Gary Galsworth
Tears And Drinks All Around
You know you can’t keep all this
Be still and things start to slough off
icicles melting from the eaves
a bloated mosquito lands on its back
unable to fly—encumbrances falling away
Sit still—a porousness of thought and phenomena
take over—a rightness in the body,
knots and twists melding
spines finding their proper attitude
Sit and boundaries overlap
silently fuse become
continuous indistinguishable
until
no longer sitting no longer
alone no longer
Wait—you mean dead?
Oh no—don’t give me dead
As soon as you find me dead you and anyone
involved starts heaping it on
Expectations encumbrances history tears and drinks all around
All the crap it took all this work to unload
Followed by
a parade of ghosts carrying more
junk than the living
Let’s start again, just sit, mouth shut, in neutral gear
allow yourself to be your own masterpiece
and
a world-class rummage sale
Shadows and Cardinals
Branches cast shadows
and the current plays them
A distant birdsong takes
me to a cardinal I cannot see
And stream sounds murmur the edge
off a strong cup of coffee
