January 2025
Bio Note: It is a good day to be a poet when my work appears in Verse Virtual. Other good days this year were being nominated for and winning a Pushcart Prize. My 6th book of poetry, That Infinite Roar published by Gyroscope Press is available on Amazon.
The Nights on Bonifacio Street
I can tell it is your house that I enter,
by guavas ripening on the table.
You bring out pillows, then chocolate.
The ritual begins, sewing a patchwork quilt:
each seam a memory, remnants of things old
placed together by sturdy stitches.
Squares of satin and wool are cut,
fitted like lines criss crossing in our palms.
You hem with an Asian silk,
I with cowgirl’s leather.
The swatches of faded velvet
were given to you by your mother on your wedding day.
Now, they cover you
as you sleep alone, wondering why.
Our hands sweep the air with questions,
answers clamor in our silver bracelets.
We stitch and talk, every detail
small enough to fit through the eye of a needle.
By morning the guavas have ripened.
Gilded
The full moon spills
through a jalousie window,
and on our dusty sill,
sits a framed photo of us
when we were better.
I am reminded
of all the moons past
and passing over our lives:
Wolf, Sturgeon, Harvest,
and with the arrival of spring
the frozen sweetness of trees
begins to melt, ready to be tapped.
Over us now,
the maple sugar moon,
and once again,
the weary wax and wane of time
is captured on a dusty sill,
in a gilded framed photo
of when we were better.
Editor's Note: If this poem(s) moves you please consider writing to the author (email address above) to say what it is about the poem you like. Writing to the author is what builds the community at Verse Virtual. It is very important. -JL