Best Whittles Poems

Buried deep between the cracks,
a photograph from yesterday,
I hold it now, within my hand,
as if between the hills and hollows
a childhood bond that we once borrowed
can take me back to days of old 

Who am I when I see your face?
One glance and I am...

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There is hearsay of a brighter day
And if it does come my way
I hope it will stay
While the time whittles away
There is no game to play
Struggling with life's daily melee
All I can do is pray
I wont be lead astray
By the things that outweigh
Like the debt...

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Bedsprings crochet bones together.
His back is sutured to gripes
stitched to gummy joints.

In the toilet, avoiding the mirror,
humming softly,
shunning conversation with himself -
the ceiling drips a sump of memories.

The park --- Frances revolves confused.
"I don't understand."
A phrase with self-winding words.

A slight miscalculation,
a turning away at the...

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The year I became seasick
I lived in a bungalow on the edge
of a wilderness moor.

The sky and land
grappled together
for supremacy of my soul,
Inner dogs whined,
my eyes were portholes
where cats watched
the turbulent dance
of garbled mind waves.

I had to leave a wife,
but knew I could not swim,
couldn't...

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Am I the only one to think
that a kite is such a sad thing?

Flimsy...frail...
never really free,
forever tied to a string

Yes, it can soar indeed,
so high, with the wind taking it places,
almost making it forget,
just enjoying the wind rushing through,
lighthearted

The wind drops,
then it gets snared
among tree...

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Argentina's son, a lineage to immigrants
shaped by boyhood aspirations 
diminutive left foot striker
taunted "dwarf" in childhood 
his growth hormone deficiency 
                    overcome through meds and workouts
...

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august evening
grandfather whittles
the light away

Published September, 2009, The Heron's Nest...

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Souls standing in line
As the world pulls out its knife
To whittle them down 
Carve up their lives

Does it have an idea
An insatiable need
As it keeps whittling
On them endlessly

You do have to wonder
What it truly sees
As it carves on you
And whittles on me

Like an old mountain...

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it   hangs over her bed

              s
            w
            ...

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~ for Sami ~


oh ...
a pity, that …
such sweet sadness, yours
my lovely lass, lost ...
do not let your lip tremble so ...
it was not made for such iniquity
it was not shaped to
sublime bow-like grace to
be such a dark
dynamism of emotion
or to be the quivering spout...

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Eve dresses the night to Dawn's scorn



At the other side of midnight awaits Dawn
Watching over the night waiting for her turn
Dawn whittles the time for Eve to begone

Moon and stars dance to night's drawn
Eve's presence causing a slow burn
At the other side of midnight awaits...

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Fear not that critique whittles my will, 
Fear that lack of such may wilt my quill. 

Fear not a lonely path in the dark,
Fear my pyro craft runs out of spark.

Fear not golden age’s silent byplay,
Fear that wondering mind goes astray. 

Fear not that I...

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The old man still burns wood in his fireplace 
But he doesn’t cut it from the forest anymore 
He buys it from a friend of a friend of his 
And they stack it outside his back door 

His wife passed away six years this April...

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You know, it is rather difficult to discuss mental health  
The simile of the racing thoughts is a swift flight 
Swift, and Intrepid like an Arabian horse,  
Sometimes, too hard to decipher, even. 
 
I face the past,  
and I talk. ...

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The cedar dock splinters out to the moon's shine
Like the second hand ticking along
A white-faced clock
Drawing in loose boats and green moths
To its sweep of time

Is there any difference
Between those little dots of cabin lights
Strung like pearls along the shore
Three miles across Torch Lake
And the...

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