change

Downtown

Met a man with one leg

wearing a green fedora

playing a cracked guitar

with 3 broken strings

and an open suitcase

with silvery coins thrown

in for his dinner, drinks, fix

whathaveyagotiswhathegot

and I added my few bits to

the meager pile that grew

slowly 

as the wind picked up 

and the sun fell from a 

weak autumn apogee

and stood there listening 

to a man playing the blues

who knew it for what it was

And tonight I'll get home

and eat and drink and fix

and sleep

and then do it again
and again
andagainandagianandagain

and I will never be as free
as that one legged man 

sitting on his stool

playing the blues
as the gulls wheel overhead 

Downtown

Parallels

I hear the piano playing
see the sunset 
and smell the breeze 
wafting from the dragonfly’s wings. 


Springtime tells us stories 
that smell this sweet, 
and so does an autumn sunset 
of the horizonless lake 
as the waves say hello 
and our feet see the sand 
for all the trillion miracles 
that it has always been, 


eyes falling only to fly high 
again when the old mariner’s bell 
rings. 


The light and the dark 
are brothers after all.