Votive

After eighty harsh 
Years of living 
Off the inscrutable 
Face of the Earth, 
When it came time 

For him to leave, 
My father took 
The chiseled wrinkles 
Of the centenarian 
Olive with him. 

Will The Real Hayseed Please Stand Up?

Listen up, 
You know-it-all 
City-bred dandy 
Wordsmith—the poem 
You’re writing should end up 
Down-to-earth discriminating, 
Say a finely winnowed product 
Triggered by wave upon wave 
Of gulls lifting off 
From the nearest 
Harbor some thirty 
Miles away only 
To land here 
In the boondocks 
With the first light 
Of day, foraging 
For sustenance 
Amongst bales and bales 
Of—you got it—freshly cut 
Seedy hay.

Irrelevant And Immaterial Spectra

Nothing 

Resembling flesh 
And bones here— 

Just an occasional 

Revenant taking us up 
And back to where

We thought 
We’d always be 

Relevant. 

Tinker, Tailor, Do It Over

My life had all 
The trappings 

Of a tailor-made poem, 
Till I discovered

I had to alter it. 

Ways And Means For Existential Dummies

--“Time passes. Will you?” 


And still it does not 
Dawn on you, literally

That which ends at the end 
Of each of your days, ends in itself 
And means absolutely

Nothing in the end.