THE SITTER*

Beauty…

It touches so deeply

it causes us to know something

about ourselves

we did not already know.

Beauty is a mirror held up before us.

We can see ourselves as sitters in it 

and the world as our painter.

Our lives are its pigment, 
pastose strokes, and canvased dance.

We are its portrait.

And, where Sargent might have seen

the animal in his Madame X,

what the world shows us,

if we are willing to see it,

is the human in the animal,

the man inside the finch, let’s say,

the tiny heartbeat behind

the fine feather and brittle bone of love.

*Inspired by Donna Tartt's 

Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Goldfinch

IMMACULATE CONCEPTION AT THE CORNER LAUDROMAT

an ancient

head to toe

in white

had she not

been overwhelmed

by her work

—a mountain

of sheets she was

feverishly folding—

I would have sworn

she was the color

white incarnate

busy

conceiving itself

through creases

DISROBED

Make her naked

with rain.

Treat her like 

a rampant season

embarrassed by 

her empty lakes.

Carry her name

in your mouth.

Swallow each letter

like a skeleton key.

Words…she’s known them,

touched their tyranny often,

but will never trust them

to suture a wound.

Mystery on raisin toast,

her favorite late night snack.

Silence: a memory,

a lullaby in her ears.

You love her like a kite,

broken and yellow at your feet.

CONVERSATION

It can be like a pond

you fill with lilies.

With goldfish –

white, orange, and black.

Let them bump

against your fingers.

Let them let you hold them.

Put bubbles in their mouths.

Watch them rise to the surface

chasing the rain you’ve made.

Watch them go into a frenzy

trying to feed on the droplets –

until you put an end

to their confusion

by sprinkling their little

food flakes on the water.

This is when you feel it:

how good it feels

to make conversation

free of complication.

It can be this simple.

This natural.

A complete world

all by itself.

Like a pond with goldfish

on a rainy autumn day.