Shape the Frame

It hurts to feel ill
But not, in each case,
To have come down sick.

Would you like to be
Sick but not feel ill
Or well but feel ill?

See, this is why folks
Eat too much, drink too
Much, and dose up drugs.

This is why we have
Faith, fierce games, and prayers.
Signs aren’t just their paints.

Frames know what they hold.
What they hold’s not just
The shape of their frame.

Quick Tail

One way to know that you’ve done
As much as you need to do
Is to keep in mind the fact
You keep none of what you do.

The Greek word for small, wild cats
Seems to have come from “quick tail.”
Who was the first to say that?
A soul who was new to cats,

A child stuck knee-deep in nouns?
Was there a wild, slow-tailed cat?
Or is this whole tale a myth?
Ask who? Greek kept none of it.

Each Point of the Wave Still Waves

This is it. The world. You can
Pause and say it now. It’s fine.
We’ll wait. You’ll come back to us.

There. You have. You know, you could
Say it at each point you live
And aren’t too caught up in life.

Once more. This it. The world.
Have a look, if you can look.
Take a deep breath and smell it,

If it’s not too rank, too vile,
If your lungs and nose work well.
Or just sit with what you feel

What it feels like to just sit.
That sense. This is it. The world.
At each and all points. Still is.

Trees and Rocks

Half shades are all you get from these pines,

And the rocks are at best crude sun clocks.

Can you tell why you are what you are?

Can you tell why you’re not what you’re not?

Your shade moves with the light as the ground

Spins in and out of sun. Call it time,

If you like, call it a beat, your pulse.

The trees should not be linked to the rocks.

The trees, calm as they may seem, are more

Like you; the rocks are more like their shades.

This is true where there are no shade trees.

This is true high in the heaped brick blocks

From which the trees look low, far, and small,

And rocks all look to be paved with tar.

This true in your head as you read

That it’s true, but now comes the true test—

Are these words that raise thoughts in your head

More like rocks and shades or trees and you?

But Where Have All Your Thoughts Gone?

The best roads are the ones with no one
On them—no trucks, no cars, and no bikes,
No fools who pant up and down their hills,

No one but you and a crow or two,
Some beasts who pass through and are not hit—
Just a strip through the world left to sit

In the sun or the snow or the rain,
A broad, smooth brow with no thoughts in it,
A carved path that feels like a great gap

In not just the land, but the whole day.
A good road that has no one on it
Feels like it’s the one lost, left to wait

For the years to come and chew it down
Bit by bit as trees and shrubs close in,
Long grass breaks through, and the paint stripes fade.

It’s a set left bare on a bare stage,
A blank page left on a desk at death,
The place in the scroll where the scribe quit.