Category: A Daily Poem

(Poem #460 on new numbering scheme)

The wind grasped puddles
left over from morning rain
and the moon was full.

(Poem #459 on new numbering scheme)

Kay turned, saying, “My birthday was Saturday. Were you aware?”
Next to me, she pushed out from her desk, but not looking at me.
“I didn’t know.” Put my head down, sighed. So she said, “And my sister
died early Sunday. She still knew – in her coma – her deathday
shouldn’t be shared with my birthday.” Suddenly tears were appearing.
“I didn’t plan on this… why am I crying again?” I sat silent.
Gathering scattered cool remnants of calm, she returned to her work.
Just an odd, errant outburst of emotion disturbing smooth water.

Coda. I watched a small orangegold leaf twist, struggle, detach
float and then hang, now suspended against a wide orangegray sky,
held there in place by a wind that was blowing from somewhere quite far.
It was so strange. Maybe life’s endless terminations grant
sweeping perspective on things – if not hope – and so, pulling my eyes
down and away from the spinning dead leaf, in the end I keep walking.

(Poem #458 on new numbering scheme)

Beasts of the Earth, part-uncoiled from the sphere, rising up skyward,

cruising alongside the edge of the sky, become platforms of gold stone.

(Poem #457 on new numbering scheme)

Skeletons, mummies,
witches and ghosts. The fall night
decorates the trees.

(Poem #455 on new numbering scheme)

ㅁ
A terrible inertia settles in
created by exhaustion, setbacks, sighs.

– a couplet in (quite rough) blank verse (iambic pentameter?).

(Poem #454 on new numbering scheme)

I came home from work.
My computer was broken.
So I did not blog.

(Poem #453 on new numbering scheme)

The world is chopped in pieces, then,
the gods' desires irrelevant.

(Poem #452 on new numbering scheme)

I listen to the radio:
it's Minnesota news.
It tells me it will snow today.
I miss that sort of muse.

(Poem #451 on new numbering scheme)

Even in Goyang,
sometimes woodsmoke scents the air.
It smells like camping.

(Poem #450 on new numbering scheme)

The air had turned cold
as I walked home. At last Fall
falls down from heaven.

(Poem #449 on new numbering scheme)

“What is appropriate,” she asked, “when all around us the world burns?”

“Well let’s discuss the gold sky’s hues, then, or instead, let’s sing,” I said.

(Poem #448 on new numbering scheme)

The people brought machines to bear -
they sought to solve some things.
Instead they found they should submit
beneath their gadgets' wings.

(Poem #447 on new numbering scheme)

There is no poem that can get you unstuck from the daily experience.

Actually, stuckness can only be tackled by diligent disregard.

(Poem #446 on new numbering scheme)

The lines project across the hollow gulfs
that underlie imagination's flights.

(Poem #444 on new numbering scheme)

Dawn comes later now
But gray gives way to silver
blue or pink or gold

(Poem #443 on new numbering scheme)

Lately the poems are not coming so easily. Epics and haikus are
difficult; weather and sunsets and student behavior become tired.

– some kind of effort at a heroic couplet (dactylic hexameter)

(Poem #442 on new numbering scheme)

The sun was large, and alligators played
beneath a random rainbow made of trash.

You can see the following blogpost for context of this couplet.

(Poem #441 on new numbering scheme)

The universe is not so big these days,
the fasteners have taken over all.
The problem is the lack of paper, since
the cellulose was used for paperclips.

(Poem #440 on new numbering scheme)

It's difficult to go on Saturdays.
There's just one class: those girls who hate to work.

(Poem #439 on new numbering scheme)

Ghosts dwell between things
and gesture with puffs of air
to show their regrets.

(Poem #438 on new numbering scheme)

Microwave something to eat and then sit down to see if the world spins;

write a few sentences hoping the meanings emerge from my pen’s end.

(Poem #437 on new numbering scheme)

I looked up. Birds were flying south. The clouds
were heavy, moving north. They passed like trains.

(Poem #436 on new numbering scheme)

There might be rain now.
Do you have your umbrella?
Then, an autumn rain.

(Poem #435 on new numbering scheme)

Magic machines lurk listless and grim in the clouds as if history
writes conversations alone, disregarding the rainbows that follow.

(Poem #434 on new numbering scheme)

And thus it happens now, today,
vacation days are past;
in fact, it's bland cliché to say,
but time went really fast.

[daily log: walking, 1km]

(Poem #433 on new numbering scheme)

Clouds drift, torn, vast, broken and scattering; destitute gods look

downward to see what, where, who, how, why. Answers can’t be found.

(Poem #431 on new numbering scheme)

I had decided to wait. Through my window the rain swept dreams
leaflike along damp sidewalks, gravity pulling the water down.

(Poem #430 on new numbering scheme)

Night demons eat words.
They gulp them down. Sunset comes.
The air becomes chill.

(Poem #429 on new numbering scheme)

Here in the world, all the sky is afraid, and its gaze is compelled – bent

down – so its motionless countenance glowers horizonward, clouds gray.

(Poem #428 on new numbering scheme)

Time takes on odd shapes.
A rain clears from cooling air.
Summer yields to fall.

[daily log: walking, 8km]