Discounted Poetry

On Sundays, Some obscure denomination Gathers here in robes to plunge And die beneath the troubled waters, Rising to a spiritual life New. Under, Sunlight breaks into outlines of cobblestones, The blue streaks echoing the waves. The rivers carried military veteran corpses From the bloody fields of civil war, The final fading cries, Destroyed soldiers grasping  Dire loss of everything, Releasing loose Tomorrow. Turtles peek and disappear again Below the languid surface Rippled by the warmer wind. I once more investigate my phone. You haven't sent a message Either through electric waves Or in an actual bottle. I pry loose another pebble, Tossing solid earth into the chaotic unknown Without form, void. - 1/12/26

A frosty morning late in winter Lines the world in stark relief. The tree has lost a limb or two But stands unslanted, Not as proud as reassured, Resolved beneath the water Running thinly black along Its bathing bark. A cardinal outside my view Begins the day by stuttering  A lonesome song of hopeless love, Although a single car Is hushing us so softly While slushing past, Believing birds, like old machinery, Should bear their solitude in quiet. I also keep my silence, Even though You are my favorite song And Canada Is still so far away. - 1/9/26

The hollow brass, A belly bulging round to hold a body, Roast one living when they fire it to orange red, Is art Inside the upstairs exhibit room A bit off to the right. She's reading from her lit-up screen To the plaque And back. When I turn aside, She's reading me Although the years Have certainly not Sanctified my hidden dead Or cast me hallow. - 1/8/26

You locked the garden gate On such a sunny day. You threw away my poetry Within the shadow of our apple tree. Your servant told me everything. You flung aside your china plates And stormed along the vacant hallways, Perfumed with pinot gris. Last week You swallowed my lower lip And swore me little more than chocolate, A major, if occasional, indulgence. I died and fell Completely despondent, dazed. I wrote a world of words To blaze in orbit round your perfect head. You read and sighed, "Oh, well." My inconstant lady, What brought your heart to rage so violently? - 1/2/26

When my world was fresher, Crowded, It was cracking thickest ice And crawling free Onto an invigorating virgin earth exotic. Now, Midnight's a digital glow of changing numbers, Strangers on the television kissing To loud music by the bands once famous, A failed attempt to conjure  Magical renewals, Sips of carbonated water With a few potato chips, A shift from empty couch to empty bed Onto another flat robotic tomorrow. - 12/31/25

The crumbled day Dropped scattered over sidewalks and driveways, Sun-spattered grey and yellow parking lots. You took it all and left me this, The corpse of summer splayed In pools of blinding light, The season I despise Although it’s still the winter. I am not a London character. I'll start a fire With a flint or match Against a sliver of your eye. You have a way of breathing in my name, Exhaling me until I settle Burning on my tangled chest. I'm heavy on the earth Although your fingers and your words No longer softly press me  To the bed we lie in, Cigarette already crushed to death Between your heel so scarlet And the festered street. You're weighing deep within my lungs And strangling my troubled breath. Just drag my body to a puddle Of the burnt concrete And click in rhythm off Into the red horizon. - 12/30/25