeing is layered

Like sedimentary stone

Laid down over centuries

Of noticing one thing after another

Is this how memory lurks

Unraveling the future

Now I see it now I don't

Built up from successive blindnesses

I slowly perceive a cup

Little Apocalypse Valentine

The classical bust of Adam

In my romantic garden

Is looking a little post-modern

And droopy today with dew

Because the lantana have overrun

The dead orange and the branches

Of my blue-flowering 

Backyard tree keep asking

Why you must make it harder

Than it needs to be

Hanging over the roof when

You will all have to be cut back

And hauled out to the alley again

Spring has such eager hands

Inspired Valentine

I have an idea

I've retrieved from a dream

Let's get dressed

And I'll tell you about it

Over breakfast and we

Can drive to the beach

Just a few hundred miles

Through the blooming desert

To catch the sunset on the water

And lay together in our tent

In that little grove we found

And renew our vows to the stars

To the whisper of lapping waves

And sleep at last content

Unplanned Valentine

We showed up on the wrong night

All dressed up and eager

To a dark and empty theater

How could we have confused the date

Speeding here not to be late

We looked at one another and laughed

I trusted you to get it right

But it wasn't entirely my fault

Had we missed the performance

Or was it still to come

You found the announcement on your phone

Two weeks from now

When we won't be home

So we had some time to kill

And that was the night

We first made love

As if the universe had reserved

Just the right space for us

We were bound to fill

In The Spring Air Valentine

I don't know what kind of flying bug

What name it goes by not a fly

Greenish and in constant motion

But every morning now as the days

Fill with more and more light

It comes back to hover and dart

About as if feeding on something

Catching bits of sunlight a few feet

In front of where I'm sitting

And then another of its kind

Comes to join it and they roll

In the air coupling and uncoupling

Desire woven with suffering

In even the smallest things

Invisible Valentine

What can you do with the eyes

But wash and watch them

How the light flows in and out

Birthing equally into the blood

As into those new leaves over there

And the light I send to them

From my ideas of what light

Can possibly conceive

Hiding as much as it reveals

Of the darkness of my inner life

Aren't they struggling the eyes

Like burning coals to light

As much of the world inside

That the invisible grow bright

Afterwards Valentine

I dunked a stale cookie

Into some cold coffee

But I could not revive it

The corpse of a cookie

That once had a life of its own

Among other yummy cookies

Still warm from the oven

And this coffee all the way

From Guatemala only

To glaze over unfinished

In the cup you sent me

From North Carolina

But that's how much I missed you

Feasting on lonely leftovers

Here in crummy Arizona

Always Valentine

One long contrail running

North to south

And another long one

Running east to west

So they cross alone

In the bluest sky

And it just happens to be

A good Friday afternoon

Does this mean the end

Of suffering as we know it

Taken up in the clouds and dissolved

So we can move on

To the real resurrection

Always tomorrow's dawn

Dogwood Days Valentine

I need my opera binoculars

And about three more weeks

To catch the birds coming back

And the sylphs who emerge

With their first pale green

All wrinkled and furry

The drops of blood falling

On the whitest flowers

Winter's ghosts brilliant

In the sodden woods

Until all the birds speak at once

In their separate languages your name

And the sun rides up

To rest on your lap my head

Wherever Valentine

It's always the same boarding a plane

Feeling everything familiar fall away

Suspended mid-air among strangers

Becoming anonymous and thrown

Up against the sky vulnerable

And alone as a bird or cloud

Each of us strapped in our thoughts

Sleeping or watching a movie

Or non-stop talking and laughing

It all feels like a kind of dying

I listen to Stutzmann singing Handel

'And soon thereafter, wherever you are,

You will see me come flying to you

To embrace you ever faithful.'

Back Then Valentine

I just wanted it to stop

So I locked the door against you

But you pounded so fiercely

I had to let you in

Broken and crying we stood

Holding one another

Until the shaking stopped

How could you you said

When you know how much

I need you now

You showed me the rose

Of my life you said

See I have carved your face

In the palm of my hand

I will not forget you

Forgive me I said 

I was hurt and lost

Let's try to love again 

No matter the cost

Impressionable Valentine

After several false starts

Earnest but not forceful enough

I managed to wrestle myself

Upright from the floor

My exertions had been mostly mental

I pondered my motivations

And the serious responsibilities

That come with standing up

Which can only lead to walking

And falling back down again

But why restrict my options

To crawling and whining

To sitting tied to a chair

When you I wanted to impress

I could just run to over there

Some Souls Valentine

Some souls are all will

The worker bees and drones

The how without the why

Busy until they die

Some souls are all feeling

The heart is queen

And passionately she rules

At the center of their world

While other souls are all thoughts

They lay the honey in the head

And rise and swarm

Restless for another home

How fortunate this whole constuction

Hovers above a field of flowers

Unfinished Valentine

Out of a large unfinished book

I was allowed to read only one long chapter

Taken from somewhere I think

In the middle of the story

So I couldn't tell if it

Was just a comic interlude

Among a series of wild adventures

Or the point where the central

Character has figured out the plot

And taken up the authorship

Of all that must inevitably follow

Or write a whole new age

In the fable of so many I's

Wandering across the page

Between Valentine

I think there are only three protagonists

In the world and two of them

Are sworn enemies of the third

Two lies that want to divide

The world between them

One a dreamer and one a schemer

Who deny any middle way

Any common ground between

Pure spirit and simple matter

As if there was only night and day

One life one death to chose

Forgetting the one who walks

The razor's edge between them

Freely holding sway

Exiled In Heaven Valentine

Your body may be elsewhere

Long since living in the breeze

But here they placed your stone

In the city where you died

Having written your masterpiece

Which somehow every year grows

More necessary to acknowledge

If only for its resonant

Architecture of a clearer life

The key it leaves we've lost

For us to find under your stone

A map to the door that takes us 

All the way back to heaven 

And all the way through hell

World Valentine

Every so often I get up

And go look at the world

It makes me a little crazy

As a child or helpless parent

All the plans it's up to

That keep me awake at night

Marveling and worrying

I go where it's snowing slowly

Or sit on some morning beach inspired

Listening to the mothers of the world

Getting their kids to school

Uninvited I attend as many funerals

As I can think of before I sleep

I feel you will take my life my friend

I know our friendship will never end

Leaning Valentine

The lovely fanciful and strange

Geometry of the waves out there

The booming along the icy shore

Below the cliffs our own abyss

Between paradise and here

Where we take our daily stroll

Where only the imagination's real

As a hand to kiss and hold

Against the cold that stiffens us

And would eat our breath

Will swallow us whole

If we would let it

Leaning homeward through the snow

As if we believed in death

Staying Valentine

My dear Lord and I still relate

On strictly formal terms

And try to remain objective

About one another and the world

I love he treats me like a dog

Who leans into his master's words

And takes me on long walks with him

Where he lets me off the leash

He knows I love the passionate grass

And the freedom to run at will

Which a confined life craves

With only your instincts and bright

Brown eyes and slobbering face

To feel what it means to hear

Him tell me to sit and stay

Slow Valentine

Between the mineral and the moral world

Where we work in deep watery mines

Where the shining gems are dug

After their long infancy as dust

Their slow curing and maturing

In the furnaces of time

But doesn't a sapphire decide one night

To change its life and crumble

Back to its primordial light

Before it can be seized and worn

On some ancestral crown

Or wed to some newlywed's finger

When so much deeper into light it wants

To run and take us slowly with it

At Least Valentine

Best pulling on a day or two

After a good rain and the ground

Forgives your weedy sins

And you can grab them by the roots

Before they bloom though some

Have already run to seed

Picked till the bed is bare and clean

Except for a school of poppies

Red and salmon swimming

Upstream in the sunny air

At least something can look perfect

And you can stand and stare

Your knees sore and ancient

After so much prayer

Stirring Valentine

The cold speaks only one solemn word

That would pronounce us dead

That could be why the snow pretends

The stillness of a corpse

To show us how to rest content

With all this fallenness

Rehearsing the funeral of the world

And yet the body stirs

As we sit and wait

It rolls over in its sleep

Only dreaming it's dead

At least I felt it when I woke

Green entering my bones

Infant sun stretching out its hands

Sometimes Valentine

Sometimes I let my body become

One large ear sitting in a chair

I try to hear how far out

Listening can stretch even to you

Past traffic and alarms and dogs

Out past where the trillium

Whisper under snow and the mouse

Emerges from his hole to find

The white owl waiting

Soundless wings to take him 

Out past fear and longing

Until hearing itself becomes

A kind of singing along

To an orchestra of stars

Some Trees Valentine

On some bare trees

The flowers burst out

Before the leaves

An extraterrestrial

Advance over the old

Way of doing things

They reassert

The urgency of infancy

As if the soul came first

And the body as afterthought

Merely trembled in the branches 

As if the medicine arrived

Before the sickness

Only spring can cure

You Ask About The Weather Valentine

Nothing more spiritual than the weather

Which liberates or confines us in our place

Nothing more alive more vigorous

Even when it's creeping past

Gathering or scattering birds

Bestowing or withholding light

Clearly a creature with a sense

Of humor and a real understanding

Of the sufferings of the world

I mean the way it so accurately

Reflects our moods and aspirations

Back to us in lightening and clear skies

How it reminds us nothing dies

That won't return tomorrow

Untranslatable Valentine

When one language looks at another

Let's say Chinese and Lithuanian

To see what sounds it's come up with

For the same thoughts so each thing

Has hundreds of words in the world

Each word shaping the mouth it speaks

As a certain atmosphere of place

Conjures up its own articulation

The way wind shears rocks and

Water returns to a dry creek bed

Each word with its own language

Its unavoidable accent and sighs

So we are spoken as much as speak

Heart-Scammer Valentine

You wake me at seven

To tell me I've won two million

And a new Mercedes Benz

You must think I'm a fool

That my mind leaps at the money

Which I'd love to give away

You remind me of a romance

That took me for a ride

A merry-go-round of fictions

But boy how you could dance

So now I know the scam

You taught me love is not

Truly and for real

Something you can steal

Saved Valentine

I keep a bank in the shape of the Buddha

Where I can throw all my loose change

One of those clear glass golden ones

Where I can see it's only half-full

Still not enough coppers or dimes 

For that promised cruise to Mars

Where they say the Buddha was sent

After his final trip to earth

It seems we're not the only planet

In need of a shepherd or diplomat

Someone who can speak the truth

Though it takes years to hear it

And many lengthy wars apparently

Peaceful under the bodhi tree

Close Valentine

His insight was hidden

In his attitude to those around him

And in the way he formed his words

Two clear groups emerged

Some who could love him

And some who wanted him dead

Which is so ironic in light

Of his purpose carefully withheld

To take the world by storm

On the page his words seem stern

But I try to imagine them spoken

By a voice of reassuring calm

Not as you might talk to a child

To soothe his fears but straightforwardly

As you would speak with a close friend

Ash Thursday Valentine

One of the sweeter gifts of getting old

Is that you start to see how the future

Doesn't really flow out of the past

But is its own bright river making its way

Youthful and brilliant and jostling

From the opposite invisible shore

Urgent with new impulses

Swirling into eddies and strange twists

You would never have imagined

Until it merges with the past

Which usually tries to drag it down

Right there where there's a waterfall

The roar of the one pouring into the other

The silence of the present moment

Where you are neither old nor young

What We'll Do Valentine

The world is damned today you said

When you meant to say damp

Your tongue slipped out

How you were really feeling

That's a little harsh I said

I mean I realize it's raining

Which you have to agree

Is some kind of blessing

At least the green thinks so

Even if a bit too optimistic

But don't be that child I say

In the back-seat pleading

Are we there yet repeatedly

Tell me what we'll do

When we get there

When love proves true

Take Me Valentine

The first dimension is the shadows of birds

Gray blurs on the sunny patio floor

The second dimension is the birds themselves

Reddish-brown in the leafless trees

The third dimension is their invisible aura

Stretching out all around them now

The fourth dimension can only be imagined

All the way to the ninth symphony

Sung by a single bird

Slowly unwinding the world

Perched on the finger of God

Take me it sings as you

Have given yourself to me

And let the spring begin

To The Well Valentine

Soon after the wine was saved

The best for last at the feast

The loaves and little fishes came

A boy with his meager catch

Who just happened to be there

So much leftover even enough

For our still hungry mouths

But what moves me even more

Is that young woman who hurries past

Every morning to the well and waits

For him to join her there

To share together those first drops

And drink their sorrow away

The Last Of Us Valentine

The world is such a serious place

Though still not serious enough it seems

And graver and graver events occur

And good things happen every day

The patient refuses half his medicine

The diagnosis staring him in the face

So I wonder if that's the plan

Since nature is already dying

To raise up another kind

Of human being letting the old one

Die as all things physical must

So we can finally see the angels

And the devils in our midst

And our real life dawning

Cliffside Valentine

The sun italicizes a single flower

Leaning from cliffs above the sea

All that's left of Italy in Monterey

Such are the waves of its memory

Restored and blurred restored and blurred

A morning cafe's whispered words

The journey through a spring of woods

Lunch by a galloping stream

But these are not Ravenna's stones

Where that singular figure dreams

Held up and tossed by screaming gulls

Here on the other side of the world

With its emphasis on a persistent flower's

Eager shattering of clouds to blue

Heart Day Valentine

My heart is a foul-smelling flower

(or a rose without a scent)

That calls the midnight moths

To come and drink with them

My heart is a drunken sailor

Walking perfectly on the sea

Mistaking it for eternity

Its exuberance won't recover

From the sunlight on the water

My heart knows how to drown

And how to settle up with time

My heart keeps one eye open

Even sleeping in the ground

Earth's Valentine

Earth is the only place

I've found so far

Where I can be myself

When I lived on Mars

I was never at peace

And Venus was a madhouse

Of hot and cold desire

And though I still enjoy

Driving to Mercury in the spring

To visit the ruins and tombs

There's something irreplaceable

About the earth that makes it home

That even after horrendous journeys

Or is it because of them I'm not sure

That only here does love seem real

Nothing More Valentine

Even these stones gathered in a bowl

Cannot contain their secrets long

And of course the amaryllis among them

Standing tall and fearless is forced

To bare her beauty to us all falling apart

Her four brave trumpets collapsed balloons

Making death look foolish and small

Forgetting the seeds she's buried inside

The dark passages of her reappearance

Her roots slow suffering among the stones

Her thick leaves licking the passing light

Straining for another victory of her own

Nothing more feeble than a flower to reveal

The secret immortality of the earth

Ferry From The Vineyard Valentine

Aren't all small islands mythical beguiling

As soon as we see one we want

To go there is it the allure

Of an independent life separated

From the mainland where we feel

Only one out of so many group souls

While out there the forests and rivers

The secret beaches and radiant nights

Might return us to our original selves

The ego that owns an island

But not quite yet itself

The world invites us to be greedy

Foolish and vain or merely good

Itself an island still to be explored

Thirsty Lives Valentine

We owe our other lives to those

Who knowingly lived them for us

So we wouldn't have to go through

All they had to endure and overcome

Those who worked for better things

For us but felt their lives were wasted

When they saw what waited down the road

They knew it was never about survival

The immortal ones had settled that

Tedious argument long ago

So when he sat down with the Samaritan woman

They drank to life together and the sorrow

Of self-discovery happy sorrow

Grateful they took back their lives

And urged them forward to tomorrow

At The Gate Valentine

There is another man like me

The mailman and the morning moon

He follows up and down the streets

Unpaid bills and shiny magazines

Half-read and thrown away

And you can tell what house

He's at in the neighborhood

By the dogs growling at the doors

Reminding us that he persists

Somewhere out there delivering fate

In little envelopes and humming

To himself as if he himself

Had gathered all this knowledge

Of the world and left it at the gate

For us to sort through searching

Searching for that note from you

Our Other Soul Valentine

On the avenue of the arts these days

Music takes the sunny side of the street

It follows us everywhere inescapably

Reminding us we have a soul after all

That sings of another kind of feeling

For another kind of world

The one that came before words

And goes on long after them

Which our tongues remember

Tilting into those first notes

Thunderous chords at the arrival

Of the descending gods

Or the trembling of a childish reed

That takes and lifts our listening along

Kaspar's Valentine

When you try to trace the hidden history

Of this simple boy this guileless man

You come upon this panoramic

Painting of the last two millenia

Strolling the museum of your mind

Where the artist has collapsed

Great empires to a few dark lines

Scattered randomly but giving back

To insignificant events their glory

And there imagining your surprise you see

His life unraveling before you stark and charmed

With all the power of a fairy story come alive

Monsters poison magic bread a pure heart

All it takes to raise us from the dead

Turned Around Valentine

Left to myself I would not become myself

I would be fine I guess but meaningless

Like this hungry starling intelligently leaping

On my green and startled lawn

Clutching some midnight still some rain

So much to me in that leaping

With my own hands I've removed

My similarly hungry heart so it can do

That hopping he does that jive that joy

Because one day you saw it thrashing

And urged me to lift it out

You who live with the sun

Beating soundly inside you

And your heart flying freely about

The Science Of Beauty Valentine

Tell me full moon in Leo strolling by

Is your beauty truly won or merely bestowed

Where would you be if the creeping sun

Did not restore your ugly soul

To borrowed brightness 

You grudgingly dissolve

In the old stories we return

To your landscape of utopias

To your forbidden forests

Before the earth rejected you

Though you still claim to love her

Passing back and forth

Tonight I hear your lion's roar

At my front door

But I with beauty sleep

My Sophia Valentine

First I get quite warmed up

Sitting in the sunny air

My morning ablution

Wiping away my spidery dreams

Then the cat in the shady chair

And I switch places where

In the warmth she thoroughly 

Brushes her silvery hair

Then quietly falls asleep while I

Grow more attentive and awake

Waiting and watching for a woman

Who at this hour sometimes passes by

My tangled yard on her morning walk

But usually I just catch a glimpse

Of her purple shawl as she breezes past

Her eyes hidden her smile uncertain

That once bestowed the world on me

Assigned Valentine

Just as I arrived on earth

I forgot what I was doing here

My screen-brain froze and blinked

And a vast empty space opened up

In which everything was starting over

But gradually I could unravel

The child I was into his later years

As an archeologist does charred bones

Of his own former life a slave

In time it all came back to me

The long years of studying the clouds

The ceremony of my assignment

The same as it had always been

Just remember to love the earth

Candlemas Valentine

Stand with me my angel of light and love

Fill me and flow through me

Guide me and protect me

Just to imagine is enough

The mystery of your presence

How hard you must suffer

Days and nights of endless chores

Just to afford to send me

To the best schools and places

Where your reverence shames me

Your faithfulness inspires me

And even so I set against you

So much obstinance and pride

My well-constructed darkness

Your light in which I hide

Buddha's Valentine

I think something of his Buddha-nature 

He saw inside every tree and cloud

To sit in one place and look out

And behold himself arrayed

And knowing he'd never be back

In a physical body on earth again

He could take his sweet time

Kissing each thing goodbye

It must have been then he realized

He could see the object of his love

Approaching to receive his love

There is that final intermingling after all

When we become what we love

And find it's Love itself

Gino's Valentine

When he was only twelve he happened

On a bookstore and drifted in a trance

To a dusty shelf of titles he knew at once

He 'd stumbled on the mother-lode of wisdom

He was far from his native language

His family torn apart barely enough

Money for keeping alive let alone books

But whenever he could he'd come

To that little corner in the back of the shop

And take down one of those books

Smoothing the dust away with his fingers

And open it randomly and read

Just a paragraph or two letting it sink

Into his soul like drops of water

His parched lips slowly drinking it all

Garden Valentine

Last night asleep I planned a flower garden

For a large rectangular empty space

Out of all the gardens I've never made

This would be my masterpiece

Isn't it really all about the timing

Of the colors and the weaving into

One another of the local seasons

But nothing too contrived

The soil is the soul of things

I leave the weather to the gods

I imagine a few hidden rooms

Along a path leading to a clearing

Where a few loaded apple trees

Await our eager choosing

19th Interview For Death Valentine

Now that you've completed the external screening

The background check and required blood-work

And met the upper echelons our shining lights

And somehow satisfied their endless questions

Though a few of your responses seemed

A little sketchy and I must tell you

There's an archangel on the fifth floor

Still demanding we re-review a few

Of your obvious qualifications

But now the process can proceed to states

Of anxiety or indifference as you wait to hear

Just know that our communication is slow

And the competition stiff and constant

But just between us my dear I'm sure

You'll knocked it soaring out of the park

Once Friends Valentine

Out for my walk

I stop to wait

For a finch to drink

Some leftover rain

A cautious nervous thing

Is it ever sure it's safe

To bend and lift its head

To take a single drop

Out of the brimming pail

Another and another

Its existence is such a marvel

And yet I'm hurt that we are

Now estranged once friends

And fluttering and helpless must

Insist upon such distance

Paradiso In Exile Valentine

I think I write these verses

Because I'm too embarrassed

To remain still or silent

In the presence of beauty

And just start to babble

I drop my glasses and step

On them doing a stifled dance

To make her/him/it smile

I try to change the subject

I try harder not to stare

I wonder what Dante would say

When even he was speechless

When his love sent him away

To speak more than a passing glance

Thinking Valentine

To think the world swims through my head

And then turns to look back at itself

Pushing aside my narrow view of it

So it can behold its entire self

We keep changing places with one another

Like children spinning till they're dizzy

Throwing off their bodies and falling

Wide-eyed helpless in the grass

To think the world is so much younger

Than I look more comfortable

In its body like a mountain or an ocean

Falling through my thoughts

To think we fit inside one another

And what I make of it it makes of me

So precise the soul's geography

Some Angels Valentine

Some angels among us 

Are never tactless as I can be

Black-belts of calm and courtesy

They try to set a good example

And because they keep

Their fears in check

Rarely see the need for anger

Mostly they are sober

And cheerful their visits

Brief and to the point

And leave me feeling both

Chastened and heartened

Like just right now a passing finch

Scolded me with his lovely song

And showed me how to get along

Let Us Valentine

Let us lift up our flaming swords of love 

Into the heights of the farthest stars

And into the depths of the darkest moments

Let them sear through our grandiosity and pain

That even such a sword exists

If we can just imagine it ourselves

As heroes of some childish play

Our armor a black cardboard box

Our tinfoil helmets flashing in the lights

Standing in the silence of forgotten lines

But just then we remember to lift them up

Our flaming swords of love

And for a few moments we are good

And everything around us better

Inside Out Valentine

Here we have sweet oranges in winter

Instead of snowflakes and frozen lakes

Tall palm trees that glisten in the sun

Instead of icicles and blanketing gray

Billowing clouds that come to stay

Your white winters are our green springs

Struggling to survive on chilly nights

That rise to blooming afternoons

While you descend to darker depths

But woe come summer here

When the heat evaporates our souls

And we are caught between bliss

And despair praying for rain

To plump the oranges up again

Some Say The World Will End In A Word Valentine

Is there a hierarchy of words

Where some are more powerful than others 

Or are all words slaves to saying

Out of all the languages aren't there words

Longing to find a common voice

A new speech free of constraints

Words that shape the bodies 

That speak them words as beings

Bestowing life on death

Words killed by too much speaking

Words lost with no one to speak them

Words not afraid to finally be spoken

Words we can never hear enough of

Words that dare to speak of love

Brief History Of Words Valentine

Words were born as simple sounds

That outlined pictures in the air

Before they grew up to become epics

Back in the day only the gods

Had words often the same

Word endlessly repeated

While we mute animals

Could only listen to their babble

What a human is to a horse

An angel tries to teach a name

But if you give us speech we said

You'll take away our innocence and passion

But the words wouldn't listen

As they fell into our mouths

And words became the flesh of gods

Unforgettable Valentine

How will I ever remember my former lives

If I can't even remember what happened last month

Out there on my ocean of forgetting

A few fishing boats still gather

I can only hope for from the shore

That it will all come back to me

The last time as a surprise

The faces with their lost names

The yes that's it exactly

No longer blurred or hazy

And not just what happened

But the hidden workings

That went on behind them

So nothing gets forgotten

How Long Valentine

It occurs to me that if Africans

Had never been brought to the Americas

By so many ignominious means

And the native peoples weren't already here

White people would never learn

What real democracy could be

And even if by some soul alchemy

The colors were switched I wonder

Would prejudice still survive

Brotherhood still evade our grasp

The original myth that I am better than you

Or can be made so by money or power

At the basis of all violence and hate

How long will it struggle against common sense

Because Valentine

Because the sun was in the sky

Flashing his ruby breast

A hummingbird came close enough

To look me in the eye

And fly off unimpressed

Because the sun was in the sky

And the air pristine

From yesterday's rain

And I had nothing to do or say

But startled and under arrest

By that peculiar bird

Who lay no claim

But took me as I am

And left me feeling blessed

Spring Valentine

How rain and snow are distributed

In the brain how heat and air

Compete with them in the blood

How this arrangement into veins

Urged to swell their banks

Is held back by the dam of the heart

So the winters are warmed

And the summers cooled

And the soul can live apart at times

From the weathers of the world

In its little cabin of rainy thoughts

And fiery feelings and wait

For the sun inside to arrive

And the real greening to start

Bird Hitting the Window Valentine

It's hard not to be continually thinking of yourself

Carrying this body around when the voices

Keep saying your selfish when some of those voices

Don't seem to have your own best interests in mind

Like standing in the middle of a stadium

With thousands of languages coming at you

Trying to tell you what to do

All of which you have to blot out

Until you can only hear your own 

Poor heart beating calmly

Having overcome your fear

Of being who and how you are

Enough not enough

A bird that comes and goes

Often Valentine

Often these dreams I'm standing on the shore

Looking out on the glittering body of the sea

Wondering how I'll ever get out there

To that island hovering just above

The cloudy edge of things

And wondering why I would want

To go there so much and how

I'll find a boat to take me there

Or an old man who speaks the language

And can lead me to the little town

Where I must have been born

To my first family and friends

Wondering who I can be to them

Curious stranger so long gone

Finally Valentine

Today I've got the blues for the world

But only the golden yellows for you

Why does it insist on madness

Mocking my gladness over you

If I forget there are millions of you

Being loved beyond sadness

Or solace or the strife on earth

If I grow impatient with love

Wasting its time on the world

When it could be so much

Greater than life or the mind

When you know it has it in it

Having entered the world

To finally take it as its own

Coming Through Valentine

I have a small round hole

In the roof of my old hut

Through which the sunlight becomes

A small full moon in that dark space

As in the first caves and temples

It strays back and forth on the walls

Striking off the seasons

And I have a small round hole

In the back of my head

Through which these thoughts

Like torches come and go

Searching the dark walls

For the lives I've lived

The bright horses of the future

Both Of Us Valentine

Putting aside all this living and dying

Let's go walk on some water

I mean what are you doing today besides

Laundry and what's for supper

Let's take our small boat far out

On the freezing and choppy lake

Despite that dark cloud coming

Toward us let's do some fishing

For the health of our spiritual selves

Let's indulge in some eternity

I mean the one standing on the shore

Watching and waiting for us not to drown

Then walking home through the quiet woods

Feeling both lost and found

Esoteric Interview Valentine

Tell me where you are strict with yourself

And where and when you let yourself off easy

How do you deal on a daily basis

With knowing so little of who you are

But persisting on a whim or a prayer

What affection constitutes a crisis

In your neural conscience

What is your favorite flower or weed

And which gives you more satisfaction

Does your life have a focal point

That has nothing to do with you

How often do you see a doctor

Do you currently have a lover

Can you work undercover

In Pursuit of Life Valentine

I can confess now I'm old

I hardly did anything I was told

Oh I made it look like that

But always secretly or not

I thought I had something hidden

On my own to add and went

My way as a double agent

Spying on my life from its other side

Susceptible to mysteries and codes

Following your trails gone cold

Elusive ghost of my nights and days

I tried to tell you once

Don't play with life but listen

It's not something you will ever solve

Human Love Valentine

The sweet apples of human love

We're still picking and eating them

Or do you prefer the sour biting kind 

Some chew like corrugated cardboard

All texture and no succulence inside

Corpses dressed up to look like apples

Beautifully arranged in market stalls

But we were only eating love

In those days dripping from our mouths

Each other's muse for the art

We were making of it the happy

Mess the heaps of brown cores

The pails of seeds gathered

Our plan was even more orchards

Even more apples of human love

Epiphany Valentine

There must be all kinds of angels

As there are all kinds of human beings

Aren't the evil promoted to high places

Taking up authority in our minds

Just as the good is given its reward

Like a proofed bread rising

To become food for the gods

Those who have scaled the heights

Outdistancing destiny and yet deigning

To weave us into their schemes

Holy and unholy but thank God

There was one with enough courage

And sense of self to combine

A human and a heart divine

Small Valentine

You mothers and fathers of the sun

You sisters and brothers of the moon

All you numberless out there in the world

Your will that works in consequences

Your heart always picking up the pieces

Do you think I feel nothing

About what you think of me do you

Feel nothing of what I think of you

That when I look at you

I feel both particle and whole

Mountains filled with snowflakes

The gratitude of feeling small

As you are small my love

Held up against the stars

Only Hope Makes Things Happen Valentine

Two dreaded phone calls

But they both went better

Than I imagined them

Each day grows hungrier

And I fear will soon devour me

But every night restores me

To the conviction of forever

I don't let things as they seem

Trouble my dreams anymore

Even when by twilight

All faith is gone like birds

No one notices when they die

Someone in the night puts everything

Back in its place and I wake up somehow

Even more hopeful than before

New Year Valentine

I double-booked heaven and earth

I found I could be in both at once

Angels strode over my crossed veins

I stranded myself in a crowd of clouds

Rescuing my face from a drowned tree

I texted Li Po my sympathy

For his lost children and swollen feet

But he deleted me immediately

I buried my books in a red-tailed hawk

Who reduced their words to a single squawk 

A sound the Seraphim tossed her

Little pieces of light on a quiet lake

I was enthralled and appalled by myself

I was thrilled and filled with the world

I could feel you waking inside me

Love I have yet to deserve

 

 

Guardian's Valentine

Overwhelmed by all the ordinary cruelties

I have amassed all the shameful episodes

I have been part of or stood silently by

And for which I beg forgiveness for myself

For the presumption it could be forthcoming

If I'm to tame the marmoset I am

And learn to love you one at a time

You masters and great teachers

For which it will take eternity a lot

Of long walks off short piers

As a distant friend used to shout

After the terror the laughter

At the foolishness of God

In giving us the freedom

To reform his heaven

By bringing it down to earth