Bloom

The ghost is outside–
here, we are safe– the crowd says,
when inside is ruin.

    ~

We are learning now
each ruin is a lesson–
the ghost is inside.

    ~

Justice is coming–
each ruin is a blessing,
a delayed judgment.

    ~

On the horizon,
the islands are lost to grey,
racing summer clouds.

    ~

A sky apart,
here the ground is adorned with a
golden latticework.

    ~

The light falls in bars
criss-crossing the poui’s flowers
slipping through its leaves.

    ~

Somewhere, Zenaidas
sing their prayers and the whiptails
scuttle in the grass.

    ~

The new moon rides high
between the sea left behind,
the crying gull’s wing.
    ~

In these many years,
we learn many things, but chief
that grief is constant.

    ~

Dear beloved one.
That is how one email starts,
if you are honest…

    ~

I have never been.
I make lies like butterflies,
prettier than truth.

    ~

The truth is ugly.
I have been trying to say–
(screaming!) this to you.

    ~

Justice is a myth.
There is no arc. History
never bends to truth.

    ~

The ruins are just
ruins. There is nothing more
meaningful to them.

    ~

They fade their own way,
the patterns? We imagine
a whole tapestry.

    ~

Beloved. Do not
listen. Lies come alerted
and the inbox fills.

    ~

Tonight, someone asked:
Must love dictate the sonnet?
and I wish I’d lied.

    ~

The truth is, love is
the sonnet’s prerequisite,
the only truth left.