The Oldest Story

My girl still needs to memorize the prologue
of Gilgamesh by Friday & so sticks it
above the bathroom sink & to the window
inside the old Subaru, repeating weary worn
out with labor
though we’re not riding
some Mesopotamian mud road, but I-35
thronged in fog. Eventually the gods would
wonder if G couldn’t really use a friend &
I know a man & when Enkidu finally shows up
their headbutt crumbles soft Uruk’s great walls
but the brawl’s not what we’ve come to expect
from standing your ground …

From part 4 of Life in a Field | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

From part 4 of Life in a Field

In this story, there is a girl and there is a donkey. What good friends they are, and they began as strangers! He has taught her everything she needs to …

SPINOZA SAYS | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

SPINOZA SAYS

He who loves God
cannot endeavor that God
loves him in return.

Do you know,
I think the cool silver
of this is hard to live by.

When there is anything

In Case of Fire | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

In Case of Fire

It’s way past time to start heaving:
unplug the air boxes in the harmonica,
bracingly slow,
“No!” rising from your throat
like deer across a road:
there are always more …

American Haiku: Far Away | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

American Haiku: Far Away

 
Sunrise on the shore
Bright fire of a flaming torch
Beckons me to soar
 

To Go to Belfast | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

To Go to Belfast

Whether you’ve boarded from Liverpool or Heysham
or Stranraer, years later the journey is the same
along the Lough at evening, the chimney of the power station

in Kilroot, Carrickfergus …