07/08/2025. Four Short Poems: "Shush, Shush" (with a little help from Marie Howe) "Faint Hearts," "For Wallace," and "Dream House"

Been messing with these on Facebook for a while. Will probably mess with them more.

Shush, Shush

I asked myself

Who am I?

The boughs

made ambiguous undulations

in the rain.

Shush

shush...

they said 

as time spiraled up 

and down

its staircase 

and I got up and walked across 

the room

to look at those photos

of us on the dresser

and I watched the neighbors 

walking their dogs 

in the street below.

"There's no one there," 

I heard someone say

from under a purple

umbrella.

Faint Hearts

I was going to drive by your house

look for your silver car

to see if you had returned from the Cape.

Is it too late for the woman on the bridge 

the one offering a sly side-glance in passing 

the one illuminating wild estuaries 

of possibility? 

"A faint heart never a fair maid won"

mom would say. 

Is a faint heart a prophet's heart?

Because now (much later, that is

but still eternity)

I hear occult ceremonies taking place

from deep within the ancient woods

and a bird's frantic S.O.S. to the world.

For Wallace

I stood on a stone bridge over the Seine.

The stars appeared above.

Their stupendous distances.

And a palm appeared at the end of the mind

If you know what I mean.

Dream House

A dream house from some other life

or my own life confabulated into a structure. 

A grand and impressive monstrosity 

beneath some clouds soaking up the day's last blood.

There is a plaster angel in the cupola.

She stares out a window

acknowledging the presence of the past

and those who passed

but you and I are an insubstantial emanation

of sensations.

The rooms are crowded with confused tourists

each drawn to the same astonishing destination.

And there is the room I never mention

so full of light that I hide my face.