Boxer’s Training

I carry my father’s battered single edge blade 

in my back pocket. The bulge, a reminder

to stay on my feet, least I fall on my ass.

Poet’s Curse

I love to watch the sprinklers blow like whales 

against an ocher ocean of dying grass.

The curse of the poet is to harpoon every moment

with verse and punctuation.

Step-Father

Every morning that he wakes late,

I wonder if he’s in there breathing

or has his soul descended to Hades. 

There he can freely abuse 

Persephone who’s wearing my mother’s 

go-go boots and polka dot min-skirt.

The Surgeon

Shadows are precise, unlike the wind.

The winds a clumsy oaf scattering leaves, 

breaking limbs, toppling trees, whereas 

shadows cut daylight in half like a medical

practitioner qualified to practice surgery.

If I could only name them

Every man lives in a valley 

limited and protected by the hills 

of his making.

That was then

I watched a man, similar to me, pulling 

a weighted roller over newly laid grass, 

like a man trying to crush his past.