Colorado

Blue spruce
you hoped would grow
taller than the cedars. . .
some of its lost needles in the 
bird's nest

Diamond Quality

Matchsticks
dampened by rain
or some other sadness.
Too many strikes. The light goes out
again.

Noisemakers

New year
dressed in the old
year's clothing. Camouflage
and gunfire shatter any plans
for peace.

Decomposing

dreamscape
of fallen trees
a silent vigil held
by mosses and lichens in your
honor

The Hurt You Cannot See

...they asked her to tell what happened only to discount her memory... (Lorna Simpson, "Waterbearer," 1986)

Fractured
in places hard
to imagine. X-rays
only show a fraction of what's 
broken.

“All that was great in the past was ridiculed, condemned, combated, suppressed — only to emerge all the more powerfully, all the more triumphantly from the struggle.”

― Nikola Tesla

For Ken:

Blueprints

In your

childhood pictures --

the gaze of one whose mind

is on the verge of inventing

something.

Cindy Tebo

Welcome to Memphis

rainy
Fourth of July
just outside of Graceland
no Elvis but the thunder keeps
clapping

Editor's Choice, Sol Magazine, 2003

(Link no longer available)