Love Poem
It’s an alliance,
the white pine
sending up
positive leaders
and the negative leaders
forking downward
from cumulonimbus
darkness, till
jittering opposites
touch, and the black
cloud discharges
down the passage
and into our pine
a Zeusian Godfuck.
Lit for an instant
we didn’t see
–not elegance,
but light, fire,
and shattering–
the front yard pine
tilted onto an oak.
Arriving home,
we paused, warm
in unexpected
sunlight, mystified.
Above us, a new
portal of bottomless
azure opened,
and in the soft light
we marveled first
at how we’d changed.
Birthday Cake
Eager for good
luck, I sputtered
pink wax
across brown icing
and “Andrew” spelled
in stale letters
peeled from a candy
alphabet.
Among torn
wrapping and small
gifts, I considered:
Six is finished,
seven begun.
Six of what?
Seven of how
many?
My brothers
ate two of the hard
green letters. Most
of my name, I ate it.
