And of course I’m a Southern writer geographically, and socially I’d imagine. Somebody has got to be on the outside, and if I am to be out, I’d rather be South of out.

Three Poems

Absences

We’ll cook the black eyed peas
with pork sausage and garlic
cabbage smothered down in bacon
and of course the roast
more garlic, more onion
and we will raise a toast
to the New Year
with a nice French wine certainly
to new adventures, new travels, new unions
and the dogs will stare
patiently waiting out the excitement
for a chance to steal a morsel
of the goodness there
as some of us silently raise a glass
to the empty chair
and the absent voice
of those who are no longer there

***

Flower Water
for J.B.

One thousand and twelve black birds
capture youth, only to disappear
this ironic sense of this
and that
assuredly cringe worthy fact
is that their existence varies
like in the exaltation
of flower water.

The kind that brings to a head
retrospect and outliers
as good as any
moniker for Roy Rogers
searching, searching, never finding
the trigger to our disarray.

All of this to say
an appropriate river
can still flow
to an ocean
that has always humbled me
and perhaps, even you.

***

Impressionist

Laid to rest
under the flower bed
out back, behind the garden shed
alone but for the sprawling moonlight.

Shadows talking low
give them wide berth
for the calico pony
is forever wanting.

The second time tonight
I heard the chitter chatter of angels
black and dark
between her eyes.

Always in gasps
the yellow woman
wants yet more
the thin and bent air
miles too high.

So, is this what is meant
when the wedding bells
have been silenced
till dawn.