None of the heroes hold
up under
the light. They scurry
away, ratty tails exposed.

The dead ones
just lie
there unapologetic
and drained of all

blood. Red

as some overgrown
field of panic
grass, it’s too late
for prairie smoke

blooms. I never

thought I’d be burning
this one too. A photo
I tore up
then restored

with Scotch tape
a month later
when I was 10.
I did sink

in the deep end
of that motel pool
first before being taught
it was better

to float

on the surface. The damage
isn’t so easy to identify
at civil twilight. Deeply
flawed from start

to finish. A beautiful
scar across the cheek
faded too fast.
The heather on the hill

in the distance

is more perfect
if no one disturbs
those underwater logs
in the creek.

None of them.

You know the one—the pond
that reminds me to drink more water.

The pond that silently reflects
our night fears back at us.

The pond that was two ponds once,
stitched together beneath

an old metal rivet-connected footbridge.
The pond that is alive.

The pond that must not die.
The pond that covers our future

in mist. The pond
that has its own rhythm.

The pond that protects turtles
and won’t reveal its secrets.

The pond that is older
than either of us, but not that old.

The pond that is thirsty.
The pond that bleeds

into a wetland hem
surrounding its littoral zone.

The pond that hums
behind the curtain.

The pond that only rarely floats
canoes. The pond that plays

interference. The pond
that will mark your oars.

The pond that cries
no salty tears.

The pond that sleeps. No,
the pond that never sleeps.

The pond that is not
a pond. The pond

that is a lake. The pond
that refuses to be ruined.

The pond that is not too shallow.
The pond that has its limits.

The pond that exhales so soon.
The pond that refuses to be

a punchline. The pond
that is drunk again.

The pond that flies away home.
The pond that was polluted.

The pond that plays possum.
The pond that did not die.

The way ducklings hide
in the wetland prairie grass.
All the avocado trees

I might have grown
if only I saved those

pits.

I call the park my front
yard because I am
unlicensed and landless.

The lake is really
a large pond is a tiny

reservoir

of dreams.
The tarp that hung
from the pedestrian

bridge truss briefly,
then fell sometime

between

my crossings. A
bundle of treated green
canvas could be

an unidentified body
of water. Are you the Jeopardy

answer,

or question? Not
too much
left to drink at all.

New subscriber!
to my poetry blog,
the notification exclaims.

Rabbits in a variety
of sizes cross the trails
after the rain.

Mist and broken
glass everywhere
to remind us

it’s Sunday morning.

Three young women
running so in sync
they appear as two

till they reach a bend
in the path—an echo
of the lake’s amoeba shape.

The long northern arm
really more a hockey stick
mid-swing. The woman

in the middle
finally revealed
as a hidden island

covered in virgin woods
comes into view. Was I
ever that girl? The one

who came to us
in a fever dream
covered in illegible graffiti.

Freshwater waves lapping
the shore behind the stone
wall. Windows

on an old utility shed
covered in red paint. The one
drawn to the translucence.

Branches down
everywhere the next
morning. A cool breeze
beckons. No more bellowing,
what billows will not break.
It figures strangers
would cut such familiar
figures on the shadowy trail.

That the figure
of a wild-eyed ancient
woman would appear
in the wound
of the shaken
tree on the other side of the hill.

Do you have any eights
that might gesture toward infinity
if you turn the card sideways?

The games we played
as we straddled so many
centuries. Strangers

clocking in so many
check-for-ticks
kind of days. Forty years

ago we met on a hot
Connecticut night
under a new wave moon.

Music blaring
from a boombox.
No bluffing necessary.

Fantastical stories
scribbled into a notebook.
Separating fact from

hallucination

was easier then.
The trees shuddered
when they asked:

Where were you

when they cut the deck
in half to expose
the Earth’s past climate?

Or sick. Panting.
Struggling. Failure
to stand. Alone.
Abandoned? A distance
from a gaggle
of geese in all sizes
(intermixed with a flock
of drakes) that communes
on the south side
of the garden
of the seasons.
A hard knot
in my throat
I can’t swallow.
I find two park-keepers
conversing on the community
arts center steps.
I struggle
to describe the location.
The north arm
of the lake?
One offers.
Near the tennis courts.
We’ll take care of it.
The end
of suffering.
I don’t linger
to see how.
I’ve completely forgotten
about the turtle
peering from its shell
at passing runners
and pedestrians
along Lake of the Isles.
This urban wildlife—
this merciful early June.

No stethoscope will help you
detect my grief. Carefully packed into
38 years and a day to measure
a deeply buried stolen blue

rhythm. Nothing borrowed,
no return to sender. Smoke
from Canadian wildfires
finally clears.

Her face appears
for a mere moment
each time I climb, reluctantly,
into a car. Then she’s gone.

A 22-year-old
voice I can’t hear
above the chainsaw buzzing
through a bright morning.

I understand clearing the lot
to make room to shelter
those in need. Still,
it breaks my heart

to expose that residual green
pulse of life in the elastic
branch that refuses
to be cracked.

A row of magnolia trees
brings aromatic shade
to the trail.
Suddenly, everything

in bloom. Her

laughter muffled,

then gone—

again.

We were soda jerks
for a night
that lasted all the next
year. And we called it
sinkhole tourism.

First, forsythia in the sculpture garden.
The arbor ready to be entwined.

“How does it feel to be
the tail end of what’s real?”

Written in bright purple
chalk beneath the shadow layer.

Then, tiny green buds
on maples, patches

of Siberian squill appear
out of nowhere in the grass.

“Did you hitch your wagon
to the wrong horse, or

your horse to the wrong wagon?”
Scratched in the glass

with a crude knife.
Sargent cherry trees

in the Peace Grove
along the park’s southeast

entrance trail suddenly shout
“Spring!” Your entrance. Your future

colonnade tosses you
down the hill. Throw another

robot conductor off a bridge
into a Minnesota lake.

Blink,

and another shoulder
season evaporates

into gasping for breath
in stagnant air.

Try to ignore
the used syringe

and stray chicken
bone in the street

beside a higher
than needed curb.

Watch your step.
Every straw and pencil wedged

in the gap between
sidewalk slabs triggers a fear

of needles, a fear
of addiction, a fear of slipping

inside the city’s
stormwater underbelly

where a hidden creek is dying
to get out. “Did she

try to possess you too?”
Spray paint on a concrete

tunnel wall. A mist

puts a smile on your face
as it fills the night

with an early May mood.
No thunder or sacred

branches cracking apart
will spoil it.