You`ll catch your death, the nurse
my mother used to say. Forty percent
of body heat escapes through your head,
my father-doctor might have added
as I ran out bareheaded in a breeze
to play. How did I escape catastrophes
of hypothermia, double pneumonia?

If they were still alive, they`d list
the summer risk of sun exposure,
melanoma, and facial wrinkles to which
I`m not immune. And yet, I still walk
hatless, loath to place a length
of twisted fabric between myself
and rain, or shield my eyes against
what I might read in a blue-gold sky.

~ taylor graham

In the kitchen
the old wife works foreboding
into heaped meringue
on lemon with a hint of sugar
to the tart, something
to greet him when he comes,
as he surely will,
eyes shot through with
daylight, without a key
opening
the bolted door.

~ taylor graham

(ed:I was thinking of this standing in line in the store while all the patrons in front of me were debating their lucky lottery numbers wasting the clerk's time. -- jdc

Whatever possessed you
to dial, hoping to be caller
#15 for a pair of tickets
to Tosca, knowing
how he hates the opera,
knowing he has other things
for the two of you to be doing,
things that don`t concern
high notes, the luminous stars
or the beautiful death
of lovers?

~ taylor graham