Yes, why not just love each other, and leave meaning for another life? August 9 2021 . Your Letter At last, your letter has arrived — in the form of a butterfly. Isn’t that just like you? And now, everywhere I go, I hear children say, “Look — that man is whispering in color.” Poems, Slightly Used, November 1, 2008 . [ 1192 ]
By holding their leaves upward, the tender young plants in the garden catch even the slightest trace of rain and send it running down their stems and trunks directly to their roots. The cedar, on the other hand, after absorbing what it will, sheds the rest around its perimeter, retaining just enough to show off as jewelry when the sun peeks through the clouds again. Later, as the air warms, […]
after the rain after the moon a friend calls about the rain and moon Poems, Slightly Used, April 4, 2010 . [ 1059 ]
Snow on the lilac — my mother has already forgotten that day. Poems, Slightly Used, April 27, 2008 . [ 1050 ]
somewhere in this scroll / lies / the truth / I know March 10, 2021 . Belated Birthday Haiku Old cat warm against a sunshine wall — Kerouac licks his aching paw. Poems, Slightly Used, March 14, 2010 . [ 1044 ]
After her walk, I find a sprig of plum, drinking from a baby food jar. Poems, Slightly Used, March 30, 2009 . [ 1040 ]
Sometimes, as I sit here writing in the dark, I feel as if my hands belong to someone else working just beyond the veil — a parallel realm in which objects roam free of any given meaning, and the sound of a passing train — I hear it now — is that someone’s remembered childhood. “Arrival” Poems, Slightly Used, February 18, 2010 . Revival . . . and now / […]
Like the poem that follows, this collection, too, is a poem museum. At least I imagine it as such. But 1,000 pages? Was that really necessary? I wonder if I will ever know. . At the Poem Museum The other day, I went to the poem museum. There were poems of all colors, shapes, and sizes. Some were made of words and others were physical objects, or word-extensions that very […]
Back in 2008, shortly after this poem was written, it found its way into a classroom, where it created quite a lot of confusion. The teacher who tried to make use of it told me that some of his students liked it, because they knew it must mean something, although they had no idea what it was. Other students were almost bitter in their disapproval, because they were sure it […]
Should I fall asleep and never waken — but what if that has already happened, and this life I have lived, and am living still, is but an instant of the dreamy outcome? . Old Man Winter Daylight spilling from his tattered sack takes all night to reach the ground. I’m a penny on a railroad track. Choo-choo. Choo-choo-chooooooo. Poems, Slightly Used, November 26, 2010 . [ 952 ]
William Michaelian 