She buys herself carnations in the market,

Pretending they were sent to her by someone

Whose fingers read her body in the dark.

For she who has no lover must invent one.

Flowers have a brief and poignant time

To lure the hummingbird or honeybee

Or luna moth before they wilt on the vine,

Sterile, unfulfilled and incomplete.

The maples are jars of cherry-orange

Marmalade.  I eat them with my eyes

And then the  peach and crimson dahlias

Flaring between cranberry candles

In my sunlighted kitchen pass-through..

The month of great expectations is not

June or January but October,  the season

 When all things still are possible in the school year

For teachers and for students.  That

Was the month I wanted for my wedding.

The torches of trees set my spirits on fire,

Reflected in our pond or spread across

The Appalachians like Indian beadwork

Shadowed by southbound Canada geese.

Someday I’ll make a fall journey to Japan.

Sitting in stillness at the sea of sand

And stone I’ll empty my inward space

And take into myself  the plum red

Gold embroidered hills of Kyoto.

This solitary passion cuts the core

Out of my apple.

Bloodless lasar surgery burns

A frozen section

Out of my heart.  I stare at the eclipse

Of the sun and go blind.

My tongue is welded to the icy iron

Knocker on your door.

A falling meteor consumes itself

Inside my womb.

My radiation count is high.

Beware of me.

I could be tranquil as the summer seas

If you were here.

Your kiss would turn the strychnine I have drunk

To sparkling burgundy.

Overnight,

Like a peony,

Love may fall into a heap

Of petals

Or stand tall,

A pearly everlasting,

Nectorless,

Sundried.

My sugar maple leaves illuminate
The swamps where darning needles copulate.
My milkweed pods are tightly packed to labor
And let fly seeds on any passing vapor.

Meteors arc across my inner spaces.
Unblemished roses baptize me with fragrance.
The wild geese point to south my weather vane
This is the time for riding hurricanes

Before the tawny grasses crystallize
Before the long dark winter nights arrive.