Unincorporated Lines

The first real snow last night. Everywhere I went today -- the Greek food store, Stella Coffee in The Fisher Building, the library -- people were cheery. I felt cheery too, something about the detritus of the year covered over, the hard lines of brick softening with a collar of white, the bracing air.

I've been writing a lot lately. For me, the practice for both life and writing -- because we bring the same mindsets to bear on creation and living -- is to walk forward with a joyful expectancy of the unknown, to see what happens. A few things from my notebook...

      *

Shots fired outside the Institute of Arts -- 

panic's animal understanding touched one 

and then another and the crowd broke,

streaming along Farnsworth Avenue.

A crackling in the night, shouts, sirens,
and the whump, whump, whump

of a distant police helicopter.

     *

We love only the specific form

but long toward the place all beauty points -- 

the lines on your face...

     *

I made a space for you in my arms, 

small because you were small. 

I have carried your absence ever since.

     *

The life you took off like a jacket

forgotten on a chair-back 

of some sidewalk cafe -- the loss 

you didn't realize until one day 

you went looking for it.