Open Mike

He has a wonder filled heart
and finds hope in the oddest places,
in the smile of a toothless bum.
the wagging tale of a mangy mutt.
He never met a vegetable he didn’t like,
especially the purple ones,
and wines, tried them all,
zins, cabs, even innocent merlots.
A hospice volunteer,
he has no fear of death,
heard too many reports of
waiting friends, tunnels of light.
He’s made music a challenge,
no genre a mistake.
Opera, jazz, blues all have
their place, their perfect right
to serve as background, foreground too,
in Mike’s discovery of life this turn,
his unbound search for new
and different joys.
No man alive loves animals
more than he, naming most
birds in flight, laughing at
dogs at play and kittens with their toys.
He donated blood to see how it felt,
then threw away the donut to taste hunger,
went home and baked bread for the smell,
and ended his day with canvas and brush.
He reads fact and fiction,
has friends gay and straight,
transgender as well.
He sometimes looks tired,
but that’s just how he’s seen
by our eyes, not his.
Too much is still not enough
in his full, artful life.
Overextended? Who says?

Where are your new poems?

So, my friends are wondering if I'm ill or bored or if I have been taken for ransom, since the wordslide has become a slow trickle. The truth is that I am working on producing two chapbooks of my earlier work, one on the lighter side, the other a bit more dark. It is a creatively draining process, this chapbook creation, and has not left much for new works. I remember reading about Oscar Wilde attending an evening soiree and telling another guest of his exhausting day. She could not believe that poetry could tire one so much, and asked exactly what he did. His reply: "In the morning I removed a comma, and in the afternoon, I put it back."