Richard W. Halperin‘s most recent collections, both 2018, are Catch Me While You Have the Light (Salmon) and Three Poem sequences (Lapwing).

 

The Olive Tree

An hour ago is gone forever.
It has been stolen.
But one can say, ‘I have painted my picture.’
And if one has, one has.

Others have,
And there they are.
Timon of Athens.
‘As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams  . . .’

There is no ago in them.
I ate them.
They are part of me.
They were always part of me.

‘She moved thro’ the fair.’
Thank God for that.

Man on a Beach


            ‘. . . desire which is love trying to happen.’ 
            Dom Sebastian Moore, Remembered Bliss

A man walks along a beach.
I think he is a priest. He thinks
Of his own pain and of the pain of others.
He is glad to do so, he has a bridge
To other people, through which he can,
A little, better understand their suffering.
He knows understanding helps neither
Them nor himself. But.

He could have stayed in his house,
With his own pain. He didn’t.
I see him. He looks like a man
Walking on a beach. He isn’t.
He is love walking.