Over crowded tables
From mouth to ear,
After the curl and
Before the falling back
It comes,
A perfect 180,
Punch line behind setup, 
No light between.
 
What we know is that it’s
Left-brain,
Not pictorial exactly,
A smashing together of
Thoughts like rocks
Shattered, dialect-specific,
On emotion’s road;
 
Three-word letters,
Four letter words,
Root words, words
Ruthless as they come
Laser-bright
From the heart.

Sioux River Slough,
Sucking up silt
Where Lake Superior and
The river meet
Is where to jam after a gig;
Or Chequamegon Forest, maybe,
Where the variegated
Rhythms hang out with
Trembling autumnal popples
Singing in thin gold voices
About improvisation,
Earth’s body language,
Doing what’s left when
The leaf falls.

Two of my children
Dance computer arcs
In the kitchen.
Steam locomotives
Shoosh up darkened hills
Over roadbeds of old
Digital watches.
 
In the woods diesel insects,
Yellow with black markings,
Stalk about bunching logs,
Blinking multicolored eyes.
 
Thin sheets of tree lie in my lap,
Words on them.
 
 
 
                                                             
In North Coast Review (MN) #20, DEC 2001.