:60LovePoems

Today, we tweet our love in 140 characters or less. At best, a text, of 160. Love happens quick. It races forward in a heartbeat, gushing like the water let loose from fire hydrants in the summertime. What can you fall in love with in :60? The girl on the subway? The fuzzy brown puppy ambling down 4th Avenue? The smell of spring? Cool grass between your toes? Sunset over the city? The feeling of freedom as the train climbs above ground? Here is a space for our fragments. For our loves as developing. The love poems that go undelivered and the ones we lost custody of through delivery (perhaps unadvised). For lyrics and images that inspire us, that renew our faith. Here is your space.

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The sweetness of dreams

hangs heavy like     morning fog over river; froth over steaming hot cappuccino -OR- the full weight of your hand as it hangs languidly from your arm, draped over my shoulder  as we walk,      rapt in  conversation

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First Harvest (A Haiku)

I licked the blackberry juice from the palm of my hand, still stained - salty, sweet

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:60 Raspberries

I counted four or five  contented sighs and then lost track

your back

-arching into it-

delivered nipple to mouth

perfectly

ripe 

raspberry rolled between

tongue and teeth syrupy sweet  nectar

teased out: vibrant swaths of jam

spread across 

warm biscuits on 

bright country mornings

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:60 La Lengua

la lengua esta mas que palabras para alas el aliento que lleva alma, corazon cada esquina de suenos sin bordes que cae como hojas amarillo, roja fueguitos contra mi tierra

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:60 High Dive

Sometimes my heart races like NASCAR for no apparent reason As if I'm standing on the edge of high dive butterflies flitting around knees heart vibrating with the buzz of bees - electric - like the wind through trees touching leaves so that they dance having heard religion the sound of birds almost words syllables on the verge of pronunciation.

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:60 Fists

I wish these fists were weapons

  [I need to pummel your chest with both hands]

  Instead they are trowel and spade pulling flowers for bouquets to present to you on late spring days;

  They are mixing bowl and spatula measuring equal portions of sugar, and spice;

  They are support beam and joust trying to add stability to this foundation laid on rotten wood;

They are  top hat and magic wand unable to make that  damn  rabbit  appear.

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:60 Mornings/Kitchen

I see a million mornings in the kitchen steaming mugs held in both hands we could look out the back door at the river we could plan our day OR

  we could just be quiet with the steam the river the day cherishing their unspoken promises of possibility

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:60 Jacket/Shoulders

you took off your jacket FOR ME

exposing shoulders so I could lay             my             hands across them gently flexing fingers as if to dig them in to the garden soil of your skin I could plant the seeds of this dream there and watch it grow

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:60 Diamond

I know I am not easy At once no boundaries THEN all boundary I could wrap my sharp edges with duct tape like they do on the scaffolding in NYC to minimize the risk of injury I could roll my rough edges in broken glass carefully crafting facets of angle and expanse: a million tiny eyes  on this impeccable diamond

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:60 Blue Ribbon

it was like you were cotton candy and I was at the County Fair you melted sticky sweet on my tongue and I won the first Blue Ribbon of my life

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Map of Home. (4th Ave. Brooklyn, NY 2007-2012)

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:60 Kisses/Coffee/Dreams

I want to be

The Kiss

before coffee

in the morning

propping myself on

elbows

to read your

tea leaves

the creases

left by bedsheets;

your face

full of

dreams

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New week, old reminders...  

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:60 Deliverance

When you promised lullabies and bedtime stories my heart raced. When you said -You’re so kissable- I thought I would surely die

[right there in the gravel parking lot between the river and the stone houses]

I’ve seen your hands and imagine they could play each vertebrae like the ivories of Liberace’s piano. But it’s my gut that flutters like banjo strings your fingers have picked and I think

-DELIVERANCE-

And am not even scared

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:60 In Bloom

This morning she bloomed for me

Like a fist releasing fingers

Her petals pulled inwards for so long loosened tentative then bold

Exploding fuchsia  against green

The contrast between  the strength and vulnerability of  pistil and stamen:

Tiny mouths of angels -not yet made majestic- turning their mouths to the sky as if to drink in the sun.

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:60 Return

Lightly licking window pain the rain makes me think of you however many miles to the north over train tracks across rivers

I wonder: what kind of blanket have you wrapped yourself in,      on the couch watching movies?    

How have you contorted yourself,     folding legs like origami to keep toes unexposed?

Perhaps I could stretch          myself          across the length of you;      tucking arms like the fraying corners of Grandma Comeforo’s afghan underneath your creases making them military:

an apt defense from this unseasonably cold, yet still, Springtime.

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This is what I saw today...

Those clouds look full of hope.