Seer

—for Eleni, who saw it all from the start

If I still call my wife
Cassandra

After all these years,
It’s not

Because she’s foretold what will happen
Tomorrow, the next day, week, month or year—

We all know no one can do that, right?

But because when I see the incredible
Light in her eyes as she tells me

Dream after dream, I still can’t
Believe how it was

I foresaw my future.

Clean Slate

There’s nothing left to erase—
Even the eraser’s left

No trace.

After Porchia, All Over Again

All things happen in an instant—
Even when nothing seems to happen

Over a thousand instances,
It’s over

In no time at all.

Getting the Picture

How dark

Unseen forces behind that will
Color it accordingly

To how many lies remain
Exposed to the light.

A Test of Poetry: Charles Bernstein's Artifice of Absorption vs Davy Jones' Liquid Assets

Whatever the drift may have been,

I always say I am a professor of poetry, I profess poetry; think of me as a snake-oil salesman, a confidence man: I don’t want to test your accumulated knowledge; I want to convince you of the value of poetry as a method, as a way of writing, as a form of vision. . . . .

By the time it took us to absorb it,

. . . . .poetry is the ultimate small business, requiring a careful keeping of accounts to stay afloat.

We’d already been taken in.

Knee-high to a Grasshopper

Jiminy Cricket! That was me
When my legs were heading
Into the final stretch.

Never figured out why
They had to up and stop
Dead in their tracks

Soon as they came to
The nearest knee patch.

Raiding the Cookie Jar

You gotta hand it to him—
The dude never lost his cool

Wondering how it was this hot
Momma kept popping

Pan after pan in her oven
So that poppa could also

Put his hand in whenever
He moseyed on back.