Love


This is just
to say
she left half
of the last 
banana
on the kitchen 
counter
this morning

for me to find.





Under Cover of Night


The ghosts of West Third Avenue
must be tired of me by now, traipsing
these back yards under cover of night,
peering in lit windows as well as dark,
calling hollowly as an owl, nudging
family dogs to stiffen and growl
in their long sleep.  I might as well
be a breeze in the blue spruce, for all
the living know.  But Ricky Young
knows who I am, and his dog Boo Boo,
who commanded his corner for
ten hard years undefeated, and now
will stalk the night with us beyond
any battle.  And Don Milliken
appears at his bedroom window,
at my whistle, scrambles down 
the porch roof into a drop-and-roll
on the dew-drenched lawn.  And 
Betsy just opens her front door
and saunters into our moonlight
away from her snoring house. We all 
slip slantwise together through hedges
and across patios from one house
to the next gathering our gang.  

It must be tiring for them, being 
called forth every night to run
these same streets again. Beneath one
chopped-down elm after another
we scuttle well past midnight.  Here
is Randy Chase, decades removed
from the jackknifed truck that took him
into its flames, now trotting up to us 
with his larcenous grin intact and talking 
a mile a minute about Deb Durkin's 
sweet ass, or sweetness, it's hard 
to hear which in the cool wind 
that always rises right about now 
and sweeps us down the darkened avenue 
like dry leaves fleeing a sudden storm.  



"What Are They Doing In Heaven Today?"


I hope they're playing hearts 
around a formica table 
with wobbly chrome tube legs,

leaning back on their chairs,
swigging half-warm beers
and in no hurry to win or lose.

I trust some Lefty Frizzell
or Patsy Cline is on the radio
almost too low to hear, but 

no matter:  everyone has
the songs by heart.  Something
funny was in the paper today,

and someone mentions it,
and there is a chuckle
or a cough at that, but the fire

of it dies down fairly quickly,
and seems like the cosy
settling hush of ashes.

No one speaks their love,
or bursts into anger
or sings along with the radio,

or if they do, it also 
dies down fast, with a tiny 
smile, a shake of one 

cloudy head or another.