Yours for Now

“Yours for now, but not forever.”

Nothing, really, mine or yours;

Except the marbles and the crackers,

But they’re all crumbs now, pigeon food.

So toss them on the water, gently,

It’s getting darker faster now.

You squint to see your ragged sneakers.

You pluck a feather from the mud.

It’s colder now, but where’s your jacket?

You must’ve left it in the car.

Listen, you hear them distant, softly

Voices of a couple walking.

The stars are out, as sharp as staples

On the dark pool of the sky,

The moon is crooked, bright, and little

A chilling breeze catches your hair.

Around the gravel at your feet

The wavelets lap like freezing tongues.

Let's Paint My Ostrich

Let’s paint my ostrich.

Yes, let’s paint him blue.

We can paint your ostrich too.

How cliché, if he wasn’t blue!

How boring, black and white!

Why, he’d resemble Oreos,

Or fields of snow at night.

Travelers

Travelers

'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Reflecting light's last rays, they're golden swirled
Which, full of wet kelp dot the sheer black cliffs.

It may be that the gulfs will wash us down;
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
We'll trade for steady breezes with our crowns
Minerva-blessed, we'll whisk across the miles.

Though much is taken, much abides; and though
Another generation burns and builds,
The world holds many haunts and fields— we'll go
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

And so I'll be content—when I can cry
Of all the western stars, until I die.

 Based on "Ulysses" by Alfred Lord Tennyson