december pomes

San Francisco

I had just pulled my Saturday Chron
From the rack on Baker Street
When a LARGE armada of city pigeons
Stoppt me in my tracks
Swinging as one overhead




Vista,  1967

How formidable we felt
As our high school football team
Crossed the parklot to the field
Thundering in our cleats



Fifteenth

It would be easy to say
   how lucky I felt

To be called on the phone
   and hired

To repair the picket fence
   on Piety Hill

Damaged from the snowstorm
   already a week ago,

Amber branches snapped
   from the weight

Taking out whole sections
   of pickets & rails below,

It would be easy to say
   how blesst I felt

To cut measure & saw
   beneath a blue sky full

Of fresh turning clouds--

But--
Is there any other way?





Temporality

Paradise as perfection
Exacts one small tariff
From us:

That it presents itself
As time,
As wavering temporality--

Not as illusion,   as something
To be escaped
But wonders behold!   to be entered:

For what in truth
Could be more Hellacious
Than permanent deflection

From any MORPHOLOGY?