Love Songs

Haiku for a Cat
Who We Call the Red Menace,
Because She’s Ginger
(For Mom)

Ginger cats who nap
In the sunlight, look just like
Fresh baked loaves of bread.

Beatrix loves naps
In rectangles of sun, but
Not as much as lunch.

And crouching on sills
Threatening birds, she can’t see
Birds don’t give a shit.

******

Infatuation

I fell and landed hard,
Skinning my knees
On the pavement at the pit of my stomach.
It hurt, so I cried.
Photographs slipped from my eyes
To scatter the floor of my imagination,
While with gracefully exact and economical gestures,
Knowing a hundred paths to a single destination,
Better angels walked a fine, fine  edge.

******

Rhyming is Harder than it Looks

Once there was a man
Whose only virtue was his charm,
Who happened on a brilliant lass,
Alone and lost, and humming.
Lucky that, for he enjoyed
Quicksilver on his arm,
And at a glance he knew
That she would never see him coming.

******

Haiku for a Broken Heart

Oh, thief in the night,
Steal the gleaming moon, sack the
Castle in the air.

Kidnap the sunlight,
Trap my tears behind my eyes,
Abduct the echoes.

Strip me of my dreams,
Tear the grief from my heart or
The heart from my breast.

******

Broken Haiku
(for Shannah)

Summer sky eyes see
Lives lived in the small spaces
Between everything,
And everything else.
Calculating the distance
Between fact, truth, and
That eternity
Between the sound and the ear -
And its endless span.

******

Andy Capp
(For Blane)

Once an irresistible force,
  Loved an immovable object.
    Which was exhausting, a trial by fire.

A cartoon cloud of cartoon dust,
  A cartoon rolling pin,
    A cartoon foot sticking out.

Rock,
  Paper,
    Scissors,

All the god damned,
  Live long,
    Day.

Love

I saw a couple walking,
And fighting.
The girl was like lightning,
The boy was like the cloud that made her.
She called him Nigga a dozen times –
After I started counting.

When he turned off her path
He insisted upon a kiss.
We don’t go apart mad, he said.
I could die, he said.
Through gritted teeth,
She carefully explained that he wouldn’t die.

He raised his voice for the first time.
People die every day – every minute – he said,
And we don’t go apart mad.
She gave in and touched his cheek,
And kissed him, long and slow and sweet,
And I loved them both.

******

Dinner is at Nine
(for Sam)

When my lover makes me dinner,
His are useful hands,
Careless gestures,
Careful thoughts.

My hazel-eyed orator,
My maker of grand gestures,
My sender of small treasures,
Is surprising, silly, and kind.

His gifts are acts,
And, by those, he loves me.
In his eyes, I’m beautiful,
And I’m never out of his sight.

******

My heart may leap, once again, to conclusions.
(for Sam)

I’m always spinning fantasies, and
We are plates overhead,
Barely balanced, but elegantly aloft.

*******

Liquid Math
(For Frank)

I read a sentence once,
Calling music Liquid Math,
And thought it odd.

I’ve never drunk a number,
Nor cared to guess the speed of trains,
I am at once oblique and obtuse, and
Always I dismiss the Why of Y.

But I know that I reside in songs,
That I sleep on jagged beds of staves,
That I speak in cadenza,
That I endlessly embellish.

Then I understood,
Music is the math,
And I am the liquid.

*****

Die Rauschkater: The Hangover
(for Jörg)

Ich habe gestern quasi mit Gott gesprochen.
Er versteht mich.
Nachdem ich ihm ein Bild von Dir gezeigt
Habe sagte er mir, er könne verstehen
Warum ich nicht die Finger von Dir lassen kann.
Er sagt du siehst sozusagen himmlisch.

Das war's für heute.
Mehr sage ich nicht,
Sonst bist Du sauer.
Aber sei nicht so streng mit mir,
Ich habe bereits Kopfschmerzen.

Strafe genug.

I sort of talked to God yesterday.
He understands me.
After I showed him a picture of you,
He told me He can understand
Why I can’t let go of your fingers.
He said you look like heaven.

That’s all for today.
I’ll say no more,
Lest you be angry.
But don’t be so strict with me,
I already have a headache.

I’m punished enough.