Clean up

the dissipated crowd
leaves the quiet
stronger and deafening

Empathy

when the lonely
comfort the lonely
then both feel less so

Cannot Be Completed As Dialed

pressing our ears to wires
we tap Morse code on rust
hoping for lightning:
a storm against silence

The Traveler

Hands in my pockets
I do not envy the moon
her lonesome path
although I fail to see
any but my own:
footprints in the snow

Leaves

Why is it?
That standing in the path
and watching the changing leaves
I feel at peace
and never alone

Single

A quiet night
I wish for arms
To hold me as I sleep

An early morning
A table with one plate and cup
The other chair pushed back in invitation

To that someone of someday
I drum my fingers in impatience
And dash images before they congeal
Lest I take imagination for something hoped for
and believe it to be real.

Four Lonely Poems

Caught between
two old friends
and two young lovers,
her arched face drinks up
a gossip of friendly banter.

The guard on campus
eats a cinnamon roll.
Behind the rain-splattered glass
of his station,
he dines with pigeons as company.

In a trio of women,
one strained face
making polite conversation
over vegan luncheon.

Abandoning his bike halfway,
the boy walks across a bridge,
hands in his pockets.

Decompression

At times
Only dreams
Act as those kind friends
Who help unravel
The painful tangles
Of everyday living

On the Mountain Peak

This blanket of silence
Smothers tender feelings and hopes
But if I fail to yell
Who shall hear me?
At least the mountain echoes my thoughts
Perhaps we were both awaiting
Each other

Drifter

The wind sighs lowly
By the sea, a lone tugboat
Calls out in the fog