A Gaunt Guard

Words don’t mix
We march right
Up to you

In your eyes
Rule-whipped lines
When too blurred

Do no good
But no harm
But aren’t words

Blue Rules

There’s no game
With no rules
There is play

Play’s the best
But play can’t
Talk to us

We’re words made
From, for games
So we lose

In the Pink

On the path that winds green
And gold from blood to brown,
The stones are white and black

From the heat that made them,
The blooms are sad and blue
From the heat that wilts them,

But the pears whose spines
Dare flesh to come too close
Like this and burst out pinks.

What’s the Date?

Old man, white beard, big nose,
Sits and waits in a car,
An old, black, small, scuffed car

On the side of the road.
The wind blows. The grass bends.
Loud trucks roar up the road.

Smooth cars glide down the road.
The day goes. Wait for it.
The thing that will change you

So much you don’t know—here
Or near here. You’ve known it.
You’ll know it. Then it goes.