Up and Down

Down is the natural movement.
Nothing is lifted. Things
disappear in ascent:
Water, souls. The phoenix
screeches into flames.
A balloon is strangled. Clouds
plummet down. Leaves fall. Birds fall.
Surrender and you will fall.

Things rise too.
Mountains scrunch
heavenward. Trees reach.
The tomatoes palpitating on the vine
climb towards the sun.
The heart ripens on the veins.

Life lives
and kills
and dies.

Two About Time

Regardless of what is bought,
time will be spent.
Pennies of seconds all rot
away to pay life’s rent.

Dollars of days funneling the debt
down with the sun into the grave.
Figures of months, mortgages of years
billing my body. I cast unwinnable bets.

Nothing can dam this flow to a halt;
Not Pictures or words collected in vaults.
Kisses and births blaze like hundreds on fire.
Our lives passed chopping wood for the funeral pyre.

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BUFFALO NICKELS

I’ve got a hunch these days will appreciate
like buffalo nickels, grimed and freely spent
newly-minted, going at their face rate,
Cherished after they’re long out of print.
“If I woulda held on to those things,” I’ll say,
“I’d be a millionaire. Instead I let
them roll down the gutter, used them to pay
for stupid things: women and drinks and debt.
How could I have known those little coins would
turn out to be worth so much?” But I do know
the worth of these days. I know that I should
spend them carefully. The question is: How?
Surely it’s better to spend while you can
Then clutch in your coffin the coin in your hand.