A couple of self-portraits and then I'll finish with one
dedicated to Fay.
"Self-portrait as Shop Window."
On the bus, thus the passing parade, All Hallows' Eve.
Winds swing the hoop skirt beneath the milkmaid's dress
of the little white girl complete with Marie Antoinette
mole on cheek.
While into central Brooklyn, the costumes
are homemade, the best, a young blood
in diaper complete with pins, Oh, P. Funk or Red Hot Chili
Peppers?
Cheekbones apparent and a rivulet of veins.
Rhymes with what?
Planes, gains, claims, trains?
Bus stops and the texting children
act as sentinels letting us off or on as they please.
I have often mistaken the mockingbird for an owl.
It's a problem I cannot solve.
There are others, more difficult.
I listen again for the bird's call.
It's mocking me.
There seems to be cows in Roethke's poems
and birds in mine.
Nature is ever present, even unto this great city that
grumbles and crumbles and yet allows
the mockingbird song and hummingbirds
wings to flash like a taste of the cosmos.
Oh, damn, the wind and light or praise the rain
and bright desire for different weather.
I stand in front of these beautiful things
and curb my appetite for murder.