In poems of this size, so little

might happen, one wonders if such brevity

can matter -- as when I strolled, thirty years ago,

with my wife (a year before she was my wife)

in her first neighborhood, and we heard

that familiar, horrible squealing of tires down the block.

And just because she was a young nurse, no doctor

in sight, when we reached the small boy

lying on the red-brick street with many people

gathered around, she had to step forward and kneel,

had to be the one cradling him and wondering,

most closely, at how quick and full an end might be.

from There Is No Finished World 

White Pine Press

                Our studies show that the autistic child apparently

                has a random relationship with sounds, linking

                them with whatever object holds his attention at

                the moment.

 

Crouched by his chair, my son hears

my complaint from the wine glass,

my praise from his own shoe.

When I read him books, I speak

through the pictures, or the wall.

 

Despite my love, I say less and less –

even if he heard me in the trees

or the sunset, he would not listen.

 

Perhaps, somewhere on the soft and hot

savannahs of Kenya, a newborn gazelle

speaks with the voice of my son.

 

He throws his cup across the room.

His hand explodes with the crash.

Synchronized Swimming

(Livingston University Press)