Michael H. Brownstein

2 poems


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A Rude Man Parks Cars for a Fancy Restaurant and I Have to Kill Him


My daughter takes a different path home each night.
She does this to avoid the man from the mountain.
He is huge, but very weak—a show off and a coward.
She knows this is what makes him so dangerous.
She knows this and this is why she is so careful.
She knows this and this is why she walks in the dark
cold extra steps, the damp cold, the rain, the sleet.
He will never offer her an umbrella or an extra coat,
but he is always capable of offering her a bribe.


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Early Evening, May, from the Train Tracks


A slice of sand in the middle of water,
Silver fox twigs and bramble at its banks,
The first fire cracker bursts of green and sage,
And a winter’s list to the small trees leaning into the sun,
Hopeful. The sky a grand blue, cloudlight
Grand dragons, a grand wind, a grand river,
A grand sunlight nestling low over the prairie,
Red flame covering the grasslands and farms,
Its bright shadow soft against the land,
Sliding the grandest of days into the grandest night.


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return to sawbuck 4.3

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Michael H. Brownstein has been widely published throughout the small and literary presses. His work has appeared in The Café Review, American Letters and Commentary, Skidrow Penthouse, Xavier Review, Hotel Amerika, After Hours, Free Lunch, Meridian Anthology of Contemporary Poetry, The Pacific Review and others. In addition, he has eight poetry chapbooks including The Shooting Gallery (Samizdat Press, 1987), Poems from the Body Bag (Ommation Press, 1988), A Period of Trees (Snark Press, 2004) and What Stone Is (Fractal Edge Press, 2005).