At Last to Rest

When the night will fall forever,

Will you tell me what I’ve done?

When I lay me down at last to rest,

Will I see I’m not the only one

Who wonders what these steps have meant

On life’s uncertain, troubled shores?

The waves just go on crashing, sent

In peaceful times and raging wars,

Depositing unlucky creatures,

On the rocks and sand, perhaps, to die.

We tried to stop the waves,

But the force the fates supply

Was stronger than our mortal hands,

Unfit to face the unrelenting flow.

And so, we turned to those now stranded,

Struggling in the sun’s unshielded glow.

We gently sent them back,

Again to try the vast, uncertain sea.

Our footprints sank into the sand.

Repeated steps dug paths that we

Could use to guide us as we worked.

But all those treads have since been swept away

By time, its tidal pendulum

Has smoothed the marks our lives display.

At times, I stayed the course.

At others, I allowed myself to stray.

And as my spirit lies in wait,

I wonder what persists, what may

Affect the universe when I am gone?

Perhaps it’s more than I should ask,

Too proud a thing that I request.

Perhaps the current task

Is to look beyond the cosmic crest,

And to say I tried my best

And rest.


This seemed like an appropriate poem to post as the year nears its end. Occasionally, I can't help but contemplate what it means to live and die in this universe that feels, at times, so vast, and at others, so intimate. When I do, things like this poem usually come out.

Tunnel through the Night

A gentle hum and sway

Accompanies the dreamers’ way

On tracks that lead us on from dusk to dawn.

The passing scenes outside are drawn

With shades of black and bluish gray

And points of light that blur before they’re gone.

The dreams and stories spun

Inside the gliding cars can run

Beside the sliding pictures in the glass.

Although the realms of thought surpass

Reality beneath the sun,

There’s magic in each darkened blade of grass

That sparkles in my sight

And shapes the lives that tunnel through the night.

When I visited my family over Thanksgiving, I took the train from Illinois to Pennsylvania. It was quite a long journey, and one leg of the trip (Chicago to Pittsburgh) happened overnight - we departed in the evening and arrived early in the morning. This poem is inspired by that part of the journey, as the train quietly glided through the darkness.

Ghost of a Memory

Your image wanders everywhere

Through the house where we had lived since you were small:

In a darkly-colored bag upon the stair

Or a shadow in a corner of the hall.

It’s the imagined ghost of a memory

My outer eyes appear to see,

But inwardly

I feel you’re near me somewhere

As more than just a shade of reverie.

This is the second of two poems I'm posting about my family's cat, Slick, who passed away last May. I wrote this poem in August, during my first visit back to my parents' house after it happened. I couldn't help expecting to see him waiting at the top of the stairs, or coming around a corner, or sleeping on the windowsill. And there were definitely a few times when I saw a bag or a shadow and thought it was him.

All Our Yesterdays

Life is oft spent waiting

For what tomorrow brings,

But when it comes with sorrow,

When all your life no longer springs

Or runs throughout the hallways,

When one more time your head will lie

Upon the safe, unmoving ground,

When every sleepy stretch and silent sigh

Has ceased to spawn your searching gaze,

I yearn for all our yesterdays

And wish to hold you one last time,

Before your spirit must rebound

To where a better peace is found.

But each today that grace has given

Will live with me my whole life through.

I’ll stand beside a windowsill

And find the breeze that called to you.

This Thanksgiving, I'm thankful for my family's cat, Slick, who passed away over the summer. This is the first of two poems I'm posting about him - one before Thanksgiving and one after. I wrote this poem almost immediately after he passed. I was in Uganda at the time, and the poem reflects some of my initial reactions to the news. I'll probably post the second poem next weekend.

The Angel of the Sounds of Night

When all the sounds collect

Between my listening ears,

More wonderful than I expect

Are harmonies, and she appears,

Allaying all my fears.

Arrayed in rainbow light

That swallows up my stagnant tears,

She hovers in her dreamlike flight,

Inspiring me to write

The growing melody

That echoes through the mystic night

Behind the silence, setting free

A creativity

That rushes to the Earth.

All manner of what’s heavenly

Arise to greet the new dawn’s birth

And share their songs with me.

This poem speaks to the creative inspiration I often feel at night, arising from inside my heart as well as from the outside world around me. I sometimes feel as if the music and poetry I write already exists before I put it to paper - my role is simply to find and share it. 

In the Dragon's Aftermath

He stood upon a blackened field of rye.

The fire-breather’s shadow loomed

Below the western sky.

He wondered if his life was doomed,

But, looking toward the dragon’s piercing eye,

He saw no note of malice there,

Unlike the drakes of old,

Whose greed was famed. Each caverned lair

Was lined with heaping piles of gems and gold

That glittered in the fiery glare

But left their master cold.

Then heroes of the stories rode

To best the beasts and win the world’s renown,

Invading every dark abode,

Perhaps, to gain a crown.

Today, the tale has changed its mode.

The monster followed as a consequence

Of modern humans’ hubris, bold

To manifest immense

Control of nature’s every fold

And quench the magic of the wider world.

With this, the mighty dragon woke,

And, leather wings unfurled,

It rained destruction, burned, and broke

The clockwork engines, gems of industry,

And raised the flames of which we spoke

With little urgency.

But now the fires are burning low,

And, standing there upon his field, he sees

A gentle rain to heal the woe

And wet the blackened trees.

It comes to fall on all alike

To quench this dragon of our own desire.

The beast departs, no more to strike,

Although it does not tire.

Its task is done, and all we’d built

Has crumbled into dust and come to naught.

He sees our great collective guilt

And every harm we’ve wrought.

He sees survivors kneel to pray,

Convicted by the dragon’s long-told birth.

He sees new hope in what they say

Of future lives of worth:

Restoring what was lost today,

But now as humble stewards of the Earth.


For me, this poem's fantastical elements are symbolic of the world's current environmental challenges, exploring a future in which those issues lead to sudden catastrophe. The hope is that, in contrast to the characters in the poem, we can change our mindsets and actions before encountering the full force of the calamity.

A Seasonal Anachronism

This order feels all wrong.

It’s not been cold for very long,

But snow’s already fallen on the ground.

The bottoms of the trees

Reflect a silent winter’s sound,

But multi-colored canopies

Still rustle in an autumn breeze,

And, slowly, leaves are drifting down

To land upon the snow.

A graceful beauty’s white and brown-flecked gown

Has warped the seasons’ flow.

Its soft anachronism

Leaves my heart aglow

Yet fearful of a harder schism

We may unknowingly have crossed.

What if there’s no returning

From where the seasons’ rhythm is lost?

What changes will we still be learning

Long after all the harm we’re wrought?

Perhaps they will be greater than we thought.

Mom and I were in Wisconsin last weekend, and we encountered what I thought was an interesting juxtaposition of autumn and winter. Snow had already fallen, but many leaves hadn't fallen from the trees yet. It made me think about the increasing environmental changes we've been seeing in the world, and where they might be leading.