Litmus Test

I am thinking of the tongue
after a popsicle, of Shibboleth,
of the flier’s detachable fringe.

Of mildness: milk and blood.
Of  pungency: vinegar, lye.
Of Polaroids and invisible ink.

I am thinking of ponderous
results: a hydrangea that finally
flowers vermillion or sky.


Scarcity

On earth we major in the math 
of paucity and paunch: calculus

of famine on abacus ribs, ratio
of rare sirloin to common glutton.

There is on earth no dearth of ways
for us to be in want, connoisseur

or hoarder, starvling or lech. Sadsack
who hefts life only to deem it meager: 

on those who find being wanting 
but do not want, scarcity tells most.

The Park at Night

At night it is another country, its hospitality 
a mere cat door. Not only the feral enter. Kids,

limber, faster than the cops who chase them, 
steal in under the cover of a darkness they burst

tossing cherry bombs from slides. The park closes 
at dark, but some warm evenings, I see a woman 


shaking samaras from a Vellux blanket—not as
denouement; she is readying herself for anything 

rather than going. The park closes at dark, but 
before first light, I see a man sit up and stretch 

in a pavilion where, on weekends, nine moms 
salute the sun. It would be too soft were I to tell you

the park is safe at night, but to say its trespassers 
could not be innocents—that would be too hard.

Poem Meant to Be Opened

No one is asking you to wrestle the lid
from the relish or to extract corks
from bottles. Leave the silver ringlet 
in the drawer. The poem is ajar.

The poem is a jar of raspberries no one
means to preserve, a palm to its rim 
to keep off flies. Take my hand.
Pour the downy fruits in your mouth. 

This world is made for joy

No one is denying that of this world
we have made a million joyless 
things: landfills, bumpstocks,

caste. In roe, plastic gristle; 
in children, lead. In case, 
the suicide note. 

                                  How is it,

then, that we tarry on this side 
of the ultimatum, unready 
to depart this cruel world 

made for joy? 

                           

                              Well, there’s this:

sometimes when we say in case
what we mean is that we are bluffing

on the strength of the bees
who stuff their leg warmers
with gold dust, and sometimes

when we say hope, we mean small fry, 
herring just hatched, an effervescing 
pond. My claim on joy is this: 

once a pediatrician asked my son
if it was his middle name. 
So when I say this world

I mean wonders and I mean 
signs taken for wonders, all of it. 
I mean the grocer who wagged 

a wet pompom of cilantro at us
like it was hyssop. You can’t tell me 
that water wasn’t holy, as the water

is holy when a man not unused 
to rain gets caught, biking home, 
not just in rain but in more

than a downpour, when his mild 
epithets turn to whooping 
on his tongue. Even later, he will

not be able to tell it without 
laughter, without incredulity; he will 
not say cloudburst or torrent

he will say, The heavens opened. 

Sometimes they do. Sometimes 
a child at three writes a note

in unproven runes and tapes
it to the sling where her infant sister
bucks. When I say hope, I mean

that when their mother asks,
the toddler reads the runes: 
Cordelia, this world is made for joy.