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Exemplary
A vagabond, seduced by impish godsTo jaywalk the downtown interstate, is dead.Addled with booze, he managed against the oddsTo hit rush hour, lifting, one woman said, That slow-down-buddy, wait-a-minute handBums use...

Epistle to a Former Friend
When I say a prayerfor the wicked I despairand think, of course, of youand how your late-night rantsmake reservoirs of jaundice riseas veins keep tightening and helplessnessintensifies. Forgiveness that I...

Saint Gobnait of the Honeybees
She’d have naught of silvery turnings like fish,The Celtic knot of wedded, bedded love.She stole away to the Arans, met a man Not man but fearsome messenger of wishAnd...
Stained Glass
My father holds a panel of glassbetween us: we are both bathed blue.Wordlessly, we let the light passthrough. Where blade scores, glass breaks true. Cut pieces are placed side...
My Mother’s Teeth
My mother’s teeth were kept in a bottlemarked with the sign of the cross. I usedto shake it till they’d rattle,interest and childish horror fused.They weren’t her teeth. They...
Apophatic
Not with the myth and phosphorus of metaphor. Notwith lines of force looped in true-love knots.Not by dumping the urn and reading the ashes. Notthrough sonic wantonness, but not...
Spontaneous Loss
Those early weeks, you could have been anyone, Too young for fingerprints, much less a name,And years away from our first catch-and-toss— A little flesh and blood, no brain,...
In the Activities Room
No one will say it, but we knowtoday’s fresh-flamed hibiscus flowerreveals in one brief, glorious showour birth, our life, our final hour. Sacrament and synecdochelive in a pot near...
Parting Gifts
Thanks for playing. Here’s your consolation prize:a mountain capped with fog, the sun behind throwing light circumspectly on a lake, the waya painter lights a lovely face from out...

Not a Lament but an Ode to the Makers
Someone somewhere long ago with a pair of hands, a bit of earthand a thirsty soul, crafteda beautiful bowl. Just as someonenot so long ago made a...

Gather Ye
Second Place — 2024 First Things Poetry Prize

At the Graveside
Based on Philip Melanchthon’s epitaph for his son, Georg

Two Owls
First Place — 2024 First Things Poetry Prize
Incline Your Ear
Imagine the shell you findon the beach, a large conch,half-buried, glistening inmorning light, waiting to belifted, rinsed, held cupped to your ear: This is your body,listen and hear; blood...
Our Daughter Beside the Sea: Blue Hill, Maine
The seaside rock she sits on shines a blaze of purple shell and matte-glazed films of moss.She perches there, bent knees to chest, to gaze the gray and frosty...