Jeffrey’s work online at Mystic River Review Shadyvale Press _______ Email Jeffrey Green. _______ Original photo of Jeffrey Green by K. Visser. All rights reserved.

Jeffrey Green Extraction One does not stop missing Even what was imperfect. A faint taste of blood Colors all my food, The remembered ache Of infected root. Owning Wake up. Don’t put on your watch. Just think How little ties that watch to the word, “your.”" For between “your” and “dream”" does any link Survive the foot’s first touch of chilly floor? Had you died in your sleep, or had a thief, Snagged the watch, soft-treading through your dark rooms, You’d concede that being yours, a belief You lay on like a firm mattress, assumes What cannot be demonstrated about Watches and selves. Your wife is still asleep. You possess nothing. The idea is daft. This moment chuckles in a silent shout. You have buckled on a watch you can keep No more than breath or laughter that’s been laughed. Retrospect Sometimes. Not sometimes: often. Too often. Eyes glued to the rear-view mirror, careers He might have made for himself, had he been The sort of man who knows which way he steers. Here he is, past fifty, on the downslope. Not invited to conferences, he sits On no boards. Quoted in no paper, hope For celebrity’s long lost, he admits. Yet better underestimated than Ridiculous -- he knows that’s true someplace. He doesn’t like the him another choice Would make. . . Driven to do because he can. Though if you take his modesty at face Value, you’ll hear dark acid etch his voice. Duo Remember Eldad’s and Medad’s cameo appearance In Numbers Eleven? Like relics of vaudeville they perform Their act in camp. It must been an experience More like sailing a ketch in a sudden storm Than doing a routine with another sixty-eight elders, When you’ve got your lines down pat. Joshua heard And wanted to jail them, but Moses shrugged his shoulders. “If only all the Lord’s people” -- he deferred To the obvious truth that Eldad and Medad were out Of control -- “were prophets, and the Lord would put His spirit On them.” Moses had a plan about As practical as anarchy but never thought to fear it. Joshua’s outlook showed more common sense: A prophet’s place is safe behind a fence.