I Stopped Running For A Month

I stopped running for a month and now death is close
swirling in the rain and the falling colored leaves
sounding like wind and strings and Andy Williams
the sounds of childhood and goosebumps
all the varieties of love you had yet to know

I stopped running for a month and can already feel
my abdomen slouching, hanging, my waist expanding
and don't think I missed the way that wild dog stared at me
outside of Starbucks this morning

I stopped running for a month and learned that sometimes
change is for keeps and that this work your doing,
friend your loving, child your cherishing, hand your holding
is not...for keeps, that is
call it luck, good fortune, a tease, or a loan
no matter how well intentioned
we can't stay.

Rest In Peace, Andy Williams

You Saw Me

Are you a quarter moon up there?
So brilliant and off kilter
drunk and brimming
with all you've seen below.
I know, you can't hold it,
and I don't expect you to.
The air is crisp tonight
and there is less peace
and more trouble than I can manage,
staring hard into the shadows, like you,
all these people carrying bags, wearing extra clothes,
thinking about killing you for your arms
while patiently waiting for
a book of baby names.

Music

listening to her broken English through the wall,
she's talking on the phone
saying nothing of substance sweetly
to someone in a language not her own
she hopes for something, deliverance maybe
thirteen and a half hour work days
seven days a week

Nausea

Feels a little like this

September Again

tonight, the wind
another Fall begins
the excitement and
swiftness of a
low grey sky
memory stirs, blurs
don't look directly at it
only at the motion, the colors,
just the feel of it and
the sound of very heavy rain