Like So Many Flecks of Gold

Like so many flecks of gold,
The leaves turn in to show
A rapt and crimson sign to wind
That time bestrides them all,
And thus, we fall.

A gilded populous filled,
Green waning to bronze,
Raining in funnel whirls
Leaving tan and ashen boughs
The fight real yet to come;
And thus we fall,
Into each others arms at dusk
Knowing the blare of winter at our ears
Can never be but a transient parting
As leaves funnelling in the wind _
You and I, flecks of gold,
And thus we fall.

Gay Child of Autumn
A mound of Autumn's finery,
Roughed by the gale
Turns in pirouette
Pressed against steel clouds.

A child plays near to where
This mound was spent away
Mustering only showery gold
Upon the infant's hair.

Through the lens of time I see me
Child of the Autumn playtime
And if I knew than what I know now
I would have held fast to my youth
And grown to age;
For the gay child, gay youth, gay man
Always plays in the mound of autumn's finery
Never know when the wind will blow.

Old gold on new gold
Tells the season's tale.

Morning Garden
Bee brushing the last bloom
And breeze filtering winnow
Come together in a wintry gust.
The wind is apart,
The body blown to the thornbush,
While the sleeping mallows dry
And the mulch gives up its must.

And all this happened as you mounted me in our garden,
Our sheets piled high in the chilly room _
Then, this morning we awoke to find
Half the last bloom
And no bees in the world remain.

A Raker takes Spring Dreams
A raker takes Spring dreams away
Toward the oven's embered bake;
Swirls of smoke puff the air
Choking natures populous with ash.
My charms have faded, but not for you
For on my heart your lips appeal;
And I have no illusions for Spring
When your lips move South to sup.
Wind takes a new breath
Compelling dust to coat the brush.
Soon another coat will be worn by this brush
And dust becomes memory.
Such are the dreams of Spring
The raker takes away.

The Bronze Cathedral
He touched my soul at morning,
My chest at dusk,
And we sat on the porch and hugged as darkness sang the horizon to slumber,
And the wind rustled his hair and I sang his eyes to their wonder.
Follow the leaves of gold
As they toss in the Bronze Cathedral,
As if in the whale's womb with arching ribs to the sea's great sigh
Taking a song with full arpeggio.

See how they lite;
Everywhere they call to all.
A golden rain from the great arc of heaven catches the world's attention;
Yet, does not . . .
But I catch it, this golden song from the lips of my heaven, my love
And like the whale's song,
It's silence falls with comfort.

Departure
The whistling Swan has flown,
Flown with my beauty, my run and gust.
Clouds are here, grey with power
And the plain by the river
Seems cold and flown.
But in the silence of my empty room,
The myriad of spirits laugh and strip;
They stand in darkness butt-naked to the night,
And in brightness they light the room with their deep sigh,
But who could tell now but me that the river plain seems cold and flown.
Yet, magnify it all and deafen the senses to see
How busy is the river plain
So cold and flown.

Last Lover
Brazen Jay, last to go _
I know you best as you caw and crow that you are Jay.
Yet, you go; and I forget
`Til the Spring brings you back again
To say you're Jay.
But I, your silent sparrow never goes.
But the world knows I linger, not by what you know
But by my quiet foot prints left within the snow.

The Tides Come in Again
The tides come in again;
Chilled beach without the cloak the warm sun lends.
Petrels time the waves
Catching shrimp and feigning men
Who prey upon the weak,
Cawing from the jetties
As the tides come in again.

Autumn Ride
We view the world from a closed cab drawn by a simple steed,
And the world, in fall, sees us not, for he and I are wrapped in arms
Cheering the love we share,
A love beyond compare.
And there is a world in the Bronze Cathedral
With steeples and smokestacks _
Gables and gardens _
And as the carriage clops the stones below
The wind's tale wings the maple's clothes
Into the lap as a prayer book.
There is a hymn on the leaf of gold _
With stanzas and clefs _
Chords and chorales
And as we read the veins and the crackling tips
The fox nips are the horse's hooves
And a cricket makes home in a leaf pile.

There is a Guy with Sandy Hair
There is a guy with sandy hair,
A fiery mind and olive balls,
But he covers them all _
But cannot.
And when the chill seeks out his hair
He bundles it all beneath a hood
And hides each strand restrained.
But I am laughter in the wind;
For patience will reveal it all
Peering through the frosty pane
In the stillness of the night.

Sweet Trick
I have waited a lifetime for this man who lays beneath my hands
A temporary lake,
Still forming as the droplets fall,
Contained in the confines of my sheets,
A slight depression on my pillow.
With each added spill,
My high spirals up and coils,
For the morning frost only hardens such temporary lakes;
This slight impression on my pillow.

Planting Tulips
Sweet William wash lunch dishes;
For I will plant the tulip bulbs in clay.
Presumptious hope indeed.
The roses are spent _
The grass like hay
And the warbler's song a distant fall
Found in a threadbare wood.
The field mice sleep,
While voles supply little borrows with wherewithal
Gathered beneath the henna pine.
Pipe's lit, sweet William;
And my back's stretched to fill the clay with wherewithal,
Presuming our roses will bloom again.

Between the Acts
I've written to them all,
Each beau and lover from the past,
Each one who occupied this spot
Inside my withering heart.
The knitting goes well
Indoors now beside the Philadendra;
The window taps;
It is a rose cane loosed from care.
Yet, to hear them,
Fingers seem to pry into skeins of yarn.
One rose still,
Burned violet by the cold,
Hangs upon the fingers outside
Where the knitting goes well.

Ring
A ring of light
As disk of moonlight
Casts its nodding stare
Across the fence and gateway.
My dinner waits,
Not quite like the one's he would cook,
But, purposes are served
As borrowed sunlight
Cast in disks about the gateway
Attracting not one moth.

Field Camp
From its husk the corn yields;
Crows pick all open _
Sparrows wait for crumbs _
But, we take all.
From its vine, wine pours forth,
Hops drain streams
And clarity is lost to nature's warmth.
The crackling fire tells a tale
Sending wisps to the high apse;
Trout sizzles _
Leaves break
And in your arms the communion is truly complete.

Nelson
In the brush we sought each other,
Through our clothes we caressed beyond all human eye,
And our passion was filtered by the fiery sun,
Cloaked by fir and a plaid shirt.
I cannot pass that place now without a stir.
The thought of woodland pleasures
Clear and at one's hand
Giving firm trust to all my forest plans;
But now the gust swirls,
A blinding, golden blast
Pouring dust and sand aloft.
No thought of even one step
Fastens upon this changing world.

Above Our Lofty Field Bed
Above our lofty field bed,
The wind brings a fine crop _
The war between the milkweed seeds,
Blazing soft for a place in time _
A shallow tuft _
A black dog's coat _
A cuff or some unsuspecting doe.
Like ours, all these the instruments of war,
Are the push and pull to be reborn.
The wind controls it all,
And above us, and above all,
We are reborn by these instruments _
Not to replicate, but to leave a spirit for all the world,
And for all time.

Cycles
The slow return of a slug to home
Imperiled by the mischief Gull,
A keen eye for all slowness.
We, with our eye upon the sky,
See, the curious purpose,
This gull in plunge,
This slug in retreat,
But never see nor know beyond a guess
The slow, silent food which churns this world.

Pillars
It seems forever we have been called we,
Hand in hand before the world
As bright casted children born to be with each other
Until each other bends to the winds chorus.
As if from Mose's pillar,
The Bronze Cathedral sends a twister filled with his debris.
It holds us, letting the past escape to Nod,
While we are held by mere debris,
Transformed selves,
Little factories spent in time,
Now a wall of memories
And debris.

Beggars
The beggar stalks his clients `til the pennies fall.
The box is filled and filtered to another sentinel,
To other clientele,
Returning to the beggar when he stalks again.
So, I in your arms let fall the coins,
I hope you stalk no other dream but me.
And when your box is filled,
You spend it not on the sentries _
Although I know to ask it defies the skies
As Summer dogs the heels of time
Until the pennies fall.

The Trumpet Sounds My Great Love
The trumpet sounds my great love,
And we believe what we do not see.
Clarion calls the clouds,
Quick paced and haggard;
The dog awakes and stretches.
The trees sway beneath the swell,
So many red-headed nods.
Yet, I this year remained in-doors,
Away from the sight and sense of the wood.
Still, the trumpet sounds
And I believe what I do not see.

Gossamer
A leaf caught in a spider's web
Soon rusts with milky net.
Cormorants are taught to fish
But, starve for the want of their catch.
I, for one, am steadfast in love,
Yet, starve for want of a catch!
While soon, like the grey leaf,
Bitterly weigh down the web.
The spider has moved away
For grey-leaves in Autumn fill no bellies.

I Leave your Bed in Sadness
I leave your bed in sadness,
Not for the want of your bed,
But for my need to leave.
The lane is still,
Save a baby's cry.
Grey mists mourn the night's passing.
Wet leaves in the gutter
Testify to the dew.
No claim here beyond the common, but my sigh and longing for your heart.
The streetlight fails;
A sparrow lites on the iron rail.
No burst of thunderous ecstasy _
No mark in time,
Save a baby's cry.

Transformation
Things change,
Shaped by the changeless force.
Subdue this thought
And a simple moment quests;
A swirl of dust in sunlight
Or the face of a wind carved mount
Remits this thought subdued.
In your toughening skin,
And your infrequent erection,
We know that time is quietly seeking a home.
In my constant reminiscing
And my stubborn forgetfulness
We know the Bronze Cathedral is at hand.
In a cat's purr
Hear the changeless force
As things change _

Cloak
A million times this oak has stripped
To the same unbidden wind;
Yet, when the blast comes,
I cloak up.
The wind is very trying,
Succeeding now where once it failed.
The wind is success
And I cloak up a million times.

Pas de Deux
Two birds in the woodland,
Dance in the air a pas de deux
And sing a duetto d'amore
Between the baring boughs.
Comes a crackling under foot,
A couple, we, men wrapped in each other's arms,
And in a sudden clasp of passion,
We let the trees supply the bed of nature.
No autumn chill,
Inner warmth swells the wing
And singing zippers grip the air.
The birds watch intent a lesson they know well,
And know they too can be consumed in dance
And song and not bring chicks to bare _
Gay lovers in Autumn know,
No young foxes will arrive in Spring
Except to bring them flowers
And lose their petals by Summer.

Remember the Cool, Green Days
Remember the cool, green day
When the sun came brief between the twig;
The bower was darked by rain;
Yet, the daisies dotted the borderline;
The brook ran full _
The vines entwined the elm's heart _
Tranquil spirits came and went;
Fears were dead _
Love thrived;
And in mundane dew, dripped smoke.

Now you are on the forest altar,
Lying naked on the rock,
With the filtered sun kissing your chest,
And your wondrous thighs wreathes in sandy hair,
The cup of my experience,
The bread of my mouth and joy,
Triumphant in it's autumnal stance _
A postulant more mine than your's.

Never would I dream,
This most shallow glen
Could now transfigure my soul
Beyond the grasp of heaven's gasp.
I kiss you lips, your chest, your hair
And forget the cool, green days
Before this altar was set and this Cathedral stood.

Ebb
My love and I walk the shore
And know beneath sweats and hoods
The cool wintry nip of the autumn sea-breeze.
And his hand is clasped in mine,
Five fingers sewn to five fingers
Measures of the intimate world beneath the dunes,
Beneath the hollow moments when sweats and hoods are shod,
And finger rove the rolling surge of our love.
The mountain sea sighs
To send the leathery shore
Slickening.
Yet, this odd season
Would make one think
The sea dries up and sighs no more.
The ancients measured all
With five fingers also.

Tree Art
Rusting tree, you mark the time
And tell me that the season's here
To fire this aging soul to heaven.
And my mind knows the rest of a year,
A year slowing to the shallows.

Red tree, you're vibrant still
As when the green of summer's coat
Had turned its eye from the hills,
Telling the artist to dab the palette again
And mix more crimson in the tide.

Yellow tree, you take my breath
And send our mouths at once
To pray to the great Signator.
When green, you were but mope;
When bare, you'll be but widow _
But now, you take the breath . . .

The Others
Walls of artist's palette
So fiercely shook by northern gust _
Forbode to some
But transfer others.
You, dear guy, for one are some _
I, for one am both.
But others, they are others.
So, the wind comes,
Inviting brush to the cooler tray,
And destroy some,
But transfers others.
A framework left, recedes to the fore';
While bare mounts claim the eye.
The village bell rings
Calling the others to worship.

A Passing Parade of Splendor

A passing parade of splendor,
First muddled green,
Then chameleon upon chameleon,
Blunted by the sky
Churned as lobsters potted.

Like us, once casual like children,
Now in our grand passage,
Today the silk tie,
Tomorrow the hair tint _
Hours preening for the true look,
The one flash to make our floats grandiloquent
As autumn clouds stealing `cross the Earth,
Like us, only in unison, unlike our fugue _
Splendid, yet cosmic,
Like lobsters potted.

When I Think of That One
When I think of that one,
The true love that never was
I think of myself
Coming to rest in a twisted, drying weed,
A wing-seed falling in fallow.
Yet, a mere fifty paces
Yields rich, sleeping loam.
Who should release it and deliver _
Give it push and watery aid?
Who should defy fate.
Yet, who's to say this wing-seed
Would have yielded yet another drying weed
To catch some other misdirected wing-seed.
Fatal sigh!

Just Fourteen Miles to Batsto
Just fourteen miles to Batsto
Where the heart of old beats newness,
A re-creation of the old days _
How delightful and exact.
Indeed, an advertisement to the past.

You and I sit, between us
An old album, on leaves of gold
Our likenesses shining as we hid our love,
In stolen hours beneath some blinking neon sign;
Not like this day where our love now flashes
To all the world above the valley.

We pass the wall of golden,
Crimson-green and brick with muddy _
Miles of yellow passion,
Arching high above our carriage
Like some renown Cathedral
To the spirits of the dead;
Yet, it's fourteen miles to Batsto
To re-create the old times.

Telewires
He snugs me close in the dawning chill,
The pillow has long slipped to the floor,
And the battle for covers, long fought
Has compromised to flesh on flesh,
And we no longer hear the summer birds of morning.
Singing tele-wires,
When the wind's nimble fingers
Pluck the harp strings
Sending carols through the eaves.
Under sheets and half awake,
Do we know the wind only for his music?
Then, parade of souls we hear you still!

They Tied the Trees with Ribbons

They tied the trees with ribbons
At the merry country dance
And decked the hall with bowers
Striking fires at the door.
And I, in my autumn finery
Dance with you upon the dais,
And raise toasts to strange harmonies
In the safety of our home.
But, the wind, homeless
Brushes the ribbons and kisses the bowers,
Embering the fires
And knows no safety of its own,
But laughs through my boots and your leathers.

Dam
River leaf borne down
Currents swift by recent rain
Is plucked to make a beaver's dam.
Once it held rain _
Now, it holds rain-swell.
Dust makes dust makes dust . . .
Roses, Willows, Snow
A collection of sticks,
Bones with thorns.
Wavering in the wind like wires
Strung between a collection of sticks.
Held upon its trellis,
The wonder bloom of blooms,
Scented blossoms in a riot of coloration, Shaming the nearby willow tree.
Now, this winsome willow tree
Wears the coat of Joseph's fame
To dim the collection of sticks.
In, the ground,
White with mounds of bevelled snow
Will steal away the play.
Come, my lover to the barn to be spent,
For my willow arms are now the show;
And we need be the sunshine
Before the snow falls to hay.

Around the Feast of Autumn
Around the feast of autumn
The creatures of the forest
Raise their hearts to heaven
To save them from the buckshot.
Some are heard _
Some not _
We harvest in the forest
Around the feast of autumn.

Bedside
Everyday I pray for your betterment,
For I know, your body will secumb
If left to the torrents too long.
And I dedicate my touch to wipe your tears,
To help you breathe,
To lift that edifice your body has become.
The storm pelts this house
Fired with grim explosion _
Whipped by tidal rain
As if around the cape this house has turned.
The bushes bow heavy _
The trees shake as Shaker Brooms
And the quake occurs.
I wait to sing the ode to the calm,
But, once the calm was not _
And, oh my love, the weather is so unpredictable.

The Crow Goblin
We share a life, a home and all,
But a note tells me he's gone,
To find his true self again.
The grain is whisked by the gale
And I lean upon the crow-goblin
More scared than the crows.
Dark clouds forewarn
The return to home is heavy,
Without a cheery destiny.
But, I go nonetheless, like the crow-goblin
With the grain, gale-whisked
Stuffed within my chest.

The Hills Sense the Good
The hills sense the good
The sun means to yield
As it arches low in the fields
Closer to the burning bush,
Kinder to the quelling gale,
The power sits in all.

I met him at the rest stop.
He peered at me across the dashboard
And I signaled him to follow
And we entered,
And we kissed
And we knew the power as we let the fig leaves fall,
Worshipping in the Bronze Cathedral of autumn anonymity.

I awoke last night
And felt the sunshine bright
Clearly in my deepest dark,
For the power sits in all
And I sense the hills.

Chapel in a Wheat Field
Chapel in a wheat field
Lost in the tall grasses,
Wants a coat no tree can give.
Although the pews are splintered
And the bell finds no hearer _
The deer peer kindly through the windows
To see within what they surely know without.
And the mice gnaw
And the worms bore,
But the chapel falls away
Each year toward splendid repair.

November
Take my hand dear love
As we leave the Bronze Cathedral,
This stately edifice of elms _
Or rather, let it leave us
Yielding a war-worn ruin,
A memory evidenced by buttresses
And shattered stain glass foliage.
Vanish we to the world of Philadendra
As the leaves turn in to show
Elegant maps to our endless pleasure
At the first communion's snow.

Sunday, October 24, 1993
Sayreville, NJ