Trippel Drive

I met two of my old best friends
with a pair of binoculars.

I saw one kid throw a dirt clod
at another kid. I put the binoculars

away and eventually I was standing
below them at the base of a dirt mound.

The classic stand off
of boyhood:

Two new kids
in the neighborhood;

the other,
staking claim to his territory.

The day was shadowless
with a light dust in the breeze.

I saw the one kids eye twitch
so I quickly grabbed a 2X4

and began to run full-speed at him.

Then, I planted the end of the 2X4 into
the ground and pole-vaulted

over a huge hole in the earth
from which the dirt mound

had been displaced.

They stood with terror and excitement
as I flailed over the abyss

screaming like a blood thirsty eagle.

Everything went by in slow-motion,
the sounds of an old Bruce Lee film filled the air

and the moment my feet hit the ground,
we were friends for life.

Going Away Party

You broke my heart
in the morning.

Then we had cake.

It was the worst
piece of cake I ever ate.

Even the milk was unreal.

Autumnal Slap

*

Leaves fall

cathedral, oblique.

Did I just imagine 

it all. And now

the bark falls

off the sycamore 

like the flesh 

off my bones.

My pastoral static

cryptic in the pyramids 

of oak, ash and thorn,

the low weeping 

tentacles, electric,
methuselah. 

*

You folded your arms

like a mummy

and in 11 words

my silent ferris wheel 

           eyes 

hung darkful over oceans.

August 8th

We were so stoked
that mid-summer

afternoon,

when the crop duster
swooped down

and increased our buzz.

I was compelled
to take off all my cloths,

so I did.

And leaped off the deck
like one of the dogs

disturbing

the cloud of bluegill below.