In Montreal, the wind below
gets channeled between buildings
evoking Bernoulli’s Principle
to lift certain poets off the ground
into the island sky
and thence perhaps to Bozeman.

Coasting into a brick wall,
surprised to pass right through it,
bricks like flowers flying everywhere,
I congratulate myself
and offer you my hand.
You take me to the promised land.

Split between the past and future,
straddling the present,
I find myself clinging to dawn,
holding onto the now
like a life preserver
against the double dragon.

The crows of worry are cawing
like cowbells in my head.
The sun is lurching and clawing,
trying to get out of bed.
And yet hope somehow persists
as the road ahead tumbles and twists.

It seems I’m walking down a hall
of mirrors to where a humble
dragon waits to lead me outside
to a gathering of my past selves
mingling with an unruly crowd.
I approach them and bow.

The sky is the wood, dawn the flame,
my mind the pot coming to a head—
for my porridge and coffee and cream—
boiling upward with thunder
and dreams to enliven the dance
of this happy shift of circumstance.

The bee returns to the rose.
But not the same bee, and not
the same rose, just as you and I
are not the same now as when
we began, these many years past.
And yet love continues to last.

When a fool embraces
the humble love of learning,
wisdom and enlightenment can
begin to fill the sky
like a gradual dawn
spreading peace and joy across the lawn.

     for Jean on her birthday

The moon and the stars dance with the sun
in an ever-changing
choreography of grace
above your dwelling place
where you lie down at night and rise
with coffee in the morning.

As the days after beltane
continue their parade, one after
another along the grain
of time, motion, and laughter,
the earth with its night clings to the sun
as I to my only one.

A cold and rainy day
has come to wash away
the remaining decay
of the after-winter malaise
moldering in my cells
like the echo of Xmas bells.

And I’m not complaining,
not at all. I’m planning
secretively within
the lowest level of my soul,
on a cushioned daybed
under the warm glow of a lamp.

Now and then I come up
to the top-floor kitchen
and pour myself some tea
for nourishment and wellbeing
and look out the window
at the birdbath and the robins.

On Mother’s Day my mother
Might want to tread carefully
Amongst all the other
Mothers strolling ruefully
Around the neighborhood wondering
Why the world is sundering.

In the sky the thundering,
Though not apocalyptic,
Hints at the blundering
Of Trump’s apoplectic
Followers cheering on masked police,
Disturbing goodness and peace.

The distance by mother geese
To the November midterms
When we hope for release 
Can’t be rushed though the world squirms—
Mother’s Day to after Halloween,
With more carnage in between.

Trust the mothers to be keen
To shine light into this dark
Episode, rude and mean.
It will seem it was a lark
As sanity returns to smother
The plan to trump another.

The dimness of the light
Diminishes with birds
That dart on deft, delicate wings
Across the scofflaw surface
Of wavering water,
The sunrise reflected there.

The I that I am swims 
In the swift flow of thought
That rhymes jestingly with the times,
And the I that you must be
From point A to point B
Surrenders your sea to me.

I wait here patiently, 
My mantra carefully
Tiptoeing over tongue and lips
To meet the ocean sunrise
And scale the mountain sky
Until it fills up the day.

The eye in rising sees
An aying sighing song,
Descries in the early morning
A departing seagull
That cries in the singing
A rye and ready ringing.

     for Vanessa on her birthday

The potential of your life
has been building up like a river
waiting for the opening
of the floodgates in spring
and the return of birds at play
arriving on your birthday.

The sunrise clings to the earth
for a moment while the earth recalls
the day you were born and breathed
the breath of light and fire
filling up the calendar page
with the river’s unleashed rage.

The way you wandered the globe
in your younger days has given way 
to the pursuit of the hearth
and the discovery
of the flame at the heart of dawn
stretching light across the lawn.

The way you hold onto faith
in the motions of your dreams deferred
keeps your soul intact in time
and bends the rising light
through the cracks in the everything
where you still hear the birds sing.

I bought myself shoes in Montana
When I was there in March—
And a few other items,
Leaving behind several articles
Of clothing in exchange
To balance my suitcase.

And now that I’m back in Montreal
And the snow has melted
And the birds are back in force
I’m walking in these Montana shoes
Along the Saint Lawrence,
Grieving to be leaving …
Grieving to believing.

Words are made of syllables, and birds
Are made of feathers and flesh and bone.
They both perch in the tree of truth
And fly forth to do the bidding
Of the creator poet
Who sends glad tidings to all the world.

My past catastrophes
have been haunting me lately, in dreams
and in my waking mind
but with the hope of crushing
the bad karma I’ve amassed
into a powder at last

held in my open fist
and released into the humble wind
of ego letting go
before I’m forced to admit
the window has closed on me
and my pride has grown too old.

What I’ve been given is,
it seems, a second chance to repair
the circuitry of grief
in the fresh air, like a leaf
unfolding on an old limb,
like a rock learning to swim.

Suddenly a change comes.
The leaf is joined by a host of leaves,
the rock finds fellowship
at the bottom of the pool,
the dawn comes, shining brightly
on the glad assembly.

I’ve thought about piloting
A plane again as I did
When I was younger and wagering 
The present on a future bid
For unfortunate fame
Or a position in the game.

It seems to me that might be
A way to reclaim balance
Within a framework of harmony 
To rebuild the wings that I once
Used to carry the earth
Above the sky of my rebirth.

But that is merely a thought,
Perhaps just a metaphor
For the return of something I sought
Back then but then let out the door
Like a dog keen to run,
The last sight of the setting sun.

I guess I don’t need the sky
With its endless blue mountains
And its promise of infinity
But only these flowing fountains
And these rivers of grace 
Reflecting your beautiful face.