Tossing the various pills on black marble counter, throwing bones like a sangoma or inyanga

Western medical treating symptoms, Eastern divinity, there are no cures

Heart condition at age thirty living with it, this cardiac cocktail every morning

Blood pressure, rhythm, deteriorating arterial linings—fighting back black buzzard hearse

Thoughts—debris that can clog dam blood rivers, set free life with these pleasures, women

Booze—feeding pagan desires—distractions from facing the darkness

Hot petite, not even a hundred-pound blonde—lost my virginity with in high school

Clear starry darkness on a West Virginia hill

My bottle green 1970 Pontiac Le Mans Sport 350, black leather bucket seats up front

Four on the floor—she fell & bumped her head years later in a parking garage

At our ten-year reunion—she had no memory

Our one unforgettable night—that is now mine, numbered with my days

Ducks zoom in jet fast, then glide quite slow, wings cool

Geese gawk honk hiss—this pond is home—belongs to future big potato eggs

Ducks, heron, hawks shooed away with flapping wings, ritual daily blares

Pond impounds two geese each year—nesting here like clocks, bring spring

Honks of hope their love lasts, guarding against fox, raccoons, coyotes, hands

Of men & teen mischief—one goal—beaks to peck, eyes to peak, goslings reach the sun.