October 1, 1984
The Dungeon Amorist
(Fort Charlotte, Nassau, Bahamas) We idle, circling the wide hilltop courtyard of Fort Charlotte,and bypass the centralsquare guardhouse — boxlike — which displaysa few stuffed scarecrowmodel prisoners, immortally stooped & […]
October 1, 1984
An Icelandic Door
In Memoriam Paul Skoog I He carved this door as a pilgrim would undertake a long penance — silent, hooded in rough serge — take ship, the sea in his […]
July 1, 1984
Mustering Light: A Sequence
I SURVIVING A three-year-long, ravenous siege by deathOf friends, of parents, cousins, uncles, auntsLeft me so skinny, holding in my breath,My tailor gave up taking in my pants.I’ve spent so […]
January 1, 1984
Epithalamium
Molding a steady hand over the brow and cheek of Noah, my only child, deep in that other world, I breathe once for him, then tighten the knot of my […]
October 1, 1983
Aubade
As hushed as nuns pressing God to their lips, As deliberately as when great musics start, The dawn extends itself, a rose light slips Through mists that hold familiar forms […]
October 1, 1983
The Scholar’s Cat
I’ve never seen anyone take to a cat the way you have. Six stillborn litters she’s had, yet you keep hoping she’ll give over one fuzzy live one, one mewing […]