New Light Valentine

I'm told that there are ancient

Teachers who live inside the moon

Who when it separated from the earth

Went with it taking all their magic

To form their own circle of light

A doorway for the in and out of souls

So we could keep hold of the sun

At night and know it was still there

The intelligence falling from it

The pure warmth of the stars

Intermingling with the moonlight

Which is why we call her mother

Isis Sophie Queen of the Night

And pray for her return

Past Time And Space Valentine

Hands on your hips

You stand in the darkening yard

Proud of your progress so far

Things still to be done

But even without a plan

It seems to be coming together

At least by the look on your face

As I watch you through the window

Just standing there and you turn

Our eyes meeting and you smile

My hands on my hips

Mirroring-mocking you

Turning away with a shy grin

Love finding us out

Death Dream #87 Valentine

I suppose nearing the end

I dream back on the beginning

Because I'd love to start again

This was just a first sketch

Begging for revision

Next draft I'll be more conscious

Of others' feelings and more

Honest about my own

Next time because of you

There will be more diving deeper

And more sitting in the woods

More speaking your language

Less hesitation less hurry

When we meet again

On All Saints Day Valentine

I would like to arrange a tour

Of the thirteen obelisks of Rome

To see what old Thutmose was up to

What was so important he had

To write it on the finest granite

Monuments to the fathers

Who were gods and kings

Their fingers still pointing us upward

To a world we no longer see

On one there are doors carved

And windows as if someone

Lived there and on others a wish

That he would come again

And the gods speak to men

All Hallow's Eve Valentine

On the night of the not-dead souls

We dress the children up as ghouls

Or disgraced presidents or ballerinas

All manner of sheets and swords

And send them out on a candy bender

To defeat the monster death

You have to look like one

To pretend you're not afraid

You have to go from house to house

Scaring the bejesus out of the neighbors

Laughing in the face of their fear

Or bejeweled and swathed in silk

Pretend to be a princess angel

Freshly risen from the grave

Has This Ever Happened To You Valentine

At twilight out walking the dog

The streets empty and quiet

Lights on in some of the houses

The others dark and dreaming

She said she was overwhelmed

By a state of deepest silence

A soundless rapture

Of pure smiling peace

That stopped and seemed to lift

Her out of herself

A stillness she didn't want to leave

And when she tried to describe this

To her husband he looked at her

Like she was a child

Or was maybe finally going mad

Death Dream #79

I wandered through an empty school

And came into a great hall

Clouds melting on the walls

I went backstage and stood

In the doorways where the actors

Make their entrances and exits

Ghost children there were singing

And past the darkened dressing-rooms

To a door that locked behind me

To find myself in a dessicated

Garden and a grove of apple trees

Ripples of laughter in the leaves

I was alone as I had ever been

And could feel the earth invite me in

Daily Valentine

Yes I'm eighty but you don't

Have to push me around

Let me borrow some of your busy

I love the sound of your voice

Railing at me about all the things

That have to get done in the yard

And don't forget to put air in your tires

Last night the temperature dropped

But did you come to put a blanket

Over me or tell me the story

Of your daily disappointments

How the world is still so ignorant

And cruel let me wrap you

Safely in my dreams for you

Dear God Valentine

Not a God we have to invent

But ourselves with him here

Or without him there

She they it together

We come in with so much adoration

Starving for something to worship

Someone to hold dear

That feeling alone could be a God

Who has nothing to do with temples

Of death but an impulse

To invent a body over and over

A force that tunnels through it

And just goes on and on

Holding everything dear

Stray Valentine

Some cat sits at my feet

Adoring-suffering in its eyes

We cannot commit

Fully to one another

We keep to our ways

But she insists

On sleeping on my chair

So I'll feel guilty cruel

Chasing her off it when

She's keeping it warm for me

Our differences run deep she glares

It all comes back to the eyes

You know so little about love

But I can teach you stranger

With so much left to learn

Chosen Valentine

From the windy grave of Moses

Which God himself dug

So there must be such a place

You can still catch a glimpse

Of the Promised Land just there

Past the Plains of Moab

Past the festivals and the laws

To be carefully observed

That it go well with you

Like a father to his child

I bring stones to his tomb

Who knew I would doubt

And disappoint him the only way

I knew to become myself

Anticipatory Valentine

Moon on the sea

Sun on the earth

Sometimes they hold hands

Moon on the earth

Sun on the sea

Wait for it

The moment always coming

The moment always gone

And wedged between them

Your life so small

It hardly seems to matter

The way the moon does on the water

Or the sun does on the wall

Wait for it

Even you they call

Rapacious Valentine

We argued in the kitchen

Which was hungrier

The body or the soul

Whether there were two kinds

Of thirst or just one source

That the body could thrive

And thicken while the soul

Grew paler and thinner

Or the other way around

He was the cook for the children

And we stood in the forgotten

Emaciated garden of October

Make me kind chef the recipe

For my rapacious soul

Lest in terror it consume the world

Carried Valentine

A presence I was only aware of

When I felt pleasure or pain

And I admit humiliated

By your limitations your ugliness

My proud soul could not accept you

Always flaunting your innocence 

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry

How could wisdom have made you

And then placed you in my care

When I was a thief and a liar

Forcing you to carry me on your back

Lest my feet get caught

By this river rushing away

O plant me on the other side

You I learned to love too late

Arduous And Luminous Morning

Arduous and luminous morning

When the new moon we never see

Slipped from its lair to stand

Directly in front of the sun

A full black disk haloed

With radiant fire as if

The darkness of the past

Was trying yet again to overwhelm

All the future's light

And though the finches keep on singing

Through the minutes of muted light

We couldn't help but feel

This was the sign and seal

Of some momentous new beginning

In the biography of the light

What Is Human Work Valentine

The first organizing principle of the world

As every morning proves

Is the warmth of the sun

Out of its willingness to return

To the darkness it leaves behind

Our only source of the future

A little flame that bursts

Out of the ashes of every human heart

At least that's how I picture it

Each a sun with its own horizon

Hurriedly rising dressing for work

In freezing cold and humid heat

That something anything get done

Hating or loving our little lives

But is this really what the sun

Has in mind for us today

That so much light produce

So little good and our suns

Not shine the way they could

The Pleasure of Life Valentine

Some accept pain

As pleasure's payment

Of its debt but life's

No bargain and the cost

Of love accumulates over time

Keep your receipt he said

They'll want to scan it

When it's time to board

Marked with the date time and place

Each item clearly described

With its price in the right column

And the total at the bottom

Gratuity included not to worry

You'll never live long enough to pay it

No Excuses Valentine

Being afraid to love

Took up a lot of the time

I've lived I see that now

The fear meant love

Had already damaged me

That at one time or times

In the distant past

I had learned the need

To protect myself from it

Enough was enough

Though it made no sense

But somehow despite time

I've kept that memory alive

Of having once loved without fear

So I know I know how to do it

And have run out of excuses

Beholden Valentine

Human body earthly flesh

You live in the stirring

Of light and warmth

A little chaos of water

Turned blood a fish

Of the air with limbs

In no case does some love

Not stand behind you

A heart not beat for you

Breathing you in and out

Leaving you free to struggle

The poorest and the richest thing

On earth the only creature

Designed entirely by hope

Gone Before Valentine

For several years now

In the spring and in the fall

A single Flicker bird

For a day or two stops by

My yard here in the desert

On it way north or south

This must happen in other yards

But it seems unlikely after

So much time it could be the same bird

Who visits so consistently

Shrieking me to attention

Time to move on he calls

Time to find our real home

But he's gone before I can follow

Then Valentine

When he told us we couldn't take

Our heads to heaven with us

But only our naked hearts and deeds

That even our brilliant ideas luggage

We would have to leave behind

I suddenly felt foolish and afraid

Lifting my heart from my chest

Throwing the dice of my deeds on the table

It was then he said you would come

Plunging my hand in your side

So I knew I was truly dead

And though still no angel

Could sit with you and eat

All your food of love I was able

Mary's Valentine

In the stars begin divinity

A placement and a movement

As sure as nerves or sense

A meeting in and out of consciousness

Like pilgrims on a journey

Crowds and crowds of stars

Rushing past and suddenly emerging

One you can really talk to

One you have met before

At a wedding or in a dream

An open earnest joyful face

Once felt you can't forget

Who has been to Venus and back

And comes to you like morning

Eager to join you on your journey

Keep Going There Valentine

It's still astonishing to me

Our clever scientists don't see

The obvious morality

In every cell and star

Not just the stark intelligence

In the structure and design

Nor even the artistry that first

Led them to a shell or stone

But the essential goodness

In every natural thing

Revealing its true origin

In a superior world

I'm astonished by their fear

I know I share to ask

When we come to the dark abyss

What's there responsible for it all

Dismantled Valentine

In the manual for the dismantling

Of the delicate body from the soul

If you can't bear to read the text

Skip to the illustrations in chapter 3

Where a blameless gown is sketched

Unbuttoning a shattered bride

Next to the diagram of a second option

A bandage ripped off all at once

No time for the hurt to happen

Unmasking the wounded soul

As the real source of hunger and thirst

Look to the final pages if you haven't had enough

They're all in musical notation

And the beautiful body is humming along

Where Are You Tonight Valentine

The soul of the world is reaching

Despite the body's ancient lore

Just eighteen years old

Remember those days

When you were still cutting yourself

Sex and shame and alcohol

And yet bursting with potential

What did it mean to have a soul

Let alone entertain its secret source

The sense that something wants to destroy you

And you'll have to fight for your life

Because it could be you yourself

Having lost it poor soul

Who has come to save the world

Of All Valentine

Of all I was capable of doing

And all I would never master

Drawing music loving diving

Cooking praying kissing climbing

Overcoming my fear of flying

All I wanted to be for you

Which turned into a disaster

A phoenix rising from desire

Who knew only friendship cures

The disease of being only me

All I would never accomplish or achieve

Persisting in my narrow ways

To you the only one I leave

I feel certain will forgive

I Take The Cup Valentine

Our own hands were the first cup

Scooping the cooling water to our lips

Until our leaky fingers were struck

With the idea of a solid bowl

From which so many goblets

Trophies vessels have evolved
Even a chalice and a grail to hold

The mystery of the wine turned blood

And still I plead to take this cup

From me this sorrow and this pain

But who to give it to

The world refuses to take it up

I am myself the cup I drink

Which only your fine will can fill

While I Was Gone Valentine

You just couldn't help yourself

From harrowing the tired yard

Summer's dead removed

Leaving empty graves

Planted now with new

Flowering arrivals small

Hopes desperate to fill in

The few feet between them

The hard work of it

Humbling you proud

And our blue-flowering tree alone

Christ in its leafy branches

Heavier than you expected

Must have taken you days

Untangling his body from the dead

A Radical Departure Valentine

Sometimes these days I'm stopped

In my tracks just standing there

Immovable for a few moments

A stone in a stream letting it all

Wash over and around me

Life and time and my death go by

And it changes nothing this sunny day

It's as if I can feel myself

Melting and merging into things

A train or a bridge or an empty street

Like that one in Samos we walked all night

Because in a flash it all slips past

Veers off into some eternity

While death swims just upstream

Waiting at some harbor with you

Hepatica Valentine

To go from mineral to living color

From pebble to leafy petal flesh

Is it not an epoch's journey

To just show up one day

The rush of wind embracing

The miracle of your face

Waiting for your name to arrive

In no one's forest garden

After so much melting and groaning

Passing in and out of terrible fires

And silent centuries of ice

To bloom for a couple of hours

A mountain dissolved in your scent

Your secret promise kept

In The Time Of Elm Trees Valentine

Seventeen is the cruelest year

A rubber band pulled taut

Full of what you don't have

And empty of all you want

That summer I caught an endless bus

To a tiny North Ontario town

Where my ancient grandparents

Gave me a room in their crumbling house

And left me free to roam around

The fields and the next-door graveyard

Where their son the priest was laid

Grandma spoke hardly a word but

Grandpa played his fiddle for me

Ardent tunes from his Irish youth

And asked me what I wanted to be

I lied to them and said a priest

When a poet was the truth

I Don't Know Its Name Valentine

All summer long despite

The constant riveting heat

Purple flowers no one planted

Have spread in my narrow yard

It was the wind or the resident birds

Or seeds carried on my shoes

Tall large clumps the pools

Of sun have randomly fed

Kept constantly in flower

A pale alchemical purple

Waving above a sea of green

All if you look closely in

With a gleaming yellow center

That illuminates their sorrow

Earth's Valentine

The most curious thing about

Living on the earth today

Hobbled as we are by bodily misgivings

Besides the question of what it's worth

Is the unavoidable sense we're ever

Only aware of hardly half of what's

Right there in front of us

Stunned by the beauty of nature

We take the signifier for the sign

And get caught up in personal adventures

And the false science of history

How long will it be lost to us

The earth behind the earth

If we look further in

Where only spirit is

San Miguel Valentine

The San Miguel is a river in hell

That runs through deserted towns

Once flourishing with busy sounds

It starts with the naked bones of a saint

Exposed at the bottom of a pit

Who left behind forgotten now

A clear map to heaven

But once every ninth or eleventh year

He brings a heavy week-long rain

That turns the desiccated canyons

A startling resurrection green

A stolen paradise that lasts a season

When the dead return to the towns

To sing and dance in the ruined cathedrals

And tear all sadness down

From A Tower Valentine

It's clear when I look up

At the stars' blazing clusters

Of light like cities seen

From a plane at night

There must be other civilizations

Living there beings of light

At their most basic and profound

And it's clear the earth is just

One member of a scattered family

Even if the youngest one

Thrown out when her mother died

Putting everything in storage

And it's clear there's much

More darkness than light

But not clear which is winning

Cold Valentine

I left you stranded

On a distant star

With visitation rights

Just so I could drive this car

Speeding through winter nights

All the windows open

I left you for another

I would soon abandon

I left you pounding on the door

While I pretended to disappear 

Was it out of love or fear

I left you your favorite guitar

And a scribbled note

Please take the garbage out

Just Asking Valentine

What if suddenly this reliable earth

Evaporates under your feet 

And all the lights go out at once 

With only a lukewarm breeze 

Wafting from Saturn's shores

Breathing you slowly in and out

Will you have saved forgiveness enough

To spark a signal fire out of the nothing

Your are on that dark and shoreless sea

From what's left of your ashen heart

Will you have finally made a friend

Of that shining brother who stands

At heaven's only door or will

He send you back for more

One Valentine

Through whatever adumbrations

The world has led to you and me

So we can trace our bodies back

While our souls evade heredity

Some great grandmother's pale eyes

Recycled in a runaway boy

Who reenacts the promise

She was forced to destroy

Our souls that pull us forward

While our bodies trail behind

But this particular you

And this particular me

Our lives so intertwined

Divide equally between us

One destiny and mind

Unsolved Valentine

A body burnt beyond

Recognition in broad

Daylight and no one noticed

A human skull in a box

Of toys donated to Goodwill

Poisonous mushrooms popping up

Between the bright lantana flowers

Something rapping on my window

At two in the morning no one there

What am I to do with these

Edgar Allan mysteries

But turn the page read on

The clueless bodies pile up

The killer strikes at dawn

Late For Life Valentine

Her due-date's running late

Under the great dome of her belly

Her son's still staring at the ceiling

Where the frescoes of his life to come

Are just receiving the final touches

And the scaffolds are being taken down

Until finally his anxious guide and him

Are left alone in the vastness

Of the light of a single flame

His guide urging him to come

Look they're locking up the doors

But he's still taking pictures

With his phone to show

Them all when he gets home

Wilderness Valentine

How to get the story straight

In the land of if and but

Where there is nothing definite

But even more convincing doubt

How dam up the tide of hate

Would it only gouge a lake

To cover up our big mistake

What happened here

In that first year

How is it now

Only a few can hear

And yet the call stays clear

Only answerable

By love or fear

Because Valentine

Because I can hear them

They must be singing for me

A small nestle of finches

In the shedding tree

And that it matters not

To them I listen

Strangely caught

It matters all 

The more to me

Their song goes on forever

For pure pleasure

Until I start to hear

Buried inside

Some dark urgency

Some flight by night

That speaks to me

Recovering Valentine

A patch of skin flayed from the head

A transplant from the hips to fill it in

I hope you were under for all of it

And wake now with some effective meds

In your own comfortable bed

I'm sending my angel to sit with you

Until I can come myself

And a playlist of healing sounds

Some popular some Bach

Do you know Ravel's piano concerto

Second movement where the soul

Lifts out of the body and cascades

In a silver rain of stars as if

Music might make us whole

The Gift Of Extra Years Valentine

I rub my arm across my brow

I stare at purple flowers

I cut my hair shower and shave

And read content for hours

I wait for the ring-necked dove

To land on my neighbor's roof

Her coo is a kind of reprimand

Though she keeps it sweet and brief

I live in a luxury of time

Remembering all my debts

To friends pleading for forgiveness

And burying my regrets

If once you've really loved I find

There's no such thing as loneliness

Sweeping Up After Valentine

Last night the other shoe dropped

Heavy trees uprooted by high winds

An ochre dust covering the city lights

And then it rained for the first time

After several months of searing heat

And just yesterday I was reading all

About Proserpine the Goddess Natura

And the fairy-tale of her flight

Her slow fading from medieval minds

The forgetting of her holy rites

And now where she stood and spoke

A smiling weatherman predicts

Another rain will pass us by

Though the sky stay gray and thick

Where Am I Valentine

It's where my life domestic-comic

Intersects the incoming cosmic

On that bridge between the two

River rushing underfoot

Fires burning overhead

Where one can have a second thought

Not I but one with all the dead

The world lets us in too far

Yet everything depends on supper

First and last the river hums

That wants to carry me away

I stand admonished and amazed

In the kitchen of my days

Cutting carrots singing praise

What Does It Want Valentine

When I see the eye of the moon

Has opened up completely

And leans a little further in

As if for a better view of us

Blinking through shores of clouds

To mitigate its blinding gaze

I start to sense a great being

Whose blazing eye this must be

Some dreamer fully wakened

Looking around an unfamiliar room

Searching for its other eye perhaps

As if it left it here in the world

Pouring through every wave and town

Stopping every woman and man

God The Cat Valentine

Isn't God as tender as this cat

Who lays her cheek against my leg

And sleeps and snores like him

But still won't let me touch her

I know he can take on many forms

More ambitious than a cat

But something about her purring

Keeps him coming back

To stretch his legs

To leap and pounce

And after a long and

Unsuccessful hunt in the yard

Come home and rub his head

Against my foot circling me

Begging for his food

Paul's Birthday Valentine

Because we shared coming into this world

Into our strange and confusing holy family

Because you were the first infant I held

In my arms and I was only seven

I think I felt then so many

Years later looking back

A strange mixture of pride and envy

From the beginning and when

We grew up and went our ways

Meeting again only in the middle

Of our lives my talk turned into rancor

And after that we hardly spoke

For thirty years I think I felt

You were living the life

I had imagined for myself back then

And I resented you for it somehow

The life I had rejected for myself

And you into the bargain

But that was all a big mistake

Simple kindness tells me that

And your extended hand

What Enlightened Him Valentine

Because he foresaw

We'll all end up

As buddhas whatever

Time it would take

He treated everyone

He met with deep

Respect and tact

Bowing inwardly

As if to say don't forget

Where you're going

I hold you in the highest

Esteem your victory

Already won and look

You can almost taste it

Buddha Onboard Valentine

What if all babies are buddhas

Like the one following my gaze

Asking who are you as I pass by

And why are you smiling at me

A look of wonder about to cry

Or maybe a grin of recognition

Floats up from another world

The crease of a smile in time

To catch its blessing on the run

And carry home that image

Seeing everything for the first time

Face before it becomes a face

Yes why are you smiling

Try to be more like me

Crying and crying for this world

Unsure Valentine

When they finally dropped me off

On earth it was in the middle

Of a quarrel my unwed mother

Had to kiss my father off to war

Inside her we took the train

From nowhere north to the busy city

Where we were quite alone

In the hospital for wayward girls

Far from her embarrassed sisters

So I took my time arriving

While she wrote unsent letters

To him and the war got worse

She was only twenty and I

Unsure I was a blessing or a curse

Still Valentine

When I read

How he was betrayed

By the bad

Behavior of his friends

I knew it was me

When I noticed

Only one or two

Followed him

To the other side

Of his death I knew

It wasn't me

But still I feel

His shoulders under me

And know he carries me

To someone I must be

Days Like These Valentine

When we're apart

I start to believe

In a spirit world

A few hundred miles from here

Where you are living now

It's strange how souls

If we subtract the body

By distance or by death

Grow closer imagining one

Living inside another

Listen I wanted to tell you

Something important but it

Can wait and anyway it's

Late at night where you are now

In the memory of my dreams

Death Valley Days Valentine

Midsummer respite

In the seething desert

A human eighty degrees

A few days grateful cloudiness

Leftover hurricane's

Furtive rain from the coast

A breeze of drowsiness

In which everything is waking

And starting to breathe again

Intermission in summer's

Grand opera to carry us

Right out of time and space

Which will soon resume

Smiling parenthesis in which we feel

We might really belong on this earth

Prompted Valentine

If all that happens here

The gods have first lived through

And earthly time and space

Are one long deja-vu

If every life resolves to solve

Some grievance of the dead

And inch by inch we turn

To find it waiting up ahead

If rhythmically we stall

And start again like planets

Looking back on other worlds

In the middle of a vowel

Suspended waiting for our cue

Mustn't it all depend on you

Making It Back Valentine

A woman out walking in the wind

Her dog along the river

Finds it hard to look

Directly at that water

Furtive glances shot

Upstream against it

Not to go under

She struggles with the urge

To leap such as one observes

In lovers heading toward disaster

But she stops at her favorite spot

Gathering herself together

And out-stares that river

Doggedly all the way back

Is That You Valentine

Is it the karma of flowers

To suffer through to their colors

Is it the destiny of beasts to bear

So much sadness in their gaze

Is it really the hummingbird's mission

To carve a chink in heaven and dash

Off as if it's nothing

Is it left to the magic of dreams

To rescue our thinking

From this phlegmatic world

And restore our sense of flight

Is it not you who opens

That little door-way beyond death

To touch and console us every night

Remind Me Valentine

I am so dense sometimes 

Only the next day do I think

Of what I really meant to say

But I note it down anyway

Practicing the perfect response

When you remind me of my failures

Going back over how I let you down

Because someone else let me down

Or some such back and forth

And now you want me to believe

No failure can defeat us

Look you say the well

Of love is inexhaustible

From which we drink our fill

Embattled Valentine

Embattled as I am

With my own inner nature

Trying to calm down and stay sane

Entrusted as I feel

With the whole natural world

In which I see myself reflected

The dreaming minerals and lazy

Waving plants the thoughtless

Roaming animal I can be

Encouraged as I often am

By the quiver of your presence

A single leaf moving in the yard

Which must absolutely be there

For it all to make sense

Assumption Valentine

There are still some places

Where they burn the fields of spring

And plant new seeds in the ashes

Is this what we are doing

Burning cities and forests

Throwing another log on the flames

In a twisted kind of self-

Immolation scorching the earth

So those who die in fire

And even the animals and plants

Might be the seeds of hell

Grown into paradise pastures

Called back in another thousand years

To reclaim their native ways

And sing their ancestral chants

Always Valentine

When I see the Verdin visit

The purple flowers in my yard

Which by the way just appeared

One day and spread like weeds

When I watch her poke about

Chirping and feeding on something

Bugs or pollen or drops of dew

I remember you asking me why

Is there always a bird

In your poems how old

That bird must be today

But love now you've gone

That bird keeps coming back

Showing me how to carry on

We Chose Today Valentine

Many nights I have that dream

That starts out fresh and calm

And ends in some catastrophe

I find some new idea there

I'd never think of here

But when I try to bring it

Back with me it crumbles

Papyrus in my hands

Or dark police pursue me

A thief's car chase back

To the crash of waking

Somehow I only find myself

At dawn or twilight

When there is just enough

Light and darkness to hold me

In a momentary peace

Don't Fail Me Now Valentine

Because I doubt I fear

Because I fear I hate

These three dragons I

Myself create

Terrible menagerie of things

I've said and done

I call them to me

And try not to run

I call as well

My Virgil soul

To strain me through

The sieves of hell

The courage that will lead me

To be whole and well

In One Day Valentine

Let's go back to the south of Sweden in 1576

When Tycho Brahe was building

His island 'Castle of Urania'

The first and last of its kind

Until Kepler came to mute

The music of the spheres

Into a hurdy-gurdy song

And the stars were given numbers

Having run out of the names of gods

Shakespeare was still a young man

And wars were everywhere in Europe

In one day the cosmos became a machine

Spawning endless new machines

Among which we now count ourselves

Between Valentine

Do we become our animals

Or do our animals become us

Does the animal in us admire

In them something we've lost

In being what and who they are

When I was a child I thought

The dogs were the men and

The cats were their ladies

It was medieval of me

Spinning a myth of marriage

Another playful religion

I was trying to leap over

That gaping gap between

Animal and angel

Lives And Words Valentine

Every day I try to read

Someone's biography I pick

At random from historical

Or contemporary obituaries

But it's like when I read

The dictionary searching

For the origin of a word

It only leads me to another life

And I have spent the morning

Absorbed in someone else's words

I think we come in cohorts

Each era nothing like the one before

So at first we don't recognize one 

Another and have to be reminded

Of the others always around us

Anecdotal Evidence Valentine

My friend a family therapist

Drove north to spend four days

Searching for his mental health

He took his wife with him who

Had a broken foot in a boot

He took his old ailing mother

Who couldn't stand or walk

And his two beautiful daughters

Four and five and all their things

And of course he had to take

The two dogs one of whom

Was sick and pooped all over

This was as far as he could get

Telling me what happened smiling

Except for the roadside madhouse they found

Where the air was fresh and cool

And how one night it actually rained

And they all lay out on the grass

Feeling finally some peace

Until the gardener sent them packing

And incredibly they all climbed

Back into the car somewhat healed

And somewhat still half-crazy

This Is Just The Beginning Valentine

Because we couldn't face the abyss

The abyss has come to us

While brave archeologists keep digging

Brushing sand from the eyes of the dead

And rocketing telescopes keep probing

The penetralia of endless darkest night

But it's all post-partum now

A child has drawn a line

And we stand amazed

To find ourselves released

On our own recognizance

Afraid hateful full of doubts

Each having to go it alone

At least for a certain distance

If only to prove one can

Migratory Valentine

If you find a murderer

In your family tree or a slaveholder

Or even vaguely some royalty

Or stop to visit an ancient grandmother

A witch of Endor and her brilliant

Daughter Sophie still surviving

In their cottage in the woods

And manage to penetrate their fairytales

Do you finally get to that mountain

Grove of reckoning where your

First family gathered

For their next migration

Hoping you would save them

Climbing on your shoulders

Together Valentine

Hey I'm over here at the grocery store

What do you want me to get

Hey I'm over here among the stars

What do you want me to get

Spring greens and a few avocados

And whatever you want for supper

Bring me that blue galaxy you found

And some word from the Kyriotetes

Hey I can't carry that much

And the store is so crowded

Just grab what you can manage

We'll make a feast of light and salad

As much as I can salvage

From the garden of the night

How Can You Look At Them And Not Valentine

On first looking into the awesome pictures

Floating back to us from deep space

For a moment it felt like spelunking 

Into a dark cave's huge walls

Lit up with ancient paintings

Strange how I felt a little

Claustrophobic at first

And stopped breathing

Without a body to sustain me

The moment of letting go of everything

When you see that it includes yourself

But it passed in amazement and relief

It's not just that there are stars

And galaxies that go on forever

But that somehow they all survive in us

Hans Who Is Everywhere Valentine (for Dave M.)

Hans the stable boy in your story

After he had met the three great minds

And served them the best wine all night

Witnessing their ecstasy and laughter

Was left with the heavy responsibility

Of putting them all to bed

Two of them already deep asleep

The third still mumbling her prayers

Have you ever had to put a drunk

Parent to bed pulled off their coat

And shoes and tucked them in

Then you've seen how wisdom

Is just a foolish child as Hans did

So much for beauty truth and goodness

Hardly capable without him

How Do We Manage It Valentine

It's so compelling to me

That the great minds of history

Are all found at the beginning

With periodically other further minds

Coming to their rescue

Just in time someone is burned

At the stake or a young boy

Is tortured and torn to pieces

So it all moves forward

Body by body their ideas

Of freedom and clarity of thought

Slowly-quickly like a lava-flow

Until a new island emerges from the sea
Back to the beginning of all we know

A Hand Away Valentine

A lot of lightening and a little rain

Much like my over-heated brain

After too much talking fluff and nonsense

I walk down to my imaginary beach

To hear the sentences roll in

The speech of a saner voice

Telling of more important things

Left glittering in the sand

As the red sun goes down

Warning of what's to come

More lightening and a little rain

The storm of my mind just offshore

And you calling to me

Stretching out your hand

Christmas In July Valentine

 If you think of the weather

As part of our collective karma

What do you make

Of this purgatorial summer

That wants to cook the planet

I think of brown eggs bouncing

Boiled hard for dinner

With a piece of burnt toast

I think of laundry frozen on a line

In some long ago winter

Me struggling to take it down

I think of all the cold hearts

In the world at any given time

Yes mine among them and hope

My melting hope might warm them

Artificial Valentine

My intelligence thinks artificial intelligence

Is such a wonderful oxymoron an even

Cleverer golden calf O Moses

A picture of the machine of ourselves

After we extract all the inspirations

Of those who conceived it

Where did those come from

What we could call genuine

Intelligence that makes things up

Out of nothing but air and desire

After all out of some unknown element

Often present in blood and hard work

Which can only get us so far

Till something comes to stir the water

Up Valentine

Sometimes I try to coax

My angel out from behind me

Where I can feel her pushing up

Against the back of my brain

Into that little magic space

Where light turns into thinking

In an unstoppable stream

But she is shy of me

A child I carry on my back

Or an old woman who ghosts me

When I come knocking on her door

Sometimes it feels like that

Then suddenly out of nowhere

She shows up in a single flower

And we can sit and talk for hours

Guardian's Valentine

You who are always peering

Over my shoulders straining

To see the world through my eyes

Giving me the benefit of my doubt

Don't think I don't worry about you

Aren't appreciative of how far back

Our first introduction goes

How much light has been lost by stars

Ascending and descending since then

I imagine you must take vacations

From my traumas from time to time

Don't even think about it I'll be fine

I know our friendship never ends

And I do know where you live

Lizard Hours Valentine

There must five or six of them

By their sizes a small family

Living safely in cracks in the wall

Though I never see them together

The baby one is almost transparent

A skinless flash up the wall

When I water the aloe at night

But the horny hefty daddy emerges

Only during the day darting about

And stopping short to listen

If I have any news at all

Of his reckless profligate son

To share with him though I sense

He knows it's me come back

Unrecognizable but for the nose

The Whole Drama Valentine

After the curtain opened

On a midsummer morning garden

Against a backdrop of leaves on a wall

The audience hushed in darkness

Nothing happened for a while

And then a small bright white something

Floated midair from stage left to right

Moon-like catching the daylight sun

I couldn't tell if it was a petal

Or a moth or a breezy angel

But for several minutes after it had gone

We sat in silence until the curtain fell

Was that the whole drama

The reviews were mixed

Some felt they'd been cheated

While others sat transfixed

Where Is Thinking Going Valentine

For many years now

In my own deconstructionist way

I've tried to study the history

Of thinking its stratification

Into periods of clarity and decay

How it gets submerged at times

And then circles back on itself

For brief interludes of self-awareness

How when it applies itself to itself

It finds something preternatural

And intriguing going on a dialogue

That happens nowhere else in the world

A hidden door that opens

Leading straight to the heart

Breathless Valentine

Are you as blind to me

As I am blind to you

Except you see what's hidden from me

And all I see is your absence

Left to feel my way in the dark

Knowledge of your presence

Real as the invisible becomes

When I can get away from my body

For a few breathless seconds

Or even for whole hours

When we can travel together

On long train rides back to childhood

Or wander off to reconnoiter

The lost cities of the future

Last Day Valentine

On the first day of your death

The 'Do Not Disturb' sign

Fell from your door when

No one was looking

On the second day of your death

I felt you brush past me in the hall

Whispering 'I'll be right back'

On the third day of your death

You stood weeping by the stairs

Showering me with kisses

Saying 'This changes nothing'

On the last day of your death

Whenever it comes you know

I will be ready and waiting

Carried Away Valentine

A morning scan of the heavens

And I focus on just one cloud

That casts its shadow at my feet

And tries to beam me up

Into the light that fills it

And slowly we amalgamate

Into other clouds that find us

Until the whole sky is covered

In a twilit afternoon

Dropping me off in some distant place

Nervous and happy about the long

Walk home nervous I won't find you

Happy because it's raining

And there's a rainbow in my eyes

Where Valentine

Great stone monuments but where

Is the memory of what made them

The words but not what they meant

To the raised voices who spoke them

What they were relinquishing

Of the light so we could harvest

More and more of the darkness

Or that's how they seem to have seen it

At least that's this morning's speculation

For why the monuments were demolished

Or buried deep in deserts and lakes

Or removed to invisible places

Unprobed by science our ailing god

Now we've lost sight of their grail

Untranslatable Valentine

Yesterday I felt heartened to learn

There are an awful lot of jokes and puns

On the walls of ancient graves and temples

Smiles waiting to be exhumed

Buried in the language pictures

The night journey of the sun itself

With a few stops along the way

For quiet reflection or entertainment

Or to visit Osiris's old house

Where language floods the walls

With so much praise and laughter

It all starts to sing and dance

Now all they heard is lost to us

Hiding in our own sarcophagus 

Still wondering what those gods were after

Only Way Valentine

In last night's trauma

Some all-consuming monster

Was advancing on our village

This must have been in the Pleistocene

Everyone screaming and running in terror

But when I looked back

All I could see was a digital clock

Flying toward us through the woods

Surrounded by impenetrable darkness

I almost laughed but that came later

Rushing to rescue my wife and child

Luckily we still had our old Ford truck

And tore off down that dusty road

Our only way to escape was to wake

Closer Valentine

Keep close what you can see and touch

In all that's going on around you

But even closer all you can't

The huge rest you have to envision

Going on in your head and heart

Right now there's a shiny beetle

Crawling through the wet grass

That clarifies a question

I have always had about

The true mission of secrecy

In human lives the enormity

Of what is hidden from us

In the progress of beetles and grass

Which you can clearly see

If you get down on the ground

Not Too Far Off Valentine

While they arrange another rain

Those winged horses of the west

We slip through centuries of stillness

Sweating evenings on the beach

Like waiting for someone to leave

Or arrive from a neighboring star

The irreplaceable to be replaced

Is it only spring that doesn't want

To see us die while dying summer

Takes its vengeance to the end

The clothes ripped from our bodies

Our bodies buried in the sea

Listen you can hear those horses neigh

Circling a new mythology

Birthday Valentine

As beautiful as you have always been

You get more beautiful every year

Not like those perennials we planted

On the farm but never got to see

Those floods of iris in their maturity

That hedge of lilac trees

Blooming a mere few weeks

Your beauty is not ephemeral

Like flesh that thrives and peaks

Somehow it grows more real

More felt more seen more you

And to think my blood lives in your bones

Soul of my soul

Carrying beauty on

Reading For And Against The Wind Valentine

Wind's what's left

When you take away the water

Gusts like going over rapids

Words in little boats

Rollicking and tossed

With some going under

Several villages of vowels

Entirely swept away

But look over there not far

A whole grove of oaks is motionless

Like a crowd that stops to watch

Some small world fall apart

Wave after wave of wind

Smacking the pages in your hands

Until you let them all ascend

How Else Valentine

I'm feeling drops of honey land on my head

Some mornings can get that sticky

I just want to lick and lick them

Suck that sweetness to the pit

How else get to the serious seed

Each morning comes to plant

How else be grateful enough

That the light comes back at all

That every night at the great council

Of lights they vote to return or not

They weigh our collective heart

And consult their medical texts

Arguing mercy over wisdom

And still they decide to come back

Or at least make one more attempt

Children's Valentine

After the seventh full moon went by

Did you not notice that door in the sky

Which I imagined must be there

Outpost of heaven under repair

Or maybe not a hole but an imprint

A seal or a stain of spilled wine

A signal or whispered word

All we can manage to leave behind

We children of the moon

What would we do without our pictures

Of the invisible world

As long as the sun can enter

Fill us and flow through us

We know we're not alone

Rambling Valentine

Me and my dead friends

Who seem more alive than I am

In the morning one at a time

Come for coffee and stay

For the rambling conversation

In which I try to wheedle out of them

The secrets they are sworn to keep

Eternity is such a tease

Look they say if I made it

Anybody can to comfort me

We go back over our charts

Rediscovering the inevitable

Parting of our stars all the way back

To our still undiscovered hearts

Eye On You Valentine

Memory keeps my books

Stern accountant and Sunday painter

In double columns and cloudy skies

But I suspect she's cooking the books

Borrowing from Peter to pay Paul

Or at least she warms them up a little

Always factoring in the future's

Amortization and return on a few

Emotional investments

But she's no economist alone

In fact she's better known

For her scenes of pastoral life

On the walls of empty buildings

So much she keeps an eye on you

Declaration Valentine

No plan is still a plan I'm sorry

It's baked in it's implicit

In life's relentless unraveling

Like you're not sure what

You're knitting you're just knitting

What's starting to look like a tent

Or a parachute while all you know

Is that it isn't finished yet

And you must keep on knitting

Your hands with a lightening of their own

Reaching back and forth to catch

A missed stitch or glance over

At the several patterns you're using

To get this shroud just right

Over There Valentine

In the quiet a dead leaf rises

Scratching his way toward a puddle

Right up to the shore and stops

Pulling himself together with a shrug

Contemplating the softness of that sea

That might yet bring him back to life

Or at least allow for a vigorous sail

It's hard to let reality in

But while he's been crying

That puddle's been drying

Hardly his likeness left

And even the wind has died

His last and only friend

Pointing to a puddle over there

Further Valentine

'Don't grow old' my parents croaked

As usual I didn't listen

But every through-line is different

And maybe we who come to the earth

Are really just heaven's rejects

Ingots thrown back into the fire

In need of further adjustments

Some achieve this in a few quick years

No return address on their unlived lives

While others wrinkle and ripen

Into wonder or rage or both

Lucky those who've saved a few apples

From the tree of life

And kept an in with the Cherubim

When winter brings its ice

The Beginning Returns Valentine

Grasshoppers are dancing in the heat

To some far-off Latin beat

The senoritas of the air

Wear hibiscus in their hair

But no one moves when the lizard

Scurries into the yard

And a distant woman starts to sing

Her favorite beautiful song

And we are wrapped in fear and joy

Hearing together for a while

How the world was made

Funny but it's not you said

With just one harmonica

Sharp as a grasshopper's blade

And rounded off with a smile