The factory. River water pushes in electric out. Stoic faces, busy hands, leaning forward, tools clanking, assembly lines organizing, textiles, metals, lathes and labor, pallets and wire. Row houses, red brick, open windows, curtains lipping the corners, pipes with steam, chimneys black belching, parking lots and fences, green service doors, fans spinning, workers in overalls, … More MILL TOWN
GRAY AND FLAT A following of suitcases, faces moving under gray metal skies. Faith long ago leaped away, claiming a lost kingdom from a ragged past. Abandoned without gain they all walk city streets, moving in mass around corners past lights and buildings. They follow without leading. Regularly looking back.
Flames lick the straw and the suitcases we pack over a lifetime with vulnerable items we adore. We wonder without speaking, what lasts, what remains the day without perishing? Building is more than walls, it’s a foundation buried deep; stones for support, the strength that lasts. Fire burns, water … More BEAUTY FOR ASHES
It’s in the eyes, the depths where souls swim in pools of black and white prints, behind doors locked tight with faces blurred and names forgotten. There’s a wall buried deep, within our reach, a point of no beyond, where denial provides a path for retreat, or repentance washing us clean. Hold fast your position, … More A SEA DIVIDING
Evenings doors begin their closings. A cellophane sun recedes to a round horizon Where a faint filtering of clouds becomes invisible as night raises the flag of darkness. The burden of evening, being alone or without, Welcomes the spirit of fear or doubt Or suspicion of sounds. But with God, the author of life and … More A HANDFULL OF PSALMS
I am downwind from the crossroads, adrift on the offside a thought. I hear the language of midnight calling where there is no second choice. A vine of clouds snake twist over a blue gray sky. Rain is far off, though moving closer within the halves of minutes. Here at a back stairway any door … More THE NEXT CORNER
A thousand flags in the hands of dancers grace the blue tiled floor in Solomon’s temple lifting together in praise and adulation. Horns strike to up heaven, harps and bells cut sharp the air raising a standard of worship by faith. Drums beat the rhythm of a nation. Voices together offer thanks through … More SOLOMON’S TEMPLE
The flash of late night neon’s offered hope and rescue to sidewalk followers searching out the end of day watching the eyes of those passing. Flatbush Avenue ran the beat of alive never sleeping, holding tight the sounds of city language. Traffic lights measure time, guarding the roads … More FLATBUSH AVENUE
Half sleep gathered me into boughs of night where dreamscapes of waterfalls and colored carnival lights shined onto a blue wall. Careless curtains beckon me to open the window where stars resemble musical notes, blinking out songs. My room capsizes as water rushes in, circling my ankles … More CROSSING BOARDERS
I know the face of 3am. It pulls tight at the bones of my rest, unwrapping the scaffolding of my cellophane sleep, breaking into my room; my eyes open into a dark sea of nothing. 3am is a black star absent of an orbit, a horizon fused into the soup … More 3 AM
Roger Singer 