The Wages Of Sin (+4)

A late night deposit

  from my spirit to my soul

 

A transfer without interest

  all currency stole

 

The bank’s main door won’t open,

  the drive-thru is dark

 

The side door unlocked

  with the hallway unmarked

 

The clerk’s eyes on fire,

  as she asks me my name

 

“It’s there on the check”

  I repeat in refrain

 

“Your last transaction I see,

  we’ll be losing you now

 

“This account to be closed

  —take the elevator down”

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2015)

 

 

 

Cream Always Rises

 

A people once censored

  their limbs on the rack

 

All knowledge and freedom

  under constant attack

 

But cream always rises,

  and cows do come home

 

The truth never captive,

  enchained—or then owned

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2015)

 

 

In Virtue I Sin

 

It was Hemingway

  early

 

And Dickinson

   late

 

Those early

  exposures

 

The trail of

  my wake

 

No bar left

  unvisited

 

Or brawl left

  unfought

 

No school that could

   answer

 

Dialectic

  untaught

 

Now this corner

  I sit in

 

Both welcomes

  and warms

 

And the thoughts

  it retriggers

 

No movement

  just form

 

I once had

  looked over

 

What I now look

  within

 

From this chair

  that I captain

 

Where in virtue

  —I sin

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2015)

 

 

 

Straddling The Flame

 

Over the fire

  and across the coals

 

We made it to safety

  our innocence tolled

 

The memory enough

   to scare and profane

 

What fate never mentioned

   —as we straddled the flame

 

    (Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2015

Listening To Clapton’s ‘Sunshine Of Your Love’

 

 

 

Fair Winds Ahead

 

The better the poet

the fuller the sails

  —and the further the lines may stretch

 

The more ranging the verse

set to feeling’s unanchored 

 —the more chances of fair winds ahead

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2015)