Two Poems

Blackberry Moon

Rain crept in overnight
and left before morning, looking

for a safe place to rest.
I'd dragged the garden hose here & there

all the unknown day.
When I went to look for the blackberry

moon, it lay uncoiled there, a hard
slick snake.

What light there was from the inside shining out
reflected on the new trash can

brought by the town to every house,
meant to be kept hidden

till six p.m. the night before garbage day.
I found one wishing star

the health and happiness of my children
and then others,

but the blackberry
moon had gone missing in a basket of sky.

 

Cusp

By day, the yellow tea-roses in pots on the patio
look weary-dusty, though in bud. Just beyond,
young rabbits nibble and rest in small round
mounds. By night, the burnished golden world
goes platinum and cool. "I need to change my life,"
my father says by wireless phone. I don't ask him
what's the point, as that would be cruel and illusory
punishment for nothing, just as the word "cusp"
refers to either point on the crescent moon,
neither of which is really there, both created by
the shadow of the earth, the reflection of the sun.