Cut Flowers

rush to cut them
the last
to be sure the last
before the much-tolled mid-november storm
the wonder of their still unfolding
this late
with such abundance

inside
packets of pastels
deeper sheens of leaves like oils
petals like tight bolts of velvet

my eye gluttons on the bounty
the cabbagehead of fullblown english rose
winks from the other room
now peach now pink

then of a sudden
as if affrighted by the tearing wind
whipping the canes outside
it drops its petals in a golden rain

the others too
no matter what the heat of this womb room
unmindful of my care
droop
fade by the half-hour
struck in sympathy of pain of perishing
under the vampire frost feeding at will
outside

  

  

Airborne

     The sky seduces
          imperiously like an old hand at love.
     Imagine, “Officer, I was watching clouds”
       after you’ve plowed headlong
       into a line of cars mired in traffic
       pushed them like dominoes into each other.

     In an uncanny concordance
       smacking of other worlds
the music on the car radio rises to its crescendo
     as clouds part before the moon
and she
          cow-jumped and stepped-on
     full face
          still looks
          intact
     tugs at my womb
     pulls every hair upon my body
          up
          over the wheel
          through windshield
     into that Dutchmaster sky
          so voraciously possessing
               space
     that all else
          is written off
     at the edges as droll miniature