Social Distancing not so strange,
I’ve been doing it for years
The world a feelings length away,
old lovers left in tears
I shared what I shared early,
with my short pants not yet off
Trusting in my family first,
I learned—but Oh the cost
For fifty years I’ve cloistered,
my psyche left to roam
Acquaintances to come and go,
true feelings mine to own
As harbormaster of this port,
one ship is anchored deep
To sail the inmost seven seas
alone—myself to keep
(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2020)
The Light Of Ibalon
Return to the sky,
our moon, Bakunawa
Masked Haliya has been called,
the tree circled again
Balyana is dancing,
the heaven’s in darkness
By the goddess of moonlight
—you’re condemned to the sea
(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2020)
A Last Adieu
The sentence was death, malignancy sure,
to pack my bags, adieu
As reds have never looked so red,
and greens, the greenest hue
The wine the sweetest on my tongue,
as birds sing sweeter still
The children’s laughter I embrace,
their joy I’ll keep until…
In thinking back on what I’ve missed,
my mind then draws a blank
Every wish and every hope, twice over,
with my thanks
A hundred days to say goodbye,
and voice my first hello
No tears have I for broken dreams
—as I prepare to go
(Bryn Mawr Pennsylvania: April, 2020)
New Memories Rehearse
Deeply hidden within thoughts
that linger
A centuries old message
to know and then feel
Remembrance crying out
from the darkness approaching
In a voice so familiar—our fortune
to steal
It calls to us silent
as it waits for an answer
It calls to us closer
as all distance revokes
It calls from within us
in a voice our breath fosters
It calls us beyond all past
anguish and hope
The air now grows heavy
with a mist that induces
Words mate in the fog
as the letters reverse
The ending comes first
as the beginning still chases
Sleep only forgiven
as new memories rehearse
(Villanova Pennsylvania: July, 2016)