In a Teapot

Still, in senescence, playing demi-monde,
he finds at last that even sex grows callous.
Besides, the tiny movements of his phallus
lately have made him reach for digitalis.
Prospero breaks his wand.

Hic Jacet

Like a commercial, death by quantity,
For that most dismal catalogue of names;
And we are pikers, grieving by low primes
And little stones on picayune display.
How dare we? asks the Russian winter. How
Now, this memorial mound of mismatched socks?

Have you not heard of Blutenwald? they ask,
Who populate the textbooks. No, by God,
I haven’t, but I blush, ashamed of 1,
3, a handful of minimum loss--
A butcher, a baker, an artisan of light
In watts too small for speakers on the Platz.

No one in history bears names like these,
Compiled like dogs and cats. They have no dates,
Vice-consular assistants; no pink rose
Tells aphids how they’re called, in Latin yet.
It snows on them in aggregate. It rains
On mockingbirds, on shrews and shrubs. On mine.

Wait Till Your Cow Comes Home

The winter cows are coming home
To roost. From fields of cinnabar
They file a-lowing. Near and far
They look the same and sound the same
And know their antecedents are

Preposterous. In barns tucked tight
They chaffer over wisps of hay:
O have you heard the news today?
LaToonya will be coming late
To tea, and why, no one would say.

They cannot hide and are not heard.
In dreams of petitpois they rouse
The King of Cows to build a house
Where he is warm and they are ward,
Where cats surround the shrinking mouse.