happiness


is sitting in the car outside the market
having chicken and wine in a paper cup,
listening to the laureate in his hay-mowed way,
writing on the envelope of a speeding ticket
showing me zooming in a photo, but it's a warning, 
salting with free salt, thinking maybe a matinee

okay?  modern lives, modern lives

poetry's like anything else, complicated 
when you want living simple, outside effort, 
nothing but sweet time, a mess to resist 

and do the tastiest thing i know,
suck time out of the swirly world,
til i've polished off the widest part 
fit enough for sea

to return--who knows?--as a fat blue shrimp,
eating myself to my next appearance

il papa es morto and Sisters of the Incandescent Word 
sleep in an alley in the black sun, old masters' style, 
habits leaned to the ancient stone, feeling softly

beyond imagining, the coarse deshabille of love,
their days in the vineyard, drinking under trees




© Copyright 2005 Peter Chapman

Home