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More or less

“I hope I die before you”, she worries.

“I don't want to be alone.”

 

“But you'll have the two dogs and some family.

Besides, I'll need you to host my Celebration of Life,

and read a poem for me. Maybe this one.

And play the music I liked for everyone;

maybe tell a joke or two, so things don’t get too somber.”

 

“But you won't be there.”

 

“Yeah, more or less, that...

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Just What We have

Sometimes we talk about death
and all it has taken away. Maybe we'll find religion,

 

or look deeper into philosophy, or a similar comfort

to help us manage our grief and concern.

For now, we'll settle for what we have

together, among the here and now.
 

And maybe, just maybe this
will help keep the unknown at bay.

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Fairytale Waltz

"Can we dance on the moon?", she asks.

"We might even be graceful there, low gravity and all,
but the scientists don't recommend it", I reply."

"Well, if we hold on to each other at least
we'll be together if we jump too high
and float away.", her playful remark.

"Well, scientists be damned! I can't think of anyone else
I'd like to be with out there among the stars.", I assure her.

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A Long Way

She couldn't have been farther away.

Even though we were sleeping

here, next to each other. 

 

Slow on the draw, to be sure,

it just took me some time

to get better at recognizing

what empty looked like.

 

And I understand now

just how far away far away can be

when it’s there in front of you.

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Give and Take

I was no different than anyone else. Not really unique;

in that I was made, in part, from pieces of others I’ve known,

 

friends and family mostly. Those still here,

and welcome spirits who seem content to stay.

 

Also, there were a few women I loved at one time or another.

Although, some of them took a few pieces with them.

 

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Her Way of Flying

If she could, she’d help butterflies

arrange the powder on their wings

just so, and they would thank her

 

with brightly colored performances in the air.

She envies the exhilaration the young ones must feel

the first time they alight after their first flight.

 

She wears a colorful dress trimmed with lace.

The butterflies accept this effort to be like them.       

...

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Muse

Sometimes, when I sit down to write,

a blank piece of paper in front of me,

I see beautiful words already there.

 

But it was always going to be you

who helped me put them on the page.

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Consequences

In a very close moment,
I touched the striations near her waist
for the first time and she began to cry.
The marks, from the birth of her son.

She’d given him up before we met.
She had been in some trouble,
and made difficult decisions
that were still exacting a price
she couldn’t stop paying for.

To her, the lines were resentful,
and would never let her forget
the only physical rem...

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Amor Facil

It’s an unhurried and easy love.
The kind that gently wants to help
solve important mysteries;

like where do the missing socks reside now?
Or who took the last cookie in the pantry
that someone hoped no one would notice?

It’s the kind of love that is comfortable
in pajamas at three in the afternoon, reading books together
while the weather outside is restless.

You wouldn't bother wa...

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Cliff House

We drive past the place
where she first said I love you.
Perched on a cliff by the sea.

The location has been closed
for a few years now,
but not in my reflections.
As we drive by, I take her hand
while drifting back to that day.

She smiles at me just then,
as the waves break with commotion
on the shore, and joins me here
in a memory I’ve saved
for all our tomorrows.

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Satellite

She danced for her friend the moon
most nights. And occasionally during the day,
when its appearance couldn't be subdued.

Sometimes she wished all of her friends
could be here with her. All of them
had spent time under the same moonlight.

The same light knew them all
and shared this connection with her,
inspiring joy in the spectacle of her performances,
rewarding her companion of the...

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Puppy Trouble

Our little fella, with his prancing gait,
trots down the hall. His feet sounding
a slap, slap, slap on the carpet
he was chewing on a moment ago.

He looks up at me with all the cuteness
the universe could possibly bestow on him
with a brief and curious look – ears at attention!

I smile back at him, to thank him for his youthful joy.
Given to us with no expectation. And certainly,
no g...

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Compliment

I show her the poem

with the noisy words

building to a crescendo.

 

My scribbled paean, foolishly trying

to say these things to her

better than they’ve been said

by others, in ink on paper.

 

“Maybe I should tone all of this down some?”, I propose.

 

She smiles and says, “I like the clamor just the way it is.”

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Working

"Where are we going?" his young daughter asked.

"To cheer up some of my friends," he replied.

"They seem to be a lot of work for you," she offered with concern.

"Yes," he said, “You’re right. The very best kind of work."

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Treasure Hunt

Sometimes I think poetry is

the time you first learned to skip

a rock across a glassy lake.

It touched the water five, maybe six times

before sinking below the surface.

 

You looked forever for the perfect one

to toss. Even though forever is where

the stone came from and returned to.

 

I don’t know for certain

all the places poetry can be found,

but if it l...

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Target Practice

I was with a woman

some time ago, who wore her love

like a pistol on her hip.

 

With her suspicious heart for ammunition,

one inevitable wrong move by me 

and I was going to be done for.

 

Pretty soon I stopped

trying to avoid her aim.

She had already put holes

where we needed to breathe.

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What Flowers Know

My thoughts, difficult sometimes,
compete with the flowers all about me,
offering their hues to the sun above.

The petals seem to understand
small wonders can be anywhere,
and attempt to share their wisdom
in bracing fields, in every shade of bloom.

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Starlight

How long would you miss me if I was gone?”, she wanted to know.

“That’s easy. See that star up there? The really bright one?
Until the last of its light can be seen here.”, my reply.

“That light will take a very long time to get here.”, she said in wonderment.

“Exactly.”

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To a Flame

It's like, what if moths

aren’t attracted to light,

as they flutter chaotically

around the source.

 

What if the thing we think

is pulling them closer confuses

which way they should go.

 

Love has been like that.

 

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Jeez! Not Another Love Poem!

It was my silliness, I thought.

Or maybe it was the smile.

Turns out it was our laughter too.

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Running Shoes

I'm not much of a runner. 

But I've traveled long distances

trying to stay ahead

of the grief in my thoughts. 

 

I don't see it as an adversary anymore.

It's simply trying to keep pace

with how I miss you now.

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Long Enough

I've lived long enough,
but not long enough
not to miss it when it will go.

Seems I am just now
getting the hang of things.
Not all of them, to be sure.

But certainly all of the beautiful things.
Those that began long before me
as dust and dirt from the stars.

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Reasons

When we would often ask

why we loved each other,

the usual items on my list were there.

 

Her melancholy for the brevity of shooting stars.

And wandering out to greet the rain at first light

as it begins its release from the night.

 

But the best explanation, we both agreed,

was that there didn’t need to be

any specific reason at all.

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Teenage Boys Looking for Religion

Listening to records with my roommate

that summer. We were very young then.

We talked about the girl. The one we met

at the western shore but didn’t get her name.

 

We watched, furtively, every one

of her eccentric and mystical movements,

and the dueling colors in her eyes.

All of it imperfectly perfect.

 

Later, while putting on another LP,

he said, “If th...

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Girl from Half Moon Bay

Crazy was never boring.
But it couldn’t be built to last.

Her love had sharp edges.
The cutting kind with no concern.

As if she could mend everything
with all of my pieces.

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True Colors

That’s the kind of girlfriend she was.
After a few dates she had me listening
to a little hip-hop, and some other music
I knew very little about. And going to nightclubs

on Tuesday nights in brightly colored shirts
she bought for me soon after we met.
Ensuring that everyone would see them before they saw me.

It was the same when she looked my way.

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Already Old

Over coffee that morning

we both smiled. Remembering

when we first met
we were both already old.

But we were free

from the awkwardness
of first encounters with love.

At the time, we didn't know
we would share in the sun

the rest of our shadows together.

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Moon Dancer

"Can people dance on the moon, Mother?"

"Maybe, but they probably want to avoid the craters there."

"But would the holes on the moon be lonesome?"

"They might be Honey; they’ve been there a very long time."

“Mother, will you be here as long as the holes on the moon?”

“I don’t think so. I suppose you’re right about the holes there.”
 

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Visiting Old Friends at Stoplights

With maybe enough money
to make it to Los Angeles,
I hoped he had enough to stay
ahead of the monsters he knew well.

The ones that had him on the run
somewhere around Bakersfield,
where I last heard from him.

All these years later, with struggles of my own,
I sometimes smile to myself, thinking
I might see him again someday, healed,
while I wait for the corner light to change.

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A Short List of Small Healings

Her smile in the morning when she rises,

sleep still in her eyes, and tells me she slept well.

Her face framed in perfectly disheveled hair.

 

Pictures in frames, echoing smiles

that stay with me. Even though some are gone,

leaving scars I’ve learned to live with,

with or without the assist of the still images.

 

And the newest one for this list:

Our puppy, sniff...

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An Old Photo of My Parents

I can look at their black and white photo

whenever I want, to take in where they’ve been.

The old wood frame somewhat worn

from years of repeating the memories.

 

The image within, from long ago, is a little blurred.

But that’s not why I couldn’t understand

where the love, captured in time, might have gone.

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Falling Down in Your Eighties (for Paula)

And it was in that moment,
after her fall, making sure
nothing but her pride was hurt,
that she understood that time
would always win. As it always had.

But her spirit was not defeated by this.
It was as if the fall had shaken her to her senses,
allowing her to finally accept the nature of things
on a journey that many never get to make.

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Shelter in the Rain

On the phone she tells me
she looks forward to the rain.
She mentions that she forgot her umbrella
again, but she’ll be okay without it.

And would I be kind enough to bring in her book
left outside on the table. Fretting in jest
that the author may not forgive if I don’t hurry,
and refuse her the denouement she hopes for.

I wonder, once more, if it’s forgetfulness.
Does she worry I’ll...

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"Blinkish" Sky

 

“What color would you call that horizon?” she asked,

as we walked along the waterfront at dusk.

 

“I really don't know. I'm not good with the names of colors.

Sometimes I think people just make them up.”

 

“Well, let's make one up for our sky tonight.”, her offer.

“The sky looks mostly blue and pink along the horizon,

but it's changing quickly. How about ‘blinkish’?”

...

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Reading the Room

She was saying goodbye
in so many muted ways.
But I was somewhere else
in my redoubt of indecision.

Indifference that couldn’t mask
her blue and walk-away eyes,
should have made It clear
she was already gone.

It took me a while to get here.
To get you to fade away.
It was just that my timing was bad.

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A Walk with You

We invited the sun to join us.

To come out from behind that sullen cloud

and share with us late in the morning.

 

With amber light breaking through,

in tow as company for the day,

our hands were together and warmed

but not by the busy sun.

 

No offense was taken,

our yellow star assured us,

as we walked between the shadows

being painted all around us.

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