For Better or Worse

Coyote pale as a ghost
In my halogen beams
Two green Christmas lights
Staring back at me
In the middle of main street
Like you did 12 years and
700 miles ago
You good bad omen
What does it mean this time
For better or worse
Right

It gets better 

and 

It gets worse
I know

That Day...

according to Pinal County 
that day 
I got lost on my way to church
and
my ASU English professor sang
Amazing Grace
with our parents (even Amadello)
3 times
that day
Orlando bore the rings
and
we said we do
(and we did)....
that day
you talked and talked and talked
as Orlando shed his little grey tux 
and ran shirtless through the hall
while hooligans outside 
“just married” our car with potato salad
cold cuts, cookies and slices of cheese
but we didn’t dance 
(it was against our religion)...
that day
I hoisted you over my shoulder
and packed you out of there
your lithe little frame 
wriggling under your silky white dress
nose buried in your intoxicating perfume
as you staged mock protest
but we had waited long enough...
that day
for the red heart, silver moon, gold star glitter
that stuck to us
months after
thirty years after
our honeymoon...
that day
that Pinal County says

 never happened.

On a Denny's Napkin

I wrote you a poem once
on a Denny's napkin
because you
visited me in jail
in the mental hospital
even 

in the halfway house

I made something of my life
as broken as I  was am
and I feel felt grateful

but I've always been confused

you beat me
you beat my mother black and blue
you piece of shit.

I was in my 40's when my  defenses
of denial and suppressed memory let me see
that she didn't run into a clothes line pole
in the middle of the night like you said
your fists made the fat lips and raccoon eyes
staring fearfully back at me that traumatic morning
when I brought you breakfast in bed

my sister says you beat me too
with a belt buckle
on the side of the highway
but I  don't remember any pain
just her screaming at you to stop
she was  traumatized
and I never thought it was that bad
you hit me in the nose in third grade
knocked me down in the mud
you hit me with a cowboy boot
and a can of orange juice
and probably worse 

so
I beg my son's forgiveness
every time I see him

for being like you.

all I've ever wanted  needed is
to sort it all 
figure out what happened
because there's still this kid in me
that needs protected
and I'm in my sixties 

I don't want to go to the grave
as this confused broken child
who doesn't trust his own feelings

but I wrote a poem once
on a Denny's napkin
spring semester of
my senior year at ASU

you visited me in jails
in the mental hospitals

in the half-way houses
by God

you were there for me

and I shed
tears of gratitude on that Denny's napkin
from eyes at the end
of a seven year drought. 

It was an epiphany.

So is this.

Stopping by the horizon

hwy 93 glides up into
the misty grey 
where billowing black
silhouettes of shifting clouds
shroud the moon
like pirate sails

wheels and metal

destined for what is

forever slipping away

yet drawing nigh

so gentle and so kind

stopping by the horizon
on a summer's eve
"because it could not stop for me" *
(if you read poetry)

sage hills roll on

long after I'm gone

From "Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening" by Robert Frost

Sonnet 30--Who Wore it Better??????

Whenever I sit in silence and think,

Inevitably, I dwell on the past

Recounting every unharvested dream

And not making each millisecond last

Then my dry eyes with tears are overflown

For rare friends... sailed on to that distant shore

For precious love that turned to stone

For all I never knew, or know no more

I lose again what I’ve already lost

Revisiting every grief anew

And once again I cover the cost

As present wounds--fresh as dawn’s dew

But if in my woe, my mind finds your face

Then all of my grief, your love does erase

scallywag night

this scallywag night I
would slip like a penny through the sewer grate
or float like a cottonwood seed on the breeze
of forgetfulness
into an infinitely black hole

Dirty old Truck Driver

Video poker at the bar
a soothing respite
from Sophomore essays
far from the maddening voices we're
struggling to find
Game's on and--
I miss my dyslexic friend

What do heavy equipment operators
and English teachers
have in common?
football--mostly

how arrogant to assume
after 28 years of  Jr. High technology
and remedial reading
I could step into high school English

How much D would appreciate
the ambiguity of Hamlet
or the religious satire
of "The Lottery?"


The stool next to me speaks

"So, where you headed"

"I live here."

"Really? What do you do?"

"I teach."

"No..."

"Yea.. High School English."

"No Shit! I thought you was one of us dirty old truck drivers!"

"Well... (what am I supposed to say)

...thanks!" (it's nice to fit somewhere)