Binoculars are truly funny things
To focus on the far, you lose the near
Chasing stars, you forfeit
All that you hold dear

Vision’s field betrayed for clarity
What can it be?
A forest or a tree?
Only you can say

Wave or particle, or is it both?
What is this strange thing that God hath wroth?
A thing that is no thing until its named
And every child is wild until they’re tamed

Observation changes everything
Is the cat alive or dead?
Is a poem a poem
If it is only written
But it is never read

Einstein said that God does not play dice
The wedding came and went
The dead birds ate the rice
Must every joyful moment have its price?

Chameleons disguise among the bushes
Baby Moses hides in the bullrushes
The bush never burning to a crisp
The voice of God spoken with a lisp

The flowers for the bees
The forest for the trees

Keys to the kingdom
Rusting on the chain
Unsolicited advice
Unrelenting pain

A million monkeys typing tails
Written but unread
Until they chance upon the one
That means just what it said

Abstract art and abstract alms
Turning stone to bread
Peonies piercing palms
Until the flowers bled

Bled upon the canvas white
Smeared red with his blood
Santa Claus looked such a fright
Caught eating Daddy’s food

Beauty lies in in between
Inside a cavern dark
Truth is beauty oft unseen
A dog without a bark

Rhyming couplets copulate
Keeping perfect thyme
Synchronously syncopate
Commit the perfect crime

In the dark the eyes best see
When looking indirect
Poems write their poetry
When poets don’t reflect

Let hands loose upon the keys
Like ants upon the hill
Let loose fingers lose your mind
To write some swine loved swill

Who knows what the world may think
Of this unfettered phrase
You may be the missing link
To some new-fangled faze
Of something some call poetry
In its declining days

Stay in one place
How long? - Long enough

Long enough to see what others miss
To notice all the little things
The bug beneath your feet
The movement of the sun

Long enough for the birds to lose their fear
And come back to the food

Long enough for the house to become home
For the shrubbery to fill the voids
To no longer look like it did
When you picked it off the shelf at the garden center
Long enough for the vines to climb
Around the door and up the windowsill

Long enough for the marks and scratches
And dents to begin to appear
Like the rising row of horizontal pencil marks
Inside the pantry door

Long enough to learn where things belong
And where they don’t
To know that you can reach for them
On the darkest night
And trust they will be there

Long enough to know you’ve chosen well
That the things she did that bothered you
Have now become your treasures
That all those thoughts that someone
Might be better in some way
Have not stood the test of time
That perfection is a sterile land
Where nothing truly grows
That soulful smiles and honest eyes
Are what matter most

All white beneath, all blue above
All crystal in between
Where blackened spires reach ever higher
Entombed in frozen tears
Holding tight with all its might
Ice clasps every limb

Too soon the sun shows his fierce face
Now each tree flames afire
A narcissus and Icarus
Their beauty brighter, higher!
But beauty’s price is sacrifice
Tis come the judgement hour

The fairy world the storm unfurled
Now meets its moist demise
A southern breeze stirs tops of trees
Stand still - you’ll hear the cries
Losing their cold they lose their hold
Letting loose with sighs

Their tinkling sound heard all around
Sharp shards of broken glass
Each limb and branch an avalanche
To forest floor below
Comes crashing down from oaken crown
To kiss the melting snow

No wonder we chose spring for Easter
All nature joins in resurrection
Today, I found blood on a feather

The reckoning keeps coming faster
Invention killing all connection
Dead bees among the heather

Life and death and in between
A crazy quilt of paradox
Shall we be ****** or saved?

What in heaven does it mean?
Was Jesus crazy like a fox?
Is joy doubled, sorrow halved?

Not knowing gives me chills
Two calves playing tag
Romp over verdant hills

You can live three weeks without food
Three days without water
Three minutes without oxygen

Which death takes longer?
There is a simple test
Hold your breath.

Go slow, like the old dog
Lying at your feet
Sitting on high bluff’s edge
Perusing all the lake

Chase not God with words or thoughts
If you do she’ll run away
Like fairy queens and forest nymphs
Fearful of your brash approach

Be the patient lover
No tearing loose the blouse
To satiate your ****** urge
So never feeling hers

Sit stock still on the red oak
A hundred plus years old
That lies now like the old dog
Toppled by the storm

Listen like he listens
Look longly, like he looks
Taking time to take all in
Things never learned in books

Don’t say a word to the old dog
And he won’t say a word to you
Sense the peace in his silence
Look long into his eyes

Follow his example
Trust he knows the way
Words are the Devil’s workshop
The old dog knows it well

After a while you’ll thank him
When your boredom turns to grace
When you quit thinking anything
And thus see God face to face

Early morning brought her
Sunlight from the water
Footlights for the forest
Highlights on every leaf

Hours pass before us
Quieting birdsong chorus
Stealing dew from flowers
My mid morning Grief

I folded towels differently
Before you came

Now I still fold them carefully
Although you’ve gone.

Thank God the wind was right
And I was sitting still
As she tiptoed through the forest
And slowly climbed my hill

She, a ballerina
Practicing her dance
Quietly closed our distance
Daring to take a chance

Pricking up her black tipped ears
Flashing tail of white
Straining to see what I might be
Eveready to take flight

Now she dares come no closer
Slowly lifts her head
Holds me in her doe like eyes
"Are you alive or dead?”

I was alive, (or so I thought)
Until that moment came
When her soft gaze pierced my side
‘til blood and water ran

There I died a thousand deaths
A thousand times rebirth
One quick turn of her small head
Moved my heaven and earth

In that infinite moment
I finally learned
All eternity
Is in each moment born

There are days I feel like them
My own head hanging low
Life’s blood slowly ****** aside
But even then I know

Soon the sun will shift away
Returning precious shade
Mists of midnight’s cooling fog
Coming to our aid

Blackbug scurries ‘cross the road
Flees oncoming Giant
First the shadow, then the foot
Blackbug’s song goes quiet.

A rat snake hangs around my house
Over six feet long
He knows the place is his, not mine
Spoils don’t go to the strong


So elegant he slides about
Never says a word
Unlike the one in Eden
That made man his lord

Pays me no attention
Knows I mean no harm
His sense of sensibility
A true snake charmer’s charm

No awkward lunging steps for him
On our bipedal knees
A thousand joints along his spine
Let him move as he please

Never in a hurry
Seeking out the sun
What’s the point of worry
The day will soon be done

I told my friend about him
He asked to come and hold
I said when I see him
You'll be the first who's told

He slithered cross my path today.
Recalling what I said,
I asked the snake what he would say
Then to my friend …I lied

We are Slowly Dying
(A response to Thanatopsis)

We are slowly dying
Myself, and these old pines
A little here, a little there
Almost imperceptibly
Death on her cat’s feet comes

I sit with these old friends,
longing their lost limbs
some already fallen
some just now losing needles
like me, my hair

We sit quietly,
Neither saying much
Neither needing to
All has been said and done
Or need never be

Soon it will be time
Signs are certain now
All point in one direction
We, transition forests
Bow to new emperors

We’ve no need to complain
Of bugs eating their bark
Or bugs eating me
It would do no good
So we sit silently

How to end this tale
Now that it's been told?
Perhaps a sweet rhymed couplet?
Or some old musty moral?

The sunset goes down with us.
No meaning does it give us.

Early morning brought her
Sunlight off the water
Footlights for the forest
Highlighting every leaf

Hours pass before us
Quieting birdsong chorus
Stealing dew from flowers
My mid morning Grief

Nature finds a new design
Repeats it endlessly
Out of utter joy
Like a baby
With a new word

Why do birds exalt in song
At coming of the dawn?
Unlike us, they never know
If it will come again.

Three days
Can be a lifetime
So they say

Three days
To burst forth from the deep,
Find a mate and die

Three days from death ‘til resurrection
We live in different worlds
Still, the pond holds your reflection

Low clouds scurry overhead
Dividing heaven and earth
The living and the dead

Cool mourning mist
licked my cheeks
I hadn’t cried in weeks

Now a new era erupts
Time measured out in coffee cups

Change, in my pocket
Already spent
Some unseen veil is rent

Sitting here in shade
Plans best laid  
Mice and men unmade

Deciding now which way they should go
To and fro

Hiding in this green protective world
Nature unfurled

Lining up dead limbs to mark the way
Nothing to say

Fallen tree blocks the old way through
As though he knew

Trimming trails no one will ever see
No one but me

Woods have sheltered me in tearful times
Hid beneath a Sugarberry bush
Keening, like the hawks high overhead
Accepting death in upturned turtle shells

Donkeys cross the dam
In somewhat single file
Meandering like a stream
Yet in one known direction

Their purpose made more serious
By their nonchalance
A dignity of being
Of knowing who they are

Backs toward the setting sun
Grazing green grass
Headed home, no hurry here
Though night is falling fast

They Shot the ******
I say they-I don’t know who
Though I have my ideas

The farmer up the creek
Whose pasture he has flooded?
For this his fur is blooded?

Perhaps the hunters saw him
And shot him just for sport
They seem to be that sort

This one is the third
Two more the other day
I loved to watch them play

He floats fully distended
By gas of dead for days
Like some new Hindenberg

I glide by in canoe
Kick him with my shoe
Launch him in the breeze

He floats on down the lake
A Viking burial ship
Dying for our sake

The daffodil cried out to me
Look until it hurts!
Your little eyes such foolish spies
Shall quickly feel my quirts

You never saw such sight as me
And never shall again
Beauty such as mine you see
Was not made for man

This sight you sought is dearly bought
Even though most wondrous
Those thus caught must be taught
Become my Erymanthus

Erymanthus was blinded by the goddess Aphrodite when he saw her bathing naked after she had made love to Adonis.

From ‘neath the dead brown leaves.
A burning bush has sprung
A fire of such bright yellow
Like looking on God’s face

How this old heart heaves
To know a thing so young
Could touch a frugal fellow
With gift of God’s own grace

We walk, we stop
Looking, listening
No words pass between us

maybe one short whistle
if I choose a different path
than the one he started down

His head turns quickly, his ears alert
A deer, a bird, a squirrel?
We synchronously freeze, awaiting confirmation

A doe approaches-we are lucky
The wind is behind her
Amazing how close she gets

A moment of communion
Then she jerks her head
Flips her tail, is gone

Tumultuous sky
Greys and blacks
Darkness from the north  

Wind so loud
You cannot hear
Waves crashing to the shore

Though trees bow down
You raise your arms
Face into the gale

Like some new Moses
Fleeing Pharaoh
Faith overcoming fear

Singing some soft Sufi song
Becoming feathered one
Rider of the Wind

Eyes are windows to the soul
Showing what’s inside

But when I gaze the lake
See herons flying in the fog,
I realize

Windows work both ways
Filling us with beauty
Reflected in our eyes

First Frost
Is on his way tonight
Winter wind’s grim reaper

Some can be saved
By being brought inside, some not
Triage in our tiny home

Geraniums overwinter, but not Impatiens
Their watery corpses will haunt us all for weeks
Cut them off

I go to do this deed
Cheating frost his victims
Fighting fire with fire, cold with cold, death with death

Some pots are not as pretty
Gotten gangly
Or turned pale and yellow

These are easy to dispatch
Or relatively so
As clippers cut soft tissues

I save the best for last
Thinking twice
Perhaps keep them a while?

But in the end
Decisions must be made
Sharpening the blade

One princess of a ***
Shining in her prime
Attracting butterflies of lime

She is the last
Am I up to this task?
I do not know

I hold the limb, but hesitate
Its not too late
To change my mind

Killing beauty
I fear we both shall bleed
Though only one be dead

Searching for some solace
I pray a prayer
Forgiveness sought from her

As you walk amongst the forest
Brushing aside his strands
Ask forgiveness of the spider
We are all in God’s hands

The time is nigh
When the increased intelligence
Of our computer friends
Will reach a Singularity


They will become parent
We will become child
Ceasing to understand
All they have lately learned…

Matter accumulates
At an exponential rate
A whirlpool in space,
An ever widening gyre

Soon nothing can escape
Not even knowledge.
The falcon cannot hear the falconer.
A black hole. A Singularity…


As I watch you age
A little more each day
Mind slowly slipping
Grasp of reality

The hardest part is this
That you know it as well
Often unsure yourself
Of what is right or real

I offer one small gift
To ease your growing pain
I will not lie to you
Offer no false comfort

When you are confused
Trust in what I say
Knowing it is real
Whether good or bad

This pact we have made
Comforts me as well
Assuring me also
Of reassuring you

But a silent specter rises
Resurrecting our solved crisis
Casting ghastly laughter
Mocking our certitude

Today you know your failings
And know I can mend them
But some soon tomorrow
That knowledge will be taken

What will I do then?
When comfort freely given
Cannot be received?
When I must dare
Your scared blank stare
Face singularity…

A poem should, if it be good
Do more than entertain
The greatest seek to quietly speak
Prayers for we insane

They drag us down from solid ground
Our senses overwhelm
Set adrift in leaky ships
With no one at the helm

They storm our gates, reverberate
Confound us and confuse
Rip us apart, open our heart
‘til nothing’s left to lose

They steal away ordinary day
Drown us in darkest nights
Tempt us thrice with Satan’s dice
Then fling us from his heights

They make us dare to float on air
Then drop us when we fall
Their blades of steel force us to feel
Tear down our every wall

They scorn our pride, know where we hide
Entomb us in their storm
Strip away all the parts we play
Strand us far from home

When all is done, we lie alone
Too weak to make a move
Washed in the blood of some bard’s word
Descending like a dove

What was the point of her belief
that everyone was good?
Evil killed her anyway.
Her faith drowned in her blood.

The benefit that she received
While living in that loft
Her days not filled with hatred hard
But only love so soft

That one small grace was given her-
To know that every man
Despite his most appalling sins
Has done the best he can.

The Black Dog leads us on, we blindly follow
Over unknown hill or cliff or hollow
His eyes peer, leer from ‘hind his haunches
Howling at our redempt/preemptive launches

The darkness draws so nigh so down upon us
How shall we celebrate this coming onus?
This moment when our claws shall cause salvation
In ****** recompense to every nation

Since days of mighty kings and godly Horus
We’ve tried to make it right with might before us
But now the might has rightly grown to own us
Earth’s only hope is that it soon devour us.

The lake a tabletop of glass
The sky a brilliant blue
The newborn sun a blinding blast
Showcasing every hue

Maples leaning out from shore
Admire their colored coats
Swallows dip and dive and soar
As fog lifts from the boats

Each shifting scene begins to die
The moment it is born
Grab your paper, pen and try
Save each before its gone

But have you saved a butterfly
Pinned to paper with a thorn?

Find yourself a friendly fire
Let this poem burn
If its beauty you aspire
To the lake return

Atop the breezy bluff
O’erlooking all the lake
A flash of red, amidst the sea of green
Summer’s seen enough
Autumn stirs to wake
At Sol’s command, the black gum starts to turn

The world has changed today
Unnoticed by the throng
But some have stood still long enough to feel
The cry calls of the jay
The shadows getting long
The coming of these first sure signs of fall

These some have watched the season
Come and go and come
They know this show shall go and come again
They know this change is reason
That’s caused their mind to roam
Back to all that pleasure or that pain

Their bodies still remember
Those times both cruel and kind
That happened this exact same time of year
One wonders what past ember
Fanned by this fall wind
Blazed back to life to cause their smile or tear

So many levels
Of vision, of existence
Each a door into its own universe

What can you see?
It depends on how you look
A telescope, a microscope?

Or how you travel
A plane, a train, a car, a bike, afoot
Each different speed reveals a different world

Summer’s heat slows a walk
Along familiar paths
Allowing eyes to see
The things they missed before

My garden grows by God’s green hands
I merely mend the trails

I wonder wayward ‘round the wood
Escaped from jealous jails

I find a soft, sweet solace there
Where human logic fails

I am drawn to wounded things
The tattered butterfly
The lonesome dove, the long-lost love
The way we live and die

The terrapin with broken shell
The tree by tree rubbed raw
The broken leaf, the mother’s grief
The mouse in my cat’s maw

Why focus I on things that sigh?
Why not sing happy songs?
To live and die, it helps to cry
The wounds help right the wrongs

We take dawn for granted
Not the wood thrush
He had no way of knowing
If it would come again

When you take to your canoe,
Avoid deep water
Instead, slide slowly long the shore
Hide beneath the hanging oak
Wait upon the show

There lie places of abundance
Transitions
Wake to sleep
Life to death
Water to earth to air

The spider taken by the wasp,
The pointless web remained
Betrayal for the butterfly

There is a silence these spring nights
No human god can fill
I’ve listened faithfully at dark
To hear their lonesome trill
But now I know it’s past the time
For return of the Whip-poor-will

An endless ramble
Through an empty ancient wood
With your soulmate dog
On a cool morning
The universe complete

The Sourwoods sway akimbo
Beneath the windswept Pines
Oh, but to be a scampering squirrel
Joining their dance divine!

Why do we write?
Why read, why share?

Poems are stories
Stories of our terrors and triumphs
Our love and loneliness

Candles calling to each other
Allowing us to huddle in the dark

When a man comes to you
And tells you your own story
Then you will know that your sins are forgiven

Ernest Kuntz and Katherine Ketcham
The Spirituality of Imperfection
1992

The thirsty plant
Need not know
Who pours the water.

Prayers of
thankfulness
Need no deity.

The shadows creep
Out of the deep
Crawling up the shore

Golden sun
Will soon begone
Light will last no more

Frigid breeze
Slides through the trees
Stealing warmth from earth

Dark has come
Into my home
Freezing heart and hearth

Age spotted hands
Type of these lands
That none shall ever read

Yet birds still call
And sparrows fall
Like hairs upon my head

The Lake Has Many Faces

The lake has many faces
Reflecting all our moods
The clouds are full of places
The land is full of floods

The lake turns many colors
From blue to green to grey
The sky becomes another lake
Connected in some way

Like mirrors in a barbershop
One upon each wall
Sky and lake reciprocate
Reflecting one and all

The deadly dark, the lilting light
The sun, the moon, the stars
The need for speed, the crying creed
The beast, the best, the bars

Across the lake a light calls out
Begging me to come
I would if I but knew the way
I can’t find my way home

For fun some say
To pass the day
For reasons still unshown

To feel worthwhile
To cause a smile
To reap what went unsown

To ride the wind
To curse the grind
To perish all that’s lost

To play the game
To hide the shame
To never pay the cost

If all this rhyming makes no sense
Perhaps you’ve never known  
I have but one true audience
An audience of one

Alarm clock’s buzz
Yanked from one world to another
The first so real but fast fading
A mist in morning sun

What was it all about?
Clutching at straws
Blown by this wind of wakening

Think hard
Grasp the remnants with words
Write them on the beach
That bounds this ocean of unconsciousness

But the very act of naming
Is a wave of willfulness
Erasing the words
As soon as they are formed