we do not agree on everything

my partner and i 

we do not agree on everything

that is why we are together

one of my associates 

tells his girlfriend, "i don't care"

when it comes to how she feels

(how do you own 

anything from another?

so he tells her)

"i don't care" could work for some

it could be just the right thing

for some people but

i told him i'd heard that love is an action 

now that we were comparing

philosophies 

but in then end he is right --

i don't care, we don't care about 

anything at all 

there's this primeval nature

an infinite view

of time and space

wherein we do not achieve

but instead abide

never separate

but until i get 

into vastness of clarity 

that has no ending

i am in a relationship

i can offer my sympathies

if it seems to help

i know we can't do anything

for anybody 

but i still want to

i'll always be this way

giving to another is a hard habit

to break 

and somewhere in there

is a path 

--

for Deborah

snow crosses an american flag

snow crosses an american flag

as the wind blows and the sky

is like a map of all the conquering

done in the name of a young nation

every high and low place every broad

plain or stabbing river flag furling

and unfurling in victory over forgetting

all the people shoveled into the earth

or gathered together and burned 

but then a flag is just a flag and the

blowing wind suggests nothing as

the flakes of snow and hail make the flag

look big and stand out against a turgid

rolling screen of clouds as we make new

friends and learn to see and speak parts of

new languages which suggests 

everything possible before all of us 

every one

more flurries across the front of a

flowing and wending american flag

we are all children sprung from disaster 

crossing a great map in our minds which

constantly is changing and extending

giving everything any thing you'd wish to see

hope victory loss anger commitment

punishment or imagination a day 

every day or no day at all let us have

the courage to know and be faithful 

towards each other

_