You stare at me from the black-rimmed frame:
forever smiling, forever young
in your officer's white uniform.
You held me in your arms who am now
older than you ever were or ever will be.
Did I cry? Did I smile? Did I learn to know you
before you became unknowable?
Am I like you?
Is my son?
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You ever hop into the bed
And pull the covers tight?
And try to get your toes to warm,
When your feet are cold at night?
They feel like living blocks of ice,
Your left foot and your right.
Frozen solid to the bone,
When your feet are cold at night!
You turn the blanket up to ten,
But where it's tucked in tight,
There is no heat above your heels,
When your feet are cold at night!
But if you've married someone nice,
Who loves and treats you right,
You'll warm each others toes and things,
When your feet are cold at night!
The only remedy I've found![[dash]](../resources/dot_black.gif)
(Be sure to get this right!)
There's nothing like good warm love,
When your feet are cold at night!
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All his life his hands handled the wood,
forming it, shaping it, cutting it,
measuring its strength.
Now his hands are placed, backs to the wood,
unable to turn to grasp it,
nailed in place.
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From image and word, vision and rhyme,
we grow the bones that shape our life,
with the antique hope that,
long dead years after,
some poet paleontologist will
reconstruct our spirit from
our embedded bones.
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The cat calls at our bedroom door,
having waited for the light to go out.
"I'll let her in for a few minutes of love,"
says my wife,
"And then she'll have to go away."
I lie in the darkness pondering the difference
between man and beast:
When I get a few minutes of love,
I get to stay.
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With fine-pinioned flowing of corporal motion
And sinuous twirling in axial joy,
Holding with lightness the beauty of loving,
I turn with the tempo of music and wine
And sit lone in wonder, and dance in my mind!
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Actions always planned are never completed.
This is the lesson of love.
For always holding you in my mind,
I never held you in my arms.
For always writing love letters in my mind,
I never wrote them in your heart.
For always asking you in my mind,
I never asked you with my mouth.
For always planning our union in my mind,
I forever will be incomplete.
Planning forever is a coward's way out.
In this imperfect world there is no perfection,
the time is out of joint and will never be right.
The circumstances are beyond our control,
and will never be good.
The omens are cautious, there are no tea leaves with instant tea.
The heart is adventurous, the mind is careful,
and it may be right.
But mind over heart leaves you alone at night.
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I saw a man on television who
Cannot remember anything
More than thirty seconds old.
He unknowingly lives the logical conclusion of
The philosophy of living for the moment.
No past to haunt him or give him anchor,
Forever awakening to a new world,
Unable to recall his nameless illness
He lives eternally the horror
Of a timeless soul.
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