TO SOMEONE

I wanted to fill your emptiness
To give your feet someplace to walk
Instead of those doors you
stumble through
And come out of looking erased.
I wanted to stumble with you
if that's what it took
to let me share your losing.
Sometimes I wonder why your
footsteps faded
But I know the things longing can do.

UNTITLED

There are many different kinds of
hurt;
And one is bleeding
Unnecessarily from
the outside
in.

STAYING IN

Since I could not save the trees
From destruction: From factories.
Since good air was getting thin
I began to consider staying in.

As I could not turn back time:
O, Youth.' Nor abolish crime.
As treachery reared again and again
I felt the desire for staying in.

As I cannot master Death:
That sting! Nor restore a breath.
As all hope of things grow dim
I seriously practiced staying in.

Because I could not reach the stars
Nor planets: Jupiter or Mars.
Because your love I failed to win
I resigned myself to staying in.

A POEM TO THE OLD AND DOWN

Bless you
All of you sad and lonely and

Homeless I
Sympathize with you
With your tears of dust
Never seen
And your dreams
calluses
On other
People's bands.