LETTER

For STEPHEN SHRADER


My Friend,

I had a lot to say before your ghost interrupted me

I took up the angle of your arm as the sector of my violence.
The city planted two trees on my block today
To replace the one the Parks Department destroyed
After its thirty years of healthy growth.

I’m getting to feel like an old timer here:
Noticing my neighbors
And the passersby
Each day
When I go out for my walk.
But painting my building is not the same as keeping it up.
My friend -
The sun aches as it passes the tall apartment windows,
Empty of heat,
Laughing and empty.
I say the sun,
Friend,
I miss the warmth of the sun in the morning, shaken, like moisture on a branch
You,
Do you forgive my resentment when the monks fall asleep?

I gave up on you a long time ago! Ego secured like an island hallucinating the tight sky
The ocean rising,
The mist broken by shadows,
Each cloud penitent in its vagaries
And the race to the hills frantic, nervous -
Catching my brain,
Crusting my eyes
My friend,
Can you tend to your own affairs?

Doris,
Your questions are your own.

Father,
You came here in rags and I gave you nakedness.

Paint is not the problem, it's the infrastructure. I like the thinking here, Peter.

Les

Les,

I see that my response to you didn't take. Anyway, I was happy that you visited this poem. I don't often write poems with more than one voice in them.

cheers,

Peter