poetry

  Though we’d wish for a straight approach, dying’s a tyro, squats in its delivery, ball   in both hands plopped on the lane. For a moment dumb there, it stutters, wobbles, creeping   down the gleaming alley. A rubbing … Read More

  It was like dying. Or terror falling from the skies in Guernica. Or the yearning of prisoners, how she fell out of herself, sometimes, forgetting her name. The feeling was worst when she wanted to be loved by her … Read More

  Translation by Yun Wang   Soft grass and flat sedge freshen after rain My horse trots on a sandy road free of dust When will I pack up to plow side by side with a friend?   Mulberry trees … Read More

  Translation by Yun Wang   The wind flies fast clouds low over the water The sky clears over swallows nesting at pond-side lodge Burdened with illness Lord Shen could barely dress   No sound of letter-bearing wild geese over … Read More

  Tomorrow someone will come for me. Or maybe not tomorrow. Later. Who knows when? I don’t mind waiting. It beats doing something. Doing has always been my undoing. Not everyone has my peculiar sense of humor. That too has … Read More

  The ostrich will give itself its own name, anoint itself in pearls, stare in the mirror as it dresses and undresses its body.   The ostrich enjoys a spectacle, draws attention to itself: bedazzled   sunglasses, a smirk, a … Read More

  I found out about his death over Facebook Messenger, some sad-face emoji staring back at me from the screen. Who does that? I wonder now. No call. No text. Just an image with a streaming blue tear, something a … Read More

  I am a root:                wishing itself a bird. I am fence:                inside a temple. I am a tooth:               … Read More

  Joe never learned to skate, kept falling down, busted   his nose once, got blood all over his winter coat.   He was big for his age, carried his father’s knife,   knew more about women than all of … Read More

  Set off by indigo and right angles Chagall’s cow appears to know something.  He regards me with a familiarity as he tilts his beveled head back.  There is no moon at which to bay.  He keeps eyeing me as … Read More

  Translation by Judy Katz-Levine   I live sitting, one who is an angel in the hands of a barber, holding a beer mug with deep grooves arc of the belly and the neck, a pipe against my teeth, under the … Read More

  Translation by Judy Katz-Levine   By the blue nights of summer, I will see rainbows in the paths, Scintillating stars by the wheat,  through minute herbs: Dreamer, I sense the freshness in my feet. I relax with the wind … Read More