Her Nighttime Companion

She shares a bed with emphysema,

dozes off to that unholy cadence

wheezing inches from her ear.

The sickness also has a name – Frank.

And a history – forty years together.

She even kisses it occasionally.

But on the bristly cheeks.

Nowhere near those overworked,

undernourished lips.

Her lungs have aged gracefully.

So she sleeps deep.

All through the night,

his choked breath digs up phlegm

like a miner down in the pit.

Her dreams are happy to peruse the past.

His are too fitful, 

are coughed out of his head

every time he tries to clear his throat.

“How was your night?”

are her first words every morning.

He either nods or groans.

Emphysema is a man of few words. 

If A Poem Was A Painting By Renoir

A pretty girl

sits on a stoop,

waiting to digest 

a recent meal,

some walk by,

some catch a glimpse,

none harass

the soft voice

whistling in the nothingness

of twilight air –

only the one

who’s not present

feels the urgency 

to record the incident –

though there is 

no incident –

merely something 

At The Dump

For the benefit of eleven-year-old boys,

the sun thawed a hole 

in the tired brown snow of late winter, 

exposed the auto dump’s rust mountains.

Here was the detritus of adult obsolescence:

busted fenders, broken windshields, 

ice-crusted steering wheels,

ripped vinyl seats, permanently flat tires.

In that brief melting, these throwaways 

become our conversation, our games: 

Dan barking out how he would love

to jolt that Buick into fourth gear, Pete

panting for the red sports car with the

accordioned engine, while I loudly imitated

the roar of a dead Thunderbird.

Three boys peered through a wire fence

made weird apocalyptic sounds…

for the generations we’d someday replace,

for the vessels we would ride in on.