Kirby Wright Poems

Hit Title Date Added
21.
Love From A Distance

He loved her but she married another man and moved to another island. He often drove to the cliffs and stared out at the hump across the channel.

He ran into her on her island. She’d been married two months and worked at the car rental. When she passed him his keys, their hands touched and there was a moment where anything was possible. Then she told him she was expecting a baby.
...

22.
Aloha, Lili’uokalani

Queen Lili’uokalani, where is our aina?
My memories are a mixture of slack key,
Plumeria, and Kona wind in the trees.
I measure the trades with a desperate tongue.
...

23.
Kahala Beach

I am alone
On a thin beach
At Christmas.
...

24.
Punahou Reunion

Here are the sterling lawns and tropical
Gardens that once belonged to us.
Love was discovered and hearts broken
As plumeria bloomed and fell.
...

25.
The Roses Are Fifteen

Your purchase? Fifteen red long stems roped by white string. You bought at noon, at the border where roses grow like weeds with many thorns, thorns threatening your hands in this desert heat. Roses struggle out of the dust of my land, senoritã, and I pick these weeds because you buy them instead of the flowers on your side. You want the discount. But there is trouble with my blossoms—they wilt after you pass the checkpoint. Your guard waved you home after smelling their innocence in your hands, but my roses die even as you drive because my sweat was not enough to keep them alive. Buds droop in clumps, refusing life beyond the border. Thorns are stilettos on the stems, blades jutting from twisted frames.

My supply? Over forty bunches. You took the biggest. I said it looked like a dozen, take them. I lied. I let you have the extras because I knew you would be happy with a bargain. You made the deal. I only hoped the thorns would not cut badly, you waiting patiently for the buds to open, you not believing a newborn could die in your arms with no warning at all.
...

26.
Van Gogh Vision

1.
Hear helicopter? she asks.
Not helicopter, I say,
Just fan carving
...

27.
Oceanside Beach, California

Santa Anas carry the scent of sage
Out from the desert.

Tumbleweeds reverse directions,
...

28.
At Il Fornaio, San Francisco

Inside Il Fornaio, a sparrow joins me
At the marble table. Sour chirp. Wants
My pumpkin muffin, a sip of espresso, then
...

29.
The Gallery Director

The skin of the gallery director is soft. But his muscles know the strain of production. He smokes in an alley adjacent to The Minotaur Gallery in Carmel. Fog veils the coast. His smoke rises south of Dolores. Streets here resist numbers—they are defined by landmarks, intersections, corners.

He has retired from Broadway with tastes for rehearsals, hors d’oeuvres, and starving actors. His face is not unlike yesterday’s or the days before. His vision is no longer curtains—SOLD lifts the soul. The goal is contracts, TRWs, payment plans for the middle class.
...

30.
Rain After A Dry Spell

The promised storm has come.
The weathermen are ecstatic.

Rain washes the bare limbs
...

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