I have turned over a new sleeve

(for Jain)

I

I have turned over a new sleeve,
Read a new book, imagined a style
Of greatest import. I scribe to
You, for you, of you these pages

In hopes of love through all ages.
In children’s eyes, toys share all
Tales, tell all stories of smile,
And make me mingle and never leave.

I lave lingered alone, dreamily
Above the spell of doubt and horror,
Lost in a time, cast aside I thought,
And within me forged my greatest hour.

I have made amends with the fairies
And the elves, delved in seemingly
Sour mood for months before sunrise
Now let us break the dawn together.

II

Gone before us are the summer nights
Of temperate warmth, worn to the storm
Of times to come, cunning hour when I
In my solitude cast aside my freight.

Now after-dark, moon-sun up before morn,
I can see the ripple of waves coming ashore
And see you ocean, and me shore, sharing
Only the beach for awhile, for a smile.

For, as the waves they beat, beat the shore
To oblivion over millennia, make sand out of rock,
Make me out of a hard-shelled, rigid rock.
I will no longer pass through your fingers.

You move me floor to coast, and children
Construct bucket-shaped towers out of my soul.
Now let us break the dawn and linger together.
I will no longer pass through your fingers.

postscript

Millions
of earth-friendly
stopthechop
"save the rain forests"
conservationists
print their slogans
on Brazilian paper.

on the silent disorder of men

When asked, in a manner
put simply as straight-forward,
a man's knees move toward
raising high a white banner.

Once proclaiming silent peace,
he quickly lowers his head,
his thoughts of the woman dread
that her feelings for him cease.

Being denied of response,
she removes from a sconce
(quite hastily) a torch off the wall,
and blazes a path down the hall,

alone.