Mirror

life tree
like black and white
can you see your own reflection?
like breaking.
two worlds
your own and that of perfect possibility.
nothing else in focus.

**

Ours is the Night

the Moon rises
then falls like rain,
ours is the night
and everything in it.
ours is the sky
dark blue,
little flecks of salt.
ours is the moonlight
shallow and playful
cast on lovers far apart.
like birds that sing
in darkness.

**

Upon having read his own poem aloud in class

the man reads,
not a poet anymore
just a vocalist—
an orator
his oration no longer
a piece of his soul.
clears the throat,
but still the words
are whispered,
creaking phlegm
infiltrates his meaning.

and mournful silence falls
his peers wear quiet contemplation
as he sports a blush,
ruddy face and a million quiet heart beats,
his fate will, here, be decided.
in his chair he does not move,
but in the boy his spirit writhes
“out with it” he yells,
echoes resounding in his mind.

**

Story of a Rock – a prose poem

There sits, in a field near Nowhere, North Carolina, a rock. It is a fine rock, beautiful in its simplicity, simple colors, simple lines. A simple life, even by the standards of a rock. Its chemical structure is not such that would make it wildly popular or valuable; nobody is looking for this rock. This rock is not even impressively large, no bigger than an average persons fist. The rock just sits there day after day, warmed in the light of the Sun, cooled in the caring glow of the Moon and the gentle breeze of night. In the spring an insect might crawl across it or live beneath it, a bird might light upon it, weary from travel, or perhaps none of these things will happen. However, always in spring the grass begins to grow, at first caressing the rock, maybe even tickling it when warm, spring winds blow. Then with the light and the soil the grass grows tall, stretching out in great towers above the rock. And spring leads slowly and anxiously into summer as it tends to do. The rock will weather long, hot, burning days, and short, hot, burning nights just as it always has. And when the night comes, young people will come to the field, they will cast out their blankets like fishing nets, and they will lie on them. The young people are different every year, different clothes and different music, the rock has seen many of them, and they all do the same things. And slowly the nights grow longer and a little colder. Fall has come, the grass that towers above the rock turns shades of gold and amber and the farmer comes with his thunderous machines, and the grass that towered above the rock is mowed as hay and lies across the rock as a golden blanket. Then the farmer comes with more thunderous machines and picks up the hay and moves it into the barn. The rock remembers when different farmers came with quieter machines, but they all did the same things. And slowly the nights grow longer and colder, and again a bird might light upon the rock preparing for long journeys. And slowly the snow come like memories from the sky. It cover the rock, but not like a blanket, like a cold death. Everything in winter is bitter and starving, the rock is alone in the field with the bitter starving snow. The rock does not remember any other snow, all the snow looks the same. And the snow melts, not quickly enough, and the rock sits in the opening glow of spring.