The Morning I Married The Sky: Poems Inspired by Rumi, Billy Collins and more

you don’t build up
good works and drag
them in a bag
up to heaven and then
unpack them
before the almighty
for his approval


god is whistling
are you dancing?


—

“The goal of poetry is to move and delight at a level deeper than the everyday. A poem serves the same “purpose” as a walk in the woods, or a bird that we pause and watch. There are two parts: the bird and the stillness of the pause. May these birds meet your stillness.”
—Chris Dingman

—

from "The Morning I Married the Sky:
he was sitting on the couch
with a laptop when he heard
the unmetered click
of something too frail
to be man-made knocking
on wood and through the screen
door he saw of all things
a woodpecker


so he went
outside

and watched
and thought they really
do they peck
the wood that's where
the name comes from

and the breeze threw
him a surprise party
in a room the sky
had painted blue

and there were trees and their leaves
were all waving and then the bird

was gone but he
stayed in the space
it left