Pilgrimage: 35 Weeks: Bars

I remember coffee with whiskey sides
cigarettes put out quickly
damp rooms that were never warm
tasting words before we placed them in poems
tears on napkins laughter
and glasses of time

Pilgrimage: #34:Homeward

unchanged and welcoming

the cafe noisy
cheerful with expresso machine and grinder chatter 

we find a corner table

read the New York Times

sip coffee dark as dreams

and watch the store across the street

Pilgrimage: Week 34: Homeward

unchanged and welcoming

the cafe noisy cheerful

with expresso machine and grinder chatter 

we find a corner table

read the New York Times

sip coffee dark as dreams

and watch the store across the street

disappear

Pilgrimage: Week 33: Gift

cinnabar spice and wine
red stones and blue
yellow grain white rice
pearls from the sea
amber incense and black tea
carried in fine woolen bags
then opened before the feet of love
and you are love and dear

Driving

Pear tree, peach tree, apple.
Constellation with a name and one without.

You are transported. Guide branches and corn
rivulets.    I am driving there (in reach) to
white trailer in the weather.   You are absent.

Peach skin, pear bark, apples in blossom.

Throat sounds indistinguishable from
the name you were born with.

Pilgrimage: 32 weeks: Erasure

Were we to erase
The cars stiff and squat upon the road
Turn off each bright light
To leave the starlight glow
We could pull lace shawls over
Our shoulders
And rise to kiss the moon

Pie, for Pilgrim Ashley

Peaches on the ends of branches
soften and fall
Critters in the kitchen cry for pie
Mom appeases all
Potty training reminds her
of the peaches,
ripening, peaches dropping
in the backyard
                          underfoot
the critters, all boys

The scent of fruit over ripe
Branches dropping, calls of
children, mother's mirror critters
thumbprints in the pie crust
Mama juggling utensils, extensions
of her arms, limbs for everything

Pilgrimage:31: Apricots

They're letting the fruit trees die

trunks blackened by burning days

without water a few push through 

green leafed edges

holding deadly desiccation at bay

some force of wind or tractor pulls 

the brittle body from the sandy soil

They're letting the fruit trees die