1-27-2016

The wrist goes still

and springs are unfed,

A few nights
pored over

Januaries,

Hands found in
morning coals,

Nights black as

The county,
flood warnings
ladled about the Kankakee,

And the way across
clear, still not possible,

Half-accomplished.

1-5-2016

Even when I was that child,
One leg in the Calumet,

I am here,
Nearer to
The way all things nosedive

Lifeless

Into snowbanks
In the end.

Even as I pulled my
Pockets empty each
Into seething winter
Rivers,
Hope
Clawed past my shoulders to find
My children.

And when I despair,
I remember
All my needed knives,

Gone from me
To depths of great lakes
By my own hand,

And careen around the sunless bends
With all that is required to keep careening.

1-1-2016

The angles
Found alongside,

The fire, the worries.