On lonely poet corners of low lying leaves and moistprophet eyes.
— Bob Kaufman, “On”

when the delicate accidents of this town rise from the ground like steam
with each breath
in, and fall back down
with each breath out, as each footstep kisses the concrete
my life
sheds its ugliness — it flares and unfolds like a sun as I walk into it, and it swims around me
as an ocean swims around a fish
almost half my life had to pass for me to see
I am no more or less than a note in this song I know I will never hear sung the same way twice,
listen to with eyes upcast
to a streaming dusk sky,
and keep the beat with my footsteps and the click of
a child’s fingers weaving the clouds and smokestack billows
into a cloak
of invisibility,
but he sees me, and did so long ago…
come on, you are nowhere near
the misfit or the monster
that you used to think
you were here,
just another lump of carbon that radiates impatiendy
as though it’s already a diamond and pulsates brighdy
under the cloudy waters’ weight like an anemone
which is
the star that you see
in the heart of every apple
whenever you cut it
the other way

*From the collection “Angel Frankestein”, Soul Bay Press, 2018.