No one told me that my poetry is horrendous--has been, for a dreadfully long time. Why else would I have to overhaul it so much? Actually, I don't mind. It teaches me that the first draft is simply that--a first draft. The final draft comes of dredging and chopping, sweating and fretting.

So here, again, one from relatively recent memory, edited.

But surely not final.


PASSAGE

I hung back in the brume
and watched thunderbirds with broken headlights
huddle off into flat cities of mist.
Ritchie's dead but I hear from his charred throat
that we belong together. I don't blame him,
what the hell does a dead man know. Can't fault
a stiff for being wrong.

there are streaks in the air,
leaves to the brittle grass,
fire colors
for dead guys who love to pluck—
We belong together.
The hell we do.

I am heir to an autumn empire,
stiff against the
hot mouth of winter;
My needle's gone bad, so Ritchie
died in a fumble of static.
I slumped in a plastic chair staring,

thinking why in hell
did my last good record
shimmy off and die.

P.S. Bonnie: Congratulations, mon lecteur!