I don’t know where you are.
I don’t know who is lost.
No refuge in the shadeless palms.
I don’t know if life
once the flame
became the stone
in the fire’s place.
I wonder not, the souls
their days unnumbered,
no one counts, wander about
the parking lot, that like
these motors, oh their
unsweet heart
might not be fixed.
RLB@1991
Love is like the
ivory coast
at this distance I
wonder at its smile,
its lovely name,
though not the swinging
‘stride, nor an
artistic life,
the ships of those
years past, that
came and have passed by
RLB @1991
I like to live
Where the sky is
Bay like blue, I’d
Like to see you
Sweetly smile in
The white camellia
Bloom. And if the
Clearing wind swept
Down the spanish
Hill, I’d want to
Have you turn my
Collar up and hold
My arm in yours.
RLB 1-21-@1991
I just hold the board
tightly, taking one of
the waves, without real
thought, parading toward
the shore. Maybe the sky
will darken tomorrow, maybe
I’ll take the car to some
point, to get a fresher
perspective, let the next
swell tell me what’s in
store. Then when the sun
decides to brigten, and
I feel I’ll turn to a
million pieces before I reach the
edge of the water running
hard with all that’s left
in me. With all that you
might contain but won’t.
Though you say hello
with a hug, once in a while.
A wet shoulder against
your cotton clothing goes
un-noticed the way it’s
night before or after
independence or christmas
day, I don’t remember
and in going by
it is also surprising
you stopped and told me so.
Climbing up the river’s
shoulder. With spent
hours in faze. Except
for you wearing a
pattern off the shoulder.
I want to return the
unbalanced borrowings
carried by vespa til
they fall and fail.
The authorities don’t call.
So unrelenting stay
the conflicts and confusion.
I should see
the contentment in
spiritual order that
shrugs off my un-
orientation.
RLB August 03, 2018
At the orpheum
I want to today
Make the rabbit disappear.
Alone on the bus seat
The counselor observes
you are very pink today
The nurse looks at
my arm. You didn’t
use today, question mark.
I want to be on time
parking near sixth and
styx. The adviser holds
my wrists. Reporting by
form how I stole and
could do worse. I am
In the class tonight
hoping that I read
the lesson. And
at home
I can paint hexagons
orange, suspended
In a red cloud.
RLB August 01, 2018
We don’t need anything new.
Like an updated picture,
you in my arms,
that dress passed on to
your sister. And that
you would stay is gone
too. We didn’t need to
talk further. Stopping
in china town for dinner.
You on my arm,
the late bus passed on by,
like clouds that you made
disappear.
We never grew older,
You had your arm around
me, over my shoulder.
Heroes honored
this weekend.
There
is nothing to change,
I just spend time
in remembering,
how the words that I’m
yours are gone too.
RLB 1 16 2008
Lets say we rode to
Mount Vernon and
Contemplated the river
Noted the way that stuart
Clouded the picture or
Perhaps was
Floating a ditty.
Lets say our thoughts
Came together
One was a resin
The other a catalyst
Ingraining our senses with
Flowers and gardens that
Bound from the past
On an historical journey
And tomorrow
Awoke to an early
Sun on a summers day
An exuberant display
And an end to
All longing
RLB 1-24-2008
I write to you again
with invisible ink
and pen. I write to
you again, steamy
words on the sky
behind me. I write
to you with hope,
wondering how
you’ll see it is
me in smoke
from the puffs
and intermittences.
I write just to
untangle time
from some late
night, to take
the words and by
the morning
give you,violets
in a garland.
RLB
02 20 2008
AEM sometime in the 1990s