For Two Newborns

Ring a thousand bells; send out
the paper cranes across each valley,
and let the morning shout.
Rouse the neighbors; light
the signal fires to spread
the news and pull with coffee
every laggard from his bed.
Turn on the television early,
give the anchors all new leads;
set the dogs to barking,
wake the birds up in their trees.
Send out to the music shop
for their very largest drum
and beat a proud tattoo to tell
the world that they have come.

In honor of Rose and Lina

December 30 2009

Ave, Maria

Ave, Maria.
Again you find me here;
again I greet you
with the selfsame wonder
in my heart. Again I feel
how gladly I
my small pretensions give away
to earn your smile. Again
I ask you what you made
of all those things you kept
and pondered in your heart,
and ask you to remember me,
and all the mothers like you
who have borne a sweet beginning
to the world.

December 24 2009

For a Dog Who Is Still Here

The north wind drives him back upon his track
to visit every scent he missed before.
The snow is deep, the ice is black,
and we are many paces from our door,
and I would rather take a different tack
than linger longer here beside the shore.
But he is old, and soon may leave the pack,
so I will stay with him and wait a little more.

January 7 2010

I Remember When We Came Here

I remember when we came here
it was the morning of a spring.
Then there were both snow
and the promise of new flowers
in the scent of damp earth warmed
by an optimistic sun.

They took the birdbath with them,
as I might have known,
and the strawberries forecast
by the agent were not there.
But certain plants did grow
that first time summer came
to see us in our yard,
and every step across the grass
was light with opportunity.

In this opposing season when
the dark is always near,
each patch uncovered by the sun
is radiant with yearning,
and these heady exhalations
quicken welcome memory:
Look, how where the dawn you found
is where you soon may be.

January 21 2010

The Winter Bear

The winter bear reached out one paw
past autumn's end and dealt
a single blow,
cuffing us back to our den.

We cubs were not dismayed
but the lesson was enforced:
Children, you are excited by
this change, this coming joy;
be calm. Your rampant play
will end in tears and enmity.

But like the young we are,
we rashly dared the snow,
in careless gambols threatening
each other and upsetting,
forgetting till we felt the paw
of the winter bear again.

December 21 2009

On a Christmas Pageant Day

They are eating clementines and practicing
riotous, illogical skips; I am in the yard,
cleaning up and noticing
how parenthood is given without regard
to who you are. Later, an angel

skips through the living room
on her way to church. There, in the
awkward dark, surrounded by cameras
and attentive close relations,
I see a heavenly host, none more than
four feet high and each unsure how to
wave her alleluia

while shepherds watch their parents, and behind,
the woman comforting her baby Jesus
is suddenly motherhood personified

and over all is felt perhaps by some at last
the possibility
of a kind and infant king.

December 14 2009

For a Dog Who Has Gone

I had no time to be sad
when she first told me,
but believe me now,
though my emotion is no doubt
entangled with my web
of work and shoulds and wants,
I would gladly pull your ears
and make your eyes disappear
into that chocolate fur,
and throw practically any ball
you wanted me to, if you
would only come sniffing to the door
in search of him, whom I cannot
and would not
tell that you are gone.

December 2 2009

So Recklessly We Spent those Days

So recklessly we spent those days,
blinded in our youth to Eden
we were living in, nor knew a need
to question or to savor. One
with the headlong moment,
friend to our cousin trees and paths,
familiar as a living room and furniture.

And how else should we live?
No other way; each day we greedily consumed
and took its nourishment,
eating the ever-renewing souls
of sunshine and the leaf,
the dirt road and the pond,
growing within ourselves
new landscapes, whose rooted ways
can guide us as they did
back then.

December 1 2009

When You Said Morning

When you said morning on the street today
it sounded so exactly like
what I imagined I remembered
all the farmers to have said,
days in layers,
each preceding year--
in the fraudulent cool of summer mornings
when potatoes can be dug,
in the frank and snapping cold of winter
when the bare ground breaks beneath your numbing feet;
going in and out of odorous hardware stores
where bins of bolts await inspection
and the dry camaraderie drones,
or in the chemical garage where ancient drawers
hold dusty buckets for the children under
shelves of fragrant DDT. When you said morning
I saw postal trucks and gardens, old
canoes and hillsides paved with needles
slippery to the foot and hidden wintergreen
where once we ate and once I mourned,
fallen apples surrounding the trees
and waiting to be gathered up in baskets for the pie,
and brooks whose rusty brown contains both leeches
and the tiniest of fish and are too wide
for one revered old man to step across;
and long before, that morning
racing down the crystal soaking frozen lawn
barefoot coming home from half a world away
across the sharpest of driveway stone
to berries
in a well-remembered bowl;
when you said morning.

November 10 2009

Because It Is This Fragile Moment

Because it is this fragile moment
I will stay.
Her cheek is round against my pillow where
she crept while I was sleeping and

on that curve her lashes tangent lie
an offhand touch of beauty looks
so easy she is breathing
exhalations I can only see and she

does not know I watch and will
not wake her will not
break
this fragile moment.

November 2 2009

This Wind Will Sweep the Branches Clean

This wind will sweep the branches clean of leaves,
and in that hurly-burly I
am something like a tree.
Who does not have leaves to shake?
Would not feel that strenuous comb
pulled through her hair
and shout a-hilltop,
For the winter I am free!
These planetary stirrings are our saving
every season; are the reason
we can make ourselves anew,
keeping what we are
and how we grew,
and sending all the rest to fill the sky.

October 31 2009

Here's to the Young Couple

Here's to the young couple
so foolishly in love,
separate in their churches but
determined in their hearts.
Such simple children, they said; how long
can such a union last? But look:
as if their hearts are amber, still,
long decades and a life along,
past children of their own
and all the accidents and happiness
that we are bound to, see
the couple even now and ever
proof against the end:
twin souls unchanging, young,
and foolishly in love.

In memory of Mary Himelrick

October 22 2009

Meaning Shared

Meaning shared
is meaning multiplied.
Listen to the echoes of your thought
resounding down the avenues of other minds,
transmuting as they travel
till their timbre tolls
ten thousand different tones:
successive inspirations taking flight,
startled into being by this novel light.

October 22 2009

The Dog Is Crooked As He Lies

The dog is crooked as he lies.
His tail is serpentine.
His simple angularity--
nose on paw,
eyes uptilted under hopeful brow,
one leg stretched out on the rug behind
forgotten as an orphaned sock--
speak his artless innocence.
Who would not have
such a being for a friend?

October 22 2009

To Certain Poets, on Their Cryptic Poetry

Through this I see that there is a particular twist in the air--
whose shape these words express
best, though certainly bereft of meaning.
This glossy paraphernalia wily gleams,
suffering much that I could not design--
again, a heart's impulse, recorded in the sound of phrases,
not in what they say. So much we moderns learned;
and to our certain if as yet unfelt regret.

What shouts of homecoming we would cry,
if once our tongues could be unlocked.
It would be like turning around
all at once,
to see the way behind made clear,
all the tortured turnings straightened
and the road before an easy and familiar path at whose end
family and fellowship lie waiting for our song.

Too long have we flown with the daring boy; consider if you will
(or suppress)
your readiness to admit the thought
of walking in a slightly different way,
married to the sound and meaning both,
and the yearning in your floating feet
to touch the earth again.

October 21 2009

Love When

Love when
is only love when
always is the when.

October 12 2009

Poetic dictum

(Overly clever)

A poem should be as long as it is supposed to be.

They Are in the Pictures

They are in the pictures,
unconscious in this happy window
of anything but the day,
and it is my firmest resolution
when next we take them
to remain within. It is better by so much
more than I can tell, to look out from a frame
than in.

October 7 2009

But This Is How We Go On

But this is how we go on
one stone to another,
hoping always that our foot
will find the next and that
there is a next to find.
And beyond that who can say,
except
that if into the stream we do descend,
we know there is a bottom and depend
on water just to wash us,
and not to be our end.

October 7 2009

Falling, They Are Falling

A piece about Autumn.

Falling, they are falling.
I am looking out the red among the green,
knowing they are what interests you.
Suddenly, flying things invest the air,
and I am in an unexpected reef.
Near the surface the schools are practicing departure:
wheel right,
moving float,
vertical shift,
dart left,
return
into the oval formation;
now rest,
and discuss with your neighbors on each branch.
A singleton rockets up before my face;
bottom feeders scour the roads,
mindful only of the harvest till
the subtle signal comes to leave
and they are one,
flying through the falling and
going, they are gone.

October 5 2009 - January 21 2010

Her Hair Is in Happy Disarray

Her hair is in happy disarray,
as are her teeth, which she gladly bares
for the camera to show that precious gap
whose softness she must often touch,
marveling at the newness of a painless loss.
The towel round her shoulders is a cape
whose roughness I can feel,
protecting shivering limbs
that scorn protection in the sun.

Is this a photograph or memory?
Something reaching from the frame
provokes my heart to joy.

October 14 2009

Before They Put the Barriers Up

Before they put the barriers up,
let us go down to the beach again.
You will smell something invisible;
I will think indefinite thoughts.
Down the narrow reach of sand
between the wall and sea,
we each will seek.

September 30 2009

Things of Constant Worth

Things of constant worth are these:
parental diligence
kindness in adversity
remembering to fold laundry
rubbing his old ears each morning
being there
knowing that a puzzle may be refused
continuing to look for God
admiring intelligence only just so much
and grasping loosely in one's open hand
the strings and echoes of this green and vibrant world.

With these you may be present in many hardships and take
no lasting injury.

September 25 2009

These Days Prepare Our Minds

These days prepare our minds for sleep.
By the brightness of the brick
or sunlight's fall on tar,
we are not misled into summer.
Indeed, we read it in the quiet streets
and the subtle chill that hides behind
heat's plausible facade:
The longer days are over;
dress your children warmly,
prepare your home and wait
for winter's celebrations in the dark.

September 16 2009

If the Next One's Mine

Now that we're all soldiers
if the next one's mine
I know you'll understand
why it's okay.

When the blood has been collected
and the money all disbursed,
what's left for us to do but take our battle stations,
in traffic jams and kitchens,
cubicles and cabs,
milking sheds and senior homes,
and classrooms for the young?
Front lines all,
and all across the country all
are drafted to this cause.

And some would even say they're glad,
the way the disused sword is glad
when the armorer finally takes it up
to give it a useful edge;
since now our long futility
at least for now is done:
At last we have a goal,
unwanted but worth dying for;
at last we know our mission.

And even if I am not glad,
if I, like you, had other ends in mind,
there's still a consolation I can find
in knowing that the ultimate goal is served,
as each life strengthens my conviction
that we will prove with justice on the enemy
that war is not the way.

Now that we're all soldiers
if the next one's mine
remember this, with me:
No one dies in vain.

October 12 2001

Labor Day

The last of the produce is coming in;
a laughable crop in all,
consistent with our care and not seriously to be regretted.
A laggard half-green tomato here,
a cucumber swollen with forgetfulness
retrieved from beneath a stiffening leaf,
and the hysterical, half-parched basil,
nervously bursting into flower at the thought
that though we say we prize it
still we do not pick or pinch it back.

Today we are out walking,
harvesting the remnants of the summer;
a few weak sheaves of sunlight,
a precious bit of warmth beneath the breeze
to ease old faithful canine bones.
Ahead we see hurrying on the season
flowing over the bending grass,
like the children running into their future and
outpacing loving us.
If we are wise, we will notice the reddening leaves
disregarded in their flight,
and see in them the early springing into life
of life's next yield,
sweet respite till the spring.

September 9 2009

After All the Murders of the Summer

After all the murders of the summer,
both real and contemplated,
the sharp delineation of the trees,
cut by an unexpected chill whose breath
is redolent of uniforms and welcome wool,
fills us brimtop with anticipation.
It is like hearing when you thought yourself alone
the nearby step of some great giant:
Suddenly, so little time left to teach her
how to ride her bicycle.

August 27 2009

There in the Spirit

There in the spirit walks my daughter, she
unconscious as that her hair is brown,
what atmosphere she cleaves. Her eyes
are on her play, no more, and more
would be much less. Her understanding
here surpasses mine: she and life
are so in love
they know and move together,
near as may be one without
a thought of separation.
Let them not observe me standing here,
dull-witted giant, dimly grasping,
fondly hoping, and earnestly trying to believe.

October 16 2009

Out There Where There Ought to Be

Out there where there ought to be an edge,
the sea and sky are one,
and in that ambiguity floats
the lighthouse pulled from service,
now a lonely, blinded I.

Locate the gulls by their pump-handle cry;
the greys are driftwood on an airy tide.
Whether they float or fly:
Is it important to decide?
From the lighthouse comes
no answer. Its days of definition
are now over.

Swimming and swimming an endless water,
we make for land instinctively.
Dry ground and certain answers are
the signposts and the goals we want to touch.
So much we are, but there is more:
When willingly our faces face the waves,
our souls commit to doubt,
our minds permit confusion and
we gladly turn our backs upon the shore.

December 24 2009

Sorry, can't help it

Realized I can't write stuff without posting it here, even if it means not being able to submit it to one journal. For one thing, I want to push it out to the world too much, and I haven't the patience to wait months for stuff to be rejected. For another, I can't follow a rule like "post stuff you don't think will get published"--I have no idea what constitutes publishable poetry, and anyway I wouldn't want to post stuff I think is second-rate; what kind of message does that send to me or you?

So I hope to publish more here soon; I'll figure out some other way to get to that journal later on.

All the Day

All the day, all the day;
that orange line of shore
beneath the distant, dusted hills;
the airplane clatters over swimming
sideways through the blue.
The hydrant's white, geranium's red,
the angled lines of rooftops, each
float distinct,
brilliant in the summer air as boats
that shimmer on the sea.

August 13 2009

Speak; Tell Me

Speak; tell me
first to whom I am speaking and next
what you are trying to say. Speak;
clarify first these raindrops and this cluttered pool
of light in which I listen and you
speak. Tell me
in which of these particulars you most clearly
speak, and I will listen.

July 25 2009

In case you're wondering

I just discovered that one journal to which I might like to submit poems has a "no prior publication" rule that includes publication in blogs. I'm currently trying to decide whether to cross that publication off my list so that I can continue posting here. Until I figure that out, I'm drafting stuff but not posting it. I may post pieces that I don't intend to submit, but I haven't worked out what the criterion would be for that. Stay tuned.

I Am Listening for God in the Night Wind

I am listening for God in the night wind
as I have listened in the rain.
I am listening to the spaces in between
for a quiet voice like thought to speak,
calmly in my ear,
chiding me with palpable love for doubt,
suggesting in the silent sureness of each word
the fearful power He commands.
Oh, what a conversation that would be, to revel,
in my tiny pride, in the sunlight of His favor,
rocked in solace and heart's ease.
But no apparent answer's in the air,
and I am left to ask myself instead
if He is absent
or I am simply not to know
or if perhaps He speaks the wind and rain.

August 5 2009

We Are Very Far from Magic

We are very far from magic here it seems,
in this neighborhood of asphalt drives
and family dogs, of massive cars
and fear of narrow definitions;
it's unlikely that the spells we thought
were all around us formerly survive.

But some magic that we thought was true was not,
the conceit of youth concerned to turn
the world to its advantage,
and other unsuspected holds--so that, for example,
the mother fox can still trot quickstep down
Turner to her den and waiting kits,
or even drop her possums on a handy lawn
and rest, careless of the owner's gaze;
and lawns themselves can bring forth life,
like the rabbits that we found
before the mower had a chance to pass,
trilling loudly in their nest to keep
intact the gentle tremor of their living charm.

And now I hear the wind
and watch the trees shake out their leaves
in sunlit preparation for the storm,
and remember that I may still tonight
see, past the blackness that engulfs
and joins our separate yards,
two shadows dancing,
empowered by a greater love than sickness can subdue,
briefly, past a window.

August 8 2009

Three Parts Of A Summer Day

Suddenly it is summer,
though not with perfect certainty.
The hurrying winds run up the hill,
ruffle the marsh's uncut fur,
and shingle the slate blue roof of the river.
My dog is grateful for the gifts they bring:
Hail, long-absent rotting scent!

In the yard the children play, creating
incidents we fail to see are memories.
Spinning, they spin the present as it passes
into threads of recollection,
woven as they weave into strong cloth
that they will wear but not wear out.

On such a day, the world appears a puzzle,
and these anxious hands can't put it down.
I could speak of this forever
and never say it more than mildly right.
I'm beginning to think that God is clear understanding,
or perhaps a letting go,
and surely His quiet prompting
by this meaningful day is just
to help me understand that He has told me so.

July 9 2009

When I Told Them Then About You

When I told them then about you
I said the time had finally come
to braid with silk the rough cloth of unhappiness.
How little did I understand the truth of what I said;
but how could I have known the strength
of this great cable that unites us now?

This should be a sculpture, not these words,
for me to show the power in this tensioned line
stretched between our hearts and minds,
alive with strain and snapping strands
but fashioned of such fabric and such steel,
the tendons and the ligatures of daily life
and our twin souls' foundations,
that though calamity can shake
no power known to me
can break this bond.

July 9 2009

Is It That I Asked Too Much?

Is it that I asked too much?
One question more, one plea--
was this what made my case implausible,
forced your hand to make me fall,
away from you and toward the bitter center
of a darkened place?

Why am I here; did you leave me?
Or was it I who led me here
and are you near behind,
wanting me to turn around,
just turn
to see the help you hold
in strong hands?

Be guide to me, I pray. In this a fearful time,
remain. Be my turning post, deep rooted in the ground
for me to turn around
and start back toward the day.

June 19 2009

What Is It That We Know -- FRAGMENT

What is it that we know?
Bedazzled by perceptions I am
caught up in,
still I must remember they are
only guesses:
the man I see in this child's face
may never be.

July 7 2009

On a Sippy Cup Still In Use

Oh in the rush to leave behind
we know we guarantee some loss
that could forever haunt us;
but it is God's most gentle dispensation
to render us new joys,
so that as we speed along,
determined to outpace each aggravation,
our thoughtless feet may always find firm ground,
and happily we careless are
by hidden hands protected.

June 26 2009

It Is a Coming Home With Tears

It is a coming home with tears to see
the broad gladness of the spreading maple leaves,
and down summer's long prospective sidewalk
listen for each memory of warmth and dusty lassitude.

To argue once again the merits of grape lollipops
while propping against our thighs balloon-tired bicycles,
feeling, like the strength of home's foundation,
the pitted shine of handlebars,
or trail like an anxious dog your brother in his competent pursuit
of airplanes wound to double tightness for their flight
or practice golfballs, light like mushrooms
blooming in the morning grass,
or even--thunderous event--
to roll without restraint down the tipping hill
through wild and fragrant grasses till you rest,
upgazing at the vastness of the cloudy, boiling sky so far above--
and suddenly feel reversal,
when you are pinned to the meadow ceiling looking down
at grey immensity all those miles below;

this, this, and all this would be sweet, no doubt.
But they are where we were back then,
and now it's for a different generation to create these memories
and enrich their driving busy days beyond
with sudden, unexpected recollection of
the murmurous intensity
of distant summer afternoons.

May 15 2009

So That When We Were Found

So that when we were found
all blazing in our particular human glory,
it was not after all a tangent to our foretold end
but its unexpected fulfillment,
and we gave thanks
understanding that in this instance as in others
we had lived by grace,
and were on sufferance heaven-bound.

Is it not an old refrain
to see how those like us are saved
without our knowing,
even wanting?
How like a human it always is
to be in spite of everything endowed
with God's dear favor; surely even He is torn
between great laughter and great tears.

May 5 2009

Pebbles on My Desk

Stones that pile, one on another,
and do not move. All their weight potential,
they sit contained,
content in their long lives to wait
for gravity's directive.

Listen to their silence.

April 23 2009

How Careless is the Rain?

How careless is the rain?
Consider the number of perfect circles it expends
on puddles in locations
where no one's eyes will see.
See them with your other eyes;
watch them
quietly,
ceaselessly
expanding.

Give thanks to the reckless rain.

April 26 2009

There is Another Language

There is another language
than the ones we speak. In fact,
it speaks us. We think
we are pronouncing on the world
in should and must and shall and want and wish,
and things we say and do hold sway,
when in fact--and only in the rarest circumstance
do we poor parts of speech glimpse this--
there is another, subtle speaker whose sentences
comprise us
and tell the true, surprising story of our lives.

What word are you in the language of the world?

April 21 2009

Cat's Cradle

And if there were no other time than this,
when strings of disappointing days give way
to nothing but fatigue,
and all our hands' slow rearrangements yield alone
a tiny share of rest in this our cradle,
still
I would follow these half-forgotten steps with you,
all my days
pinching, pulling taut, and trading,
giving, each to the other in return,
this endless, silken pattern of our lives.

April 15 2009

The Ground is Rough Where She Goes

The ground is rough where she goes,
but she goes lightly.
Indeed, it is impossible to see her proceeding
other than at a skip. Surely she is a firefly whose light
enchants me. Each blink shows what looping run
of fancy she's essayed,
and at each dark I wonder in what unexpected place
I'll see her spark again.
Climb the summer night, my own;
never will there be a jar for you.

April 3 2009

Parade -- FRAGMENTS

Notes for a piece on the St. Patrick's Day parade

a horse showing off
the quick, bright flashes
of its street-polished shoes

The parade is a needle,
drawing the community's thread
through the fabric of the street.

motorcyclists,
trying to say something serious with their hogs

Seasons Rhyme

Spring, the baby, cries
and tries to rock its wooden cradle.
Summer and her love, alone,
lie heedless on the hill.
Autumn keeps the kitchen warm,
baking apple pies,
till Winter comes in stamping snow
off his leather boots.

Not sure how old this one is; very, is all I can say.

Things Worth Not Pursuing

Things worth not pursuing include
sleep, inspiration, perfection, and faith--
oh, and dogs and cats.

All these things we want are fugitive
like names, like thoughts, like memories--
like Bo Peep's sheep
they come back home
only when we let them stray.

What else do these things have in common?
Are they all children of our other mind?
(You know the one I mean,
the one that doesn't know about what time it is,
or when you have to get there.
So useless in our waking lives,
so crucial to our dreams.)

Of course, dogs and cats aren't children of
either of our minds,
but fairly clearly they possess
just the one that counts in this discussion.
Perhaps we should ask their opinion.
Maybe they can let us know the secret,
how to chase without pursuing
so that when we let them be,
these things that flee when sought
may come and nose our arms--
moist assurance of devotion--
or place one paw,
so delicately,
a touch at which our hearts leap up,
just briefly on our shoulders.

March 20 2009

Ooh! Ooh! Another one!

Just thought of another item for the list of things you cannot successfully pursue: Faith (religious faith certainly, and presumably all faith).

OK, sleep, inspiration, perfection, faith. What do these things have in common? Possibility: all are in some way non-rational (not irrational, just not in the domain of things influenced by reason). Perfection is a bit of an oddball there, but perhaps still fits if you think of it as a state that is pretty much beyond the ability of reason to produce.

All these things go away if you seek them; if you don't, they may come and tap you on the shoulder. Interesting (assuming this is a valid line of thought).

A Drum in Your Heart

If you have pierced ears,
do you have a drum in your heart?
When you asked me that,
how could I say anything but yes?
Freshly hysterical from your bath,
you probably meant something I was just
too old to understand,
but honestly, I'll miss it more than I can say
the day you stop making
such perfectly reasonable nonsense.

(And yes,
though it's been years since my last earring,
I would venture to say that I still do have
a drum in my heart. It beats for you,
in case you didn't know.)


March 5 2009

Turn Out the Light

Turn out the light;
entrust your soul to God
and wait for night's black caravan
to carry you away.
Who knows what sands you will cross?
The road is long, and always new,
between tonight and morning.

February 26 2009

Poetry and Perfection (and Sleep)

Returning to a theme I brought up briefly a couple of weeks ago, it occurs to me that poetic (or any) inspiration is similar to perfection, in that both are commonly the objects of pursuit. It also occurs to me that pursuit is the wrong approach.

Neither poetry nor perfection is impossible, but going after them is commonly fruitless. In my experience, both are things that come and find you, when you are thinking about or doing something else.

Add another item to this list of things that can only be attained by not reaching for them: Sleep.

However, note that refraining from pursuit is like not thinking about the word rhinoceros for ten seconds. Also, it is valid to pursue excellence, which is something short of perfection.

Sleep, poetry, perfection. Do these things have anything else in common? If so, why? What are some effective techniques for refraining from pursuit, without abandoning one's goal entirely? Discuss.

The Speed of Dark

The speed of light is equaled by
the speed of dark.
Every time you throw a switch
or strike a spark
the night flies out
pursued but never caught
by radiance.

And when you douse a flame,
darkness races to reclaim dominion over space,
exploding from the source to chase
the fast retreating, yet still loyal,
bright and royal lances of the light.

February 26 2009

Clues

This branch says
"I grow straight because
I am strong and clean and true, and here
I split apart because
there was in me a need to be
more and more and more
and more."

This lamppost says
"Do you remember in my arching neck
the horses at the battle of Bouvines and all
the smoke and dust and tumult of the flashing swords?
Or is it just
the dancing lower of a nodding bloom
in springtime I evoke?"

Watch the world and wait
for memory's bell to sound and draw
the shade up on resemblance.
Each brick's a road;
each hue a history.
Every turn of line and angle speaks
of other lives and worlds and spare
necessities. So they teach
and so we learn if with a quiet mind
we feel the bridge's red upon our eyes.

December 9 1999

Office Day

A summer poem.

Amazingly,
it rained.
When oh the floods came down and washed
the landscape of the streets into the river, then
oh then it rained
amazingly.

With what buckets did the sky prepare
to drench the weary wars below?
How laughingly did heaven send
its moist and melting messengers
like armies from the high,
to pacify the low?

While in here we,
so dry it seemed a crime to look outside,
kept working, still
we stole a sideways glance
just now and then
to out there where
the war was all but won.

June 30 1998

Rain

This is a sentimental favorite from MANY years ago. It is "translated" from a string of nonsense words that I pretended were in a real language. I can't remember all of the original, but it began, "San/o we/das remmelt yan..." (a little German creeping in there).

Rain
the flowers
in hair made of water.

Love!
As many as the fingers of my hands
has my heart caressed in vain.

Date unknown

The Year of Mending Things

Is this the year of mending things?
First there was the top,
though that was last year, before Christmas;
but remember how proud I was to give it back its voice?
Since then I've fixed a few more things:
some floors, the world in miniature spinning on a stand,
and portions of a mountain;
and also me--at least in part.

And then of course your foot is on the mend;
though I can't claim credit for that, any more than for
recovery from real catastrophe you watched in disbelief--
but look: even there, at least the wreck is gone,
the hole's filled in,
and lasting hurt is bandaged by the quiet snow.

What else can we fix this year?
Our door, of course--
but hearts undone by loss,
shaky souls
(a nation?),
and all our silent fears?
Too much to hope perhaps,
that now so much has broken we have reached a temporary peace,
where glue and love and energy and care
can now repair the damage of a brutal year--
but we can hope; and that, or so it's said,
is where we start.

February 4, 2009

Holiday

I'm going to take a break from new writing for a while. After some recent focus on poetry, the prey ("poetry" anagram: "to prey") has been kind of reticent--basically, I've been trying to write a "good" poem, which is almost never a good idea--so I need to focus on other things until it comes out of hiding. I might post an old poem or two, just for fun, but don't look for anything new for a while. (I know, that really ruins your day.)

Snow Ghosts--IN PROGRESS

Snow ghosts
sifting down from warming boughs
in powder shrouds,
small echoes of the storm that passed
this way.

This seems somewhat weak on its own; wondering if it might be combined with the "Snow Days" piece from a few days earlier, or some other piece.

Early Spring

A slightly different version of this poem appeared in The Morpo Review in 1995. (I have to admit, this particular view of spring is not the best one to present right now, when you may, depending on your location, have had just about enough of winter.)

Blue sky's an intrusion
when the cloudy dims
and branches softly wave
their welcome to the rain.

Then the sun's a stranger,
and the yellow light
is hard upon the poor old snow
that waits for water cold
to wash it down the drain.

Rain turns all to smoky day;
the grey clouds close my eyes
and turn me
back in memory
to moors unvisited, and that grey rock:
green lichen on the craggy rough.

These tired beginnings
are like sleep:
When seasons change
we want just five more minutes to remain
ourselves
before becoming something new.

July 27, 1995 - January 20, 2009

Any Plant That Grows

Slight, but worth it (I think) for one line.

Any plant that grows,
sometimes,
you just don't want to step on.
God knows, the world has weeds enough (and thyme),
but let's be honest:
There are days
when nothing is accomplished,
and even in a parking lot,
a seedling trying to make it
earns our praise.

June, 2006

Everything Reminds Me Today -- IN PROGRESS

Everything reminds me today
of dreams I can't remember.
These quick and poignant jolts
are disappointing catapults
that throw me when they fling me
nowhere.