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Lake Eola 1989
that winter we put
on Shakespeare
in the park
was the coldest in ten
years and just before the audience
froze
during Shrew
a horse and carriage got hit
by an Isuzu
the loose filly galloped
past the bandshell
but missed the stage
sirens fired past
and broke up Kate's wedding speech
the crowd thought she's finally realized
what a crud Petruccio is
Monday, October 2, 2006
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Sarasota 1998
he had wants
stained glass entry
new wooden windows
fiberglass garage door
small house built in 1928
siding petrified to blond patina
just needs a few touches
here and there
new mantel
vinyl guttering makes such a big
difference but despair
makes more of a difference
so he hung his wants
from the rafters
and swung back and forth
handsomely
like a good pendula
Monday, October 2, 2006
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Tempe 1994
or a most appropriate fig leaf
to their nakedness
a sermon set loose
after an idea
like a pit bull
that's working the yard
or a sermon as chocolate chip
after the funeral
when the mourners are up to their necks
in coffee
then watch the blue airplane
water flush it away
or before a large audience
each at each lectern
reads homilies written by others
to each other in a kind of code
only they would know
they were making peace subtly
or we knew and could tell
but being subtle ourself
didn't
Monday, October 2, 2006
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Jerusalem 0031
do not celebrate the fall
of rome at mass do not shake
open your wallets and let
green twigs fall do not
leaven your juries do not bear
libations to the armies nor sprinkle
foreheads with evian
because the elohim loved the basket
of green twigs they lay down loving
our father then got up wondering
what ram lay bleeding from the dagger
embraced to our father's chest
chest of his chest our father tested
back high on the holiest what god
what ram what son for man so loved
his son made in the image of god
that he clung to the bush lit the ram
and claimed stone knives sanded sharp
by love what god so loved
his son made in his image more god
than man and let him wander
for thirty or so years around nazareth
Friday, September 29, 2006
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Chicago 1871
glitter swings
through the pine needles
coats branches
and bows stipling oaks
spindly maple
rooms cast lamplight
on cowering juniper
winding flame engulfs
a bowl
smoke
mixes with ash
rises in wisps
that string upward
to gray sky
billowing
across shadows
far away
Friday, September 29, 2006
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Salem 1692
leaning tower
sprung from the paving
its bell clangs
hung like the gallows
quaked among rocks
spars whose ropes
when tugged
make iron ringers sail
past the sexton
head swung sideways
and eyes riveted
to the steel statue
hands crossed upon its
chest
popped onto the steeple
dropped bolts
stripped
and fissures singing
Friday, September 29, 2006
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Sweetwater 1966
she hoped they'd
love her
tried to love them
their clothes cost
more than a year's tuition
cars as much as her
parents' split level
dinner with them
emptied her purse
trips emptied her VW's tank
they talked vacations
in Zurich and Rome
shinnied gutter spouts
to their beds
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
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Canaveral 1969
owl feather acorn pine
cone trout scale
coon-fur rubbing orange
blossom beeswax palm
bark morning glory blue
as my arteries
white spout and yellow stigma
poking out five black stripes
make a star where I touch
the petals an hour later pink
fingerprints in the blue
emerald swells plumeria
flower on jams trampled
at bottom in seashells
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
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Orlando 1992
a tower of light like a blown palm
made from green glass
windows for staring strangers
horns flaring at us
wild yellow belly of the bulldozer
its iron dong trenching the soil around us
cracker shacks once harvested from orange crates
cobbled with spent nails
the road's end splays into the tower of light
like an artichoke made from coke bottle
light gone inside out
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
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