Stephen Dobyns Poems

My stepdaughter and I circle round and round.
You see, I like the music loud, the speakers
throbbing, jam-packing the room with sound whether
Bach or rock and roll, the volume cranked up so
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Each thing I do I rush through so I can do
something else. In such a way do the days pass—
a blend of stock car racing and the never
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These are the first days of fall. The wind
at evening smells of roads still to be traveled,
while the sound of leaves blowing across the lawns
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Over a cup of coffee or sitting on a park bench or
walking the dog, he would recall some incident
from his youth—nothing significant—climbing a tree
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Each morning the man rises from bed because the invisible
cord leading from his neck to someplace in the dark,
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A cry was heard among the trees,
not a man's, something deeper.
The forest extended up one side
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A man owns a green parrot with a yellow beak
that he carries on his shoulder each day to work.
He runs a pet shop and the parrot is his trademark.
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Across the street, the carpenter carries a golden
board across one shoulder, much as he bears the burdens
of his life. Dressed in white, his only weakness is
temptation. Now he builds another wall to screen him.
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Each dance step we execute is a slap in the face
of immobility. Are you light on your feet? Do you wear
tap shoes and feel an elasticity of sole and thus
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How close the clouds press this October first
and the rain—a gray scarf across the sky.
In separate hospitals my father and a dear friend
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