Inhumanity to Flora

The cruelest vegetable torture:
hanging baskets on a covered porch
in summer
inches from the rain.

July 10 2010

How

How people die, and are reborn;
how we meditate
and mediate
and eat.
How we hunger.
How everyone needs a bed.
How the inexpressible demands to be said.
How daylight becomes despair
and seasons of wanting become a life of loss
and how we pray and hear nothing
and gain a momentary strength
and fall
and still remain. How we spin
each in our planetary orbit
and transmit signals to each other
of reassurance and of hate, and still
keep circling our common sun.
How small our data,
how great our wish for more,
how comforting belief,
how hardly gained. How plain
our passage to delight and pain,
and how
little can or must be
ever said.

July 14 2010

The Hillside Is No Longer Mowed

The hillside is no longer mowed;
I remember when it was closely clipped.
Meticulous, he roamed the lawn,
his only apparent task
day by day and day.

Now I see the flowers and the grass
nodding down the shaded slope
and wonder if their quiet growth
declares a faithful reaper
has gone home.

July 12 2010

Private Lightning

Private lightning,
beyond the blackened cutouts of houses and their trees,
illicit magic in the independent sky;
and you, still possibly awake
but maybe finally near sleep across my knees,
must catch no inkling from my surreptitious gaze
that what you hoped to see is blooming bright
outside your bedroom window.

July 4 2010

The Weight of Water

The weight of water
bows the branches
dragged down by their leaves
they make a dark and misted tunnel
one good squeeze
as from a chimp's great hand
would relieve them of their burden
and springing back
they would let the droplets fly
back to heaven
and the sky
might give some back to me.

June 17 2010

Everything You Hear You Sing

Everything you hear you sing;
is that not high praise? Who would not
make music of reality?
True, you sometimes find quite different notes
from those you seek, but I have heard
that errors open up new paths
new songs
new life. Take this from me:
Practice always as you go; enjoy,
or do not do; and claim as your most precious right
that you may sing
and fail
and sing again.

June 11 2010

The Wind Blew In

The wind blew in like glory
and the trees put down their hands
and the children in the yard
were at a loss
so we went shopping.
There in the aisles we had no knowledge of
the deal that was made in the atmosphere
for the storm to pass us by
and when we wheeled our carts outside
the sky looked still to us
like expectation.

June 9 2010

Remember the Running Giraffe

Remember the running giraffe you saw and knew
that God was real? Remember
its rocking stride, that catenary neck
whose arc flexed gracefully
with each silent step? Remember
the impossible sunlight and
the endless grass relieved by thorny trees
before commanding cloud and distant
darkened curtains of the blessing rain?

To that waking day when you were born
my thoughts are tied; now, when shelter takes priority
and blows repeat, and even dying seems distinct,
I yearn to call, and in your hearing ear
repeat this question:
Do you remember your African God,
and have you lately asked His aid?
Even here in cages you may find,
in long-lashed eyes above,
that He remembers you.

May 26 2010

We Find Ourselves Here

We find ourselves here in the middle course,
and sometimes we would ask no more
than to be given to the margin
where a clear and certain boundary sets
a limit on the world.
But these banks are passed by active lives;
they are sticking points, used and useful
just for rest and to contain and shape
the roiling flow at either side.
Push off joyfully or with regret:
Our path must be to complicate,
accept the ceaseless milling of the stream:
not birth, not death; not great, not small;
nor good, nor bad, nor black, nor white--
living happens only in between.

May 19 2010

I Found Your Wishes

I found your wishes on the floor:
notes to hope, which we were never meant to see.
I read them, I admit,
your fears and fleeting aspirations,
with accepted guilt, as parents do.
But though you let them fall, I knew
they still were secret,
so put them back where they belong,
beneath your dreaming pillow;
and this I'll tuck beneath my own,
that you, my dearest wish,
will likewise stay
till you come true.

May 19 2010

A First Communion Day

Rain that falls on a First Communion day
reminds us of their christening.
These puddles that we splash through
on our way to get the cake
might be baptismal fonts
for other kinds of children.
The trees like verdant sponges overhang
the street, dark with promise
and heavy with this water,
ready to bless our unsuspecting SUVs
if a godly wind so moves them;
and now we remember the waking dawn,
how the rain knocked on our windows and
thunder like a voice reminded us
that it was time to rise.

May 8 2010

I'll Show You the End Of the Ocean

I'll show you the end of the ocean, you said,
but not to me. I'm too old to see
where the waves come from; too old to willingly
suspend my disbelief,
crawl under the blanket archway
of your realm and sail
across the wooden sea on hands and knees
grown painful with my weight and age,
too busy ironing
the wrinkles out of life for you,
too near the end to take the time grown precious
from my busy days whose minutes shrink
proportionately to the sum of years
whose corridor rings with echoes that will keep
my ears from hearing what you offer
to your sister, or
so you possibly may think.

May 4 2010

God Willing, I Will Spend Today

God willing, I will spend today
not trying to reach conclusions.
Its riches all around me lie,
in need of no decision.
Three cardinals that flit across the street
into the trees
are self-sufficient;
the blossoms and the branches
don't require me.
My God is more a hoped-for God
than present,
but if he is and wills,
I will wait upon this day
to show me in its way
how to be,
and with this I will be
and be content.

April 24 2010

Oh If I Could Give You That Ungainly Gift

Oh if I could give you that ungainly gift
what useful answers might spill out
as you tried your best to carefully unpack
its richness. Look, oh
you lost one. Never mind;
one secret I can tell is that
there is always more to discover and
the box is never empty.

April 25 2010

Sleep a Little Longer

Is this quite what you expected?
We can talk sometime about the dreams
you had, there in the pulsing dark
where you first learned
a silent song of movement
and your mother's heart.
For now, you must adjust
to vision and the rush of moments
that you waited for not knowing
that you waited. If
it's all a bit too much,
take comfort in her touch
and sleep a little longer, child,
upon her breast;
The world will wait for you.

April 22 2010

Welcome to Lillian Persson

Worry Stone

The world gave me this worry stone
ready polished and fitted to my hand,
long ago, like an unfamiliar uncle
folding my fingers gently over it
and patting them,
whispering confidentially,
"Keep this; you may need it."
Polite if callow nephew,
I did not say what I believed,
that worry stones have never worked for me,
but kept instead the stone inside my pocket
like a promise; and in truth
its easy weight
and light-veined surface in the dark
have comforted my hand.

April 21 2010

An Almond Moon

An almond moon is in the sky.
Down here, a certain weariness pervades;
a sadness of the soul that sits in judgment on
a day it is good to just be past.
It left a quotient of despair,
arrived at by division of the world
into myself and all the rest.
What is that cruel divisor,
and whose the hand that set the sum?
Is it a subtle test by an examiner
to check my understanding?
If true, I'll take the failing grade
in trade for sleep--and that, above,
small benediction whose impassive face
is in this tedious circumstance
an unexpected, insufficient, but
still welcome grace.

April 12 2010

Once I Knew the Branches of a Tree

Once I knew the branches of a tree
as she does.
Once I knew the better hold for my left hand
than that one;
knew the place where my right foot would fit
and lift me to the seat of limbs,
a living cage commanding earth and sky,
and felt no wonder that I knew.
That is home: to understand the where and how
and why, each detail,
and never need to question.

April 5 2010

Let's Talk About Souls

Let's talk about souls being incorruptible.
Let's consider for a moment what that means.
Do you understand that there may be a party
at any moment in heaven to welcome
the newest member of that band?
There is not time for solemnity
in the face of such radiant joy;
all that is lacking is your joining in
to sing and shout and laugh
as she comes trucking in.
Play your bugle, old Gabriel.
Play your harps, you hangers-on.
Keep your rhythm, try your best to keep up:
An angel of laughter and friendship
has finally come home.

April 5 2010

For Sue Spratt

Steps for a Successful Spring

Brush the red across the trees
lightly as a veil.
Blot with yellow the forsythia
and let the ducks in puddles play--
but send away the ungracious rain
and give the birds instruction in their song,
to make their welcome bright and sure
to capture fickle Spring.

April 2 2010

They Wasted No Time

They wasted no time in making it look like summer out here.
Like the hardy crocuses,
their plastic golf clubs multiply,
and with sidewalk chalk
they made new colors bloom
on surfaces that lately lay in snow.

The new moon holds a promise in its cup
that as the dusk proceeds
reveals itself to be of Earth.
Gazing, I am stupefied,
as the smoke from Spring's first offering
rises toward the sky.

March 19 2010

As Morning's Dark Alarm Required

As morning's dark alarm required
I used to rise,
put on my old dysfunctions,
and walk him down the street.

His pattering claws ticktapped in counterpoint
to the squeaking of one shoe.
I considered the closing of my eyes to be
a safe alternative to wakefulness:
Surely my young dog would lead me
where I had to go.

Now, when shadows overlay
each other and the street,
and rolling, down the hill,
the ocean utters in the dark
a highway's thunder,
quiet but unending,
I remember in my bed.

What separates our past from now?
How far do we ever overstride
our disabilities? Those treasured steps
that brought us here can be retraced
without our knowing,
till once again we find that we walk blindly,
wearing what we thought we left behind.

Let us in our separate hearts
each thank and prize these weary days we travel,
for the teaching they provide us
and the distance they divide us
from the less we used to be.

March 17 2010

There Is Something I Forgot To Tell You

There is something I forgot to tell you,
and I would not have had you leave
until I said it;
but since with your accustomed practicality
you have stolen this last march,
I'll say it here and trust that you'll receive it.

Never, by the way,
was there a man who spoke so constantly as you
no more than was needed; a man
who once stood on a Pacific shore,
immaculate in tans,
and greeted his own sweating brother
in the war, with what I hear
was a fine reserve (gilded, I imagine, by
an eloquent, ironic silence,
and of course that smile--you know the one I mean--
that hints at so much more that could be said,
if only it were not
so needless).

But now you see me at a loss:
Of much you taught, I learned your silence least
yet loved it possibly the best;
and I should honor you today
with quiet, not these words.
At least I can stand mute,
as sorrow certainly desires--
and you, I think,
already know
what I forgot to say.

March 18 2010

In memory of Pearson Stewart

I See Her Running into Happiness

I see her running into happiness.
Let, if it is not too much to ask, her golden hair entrain
each of these my doubts and misperceptions and,
drawing their dark threads from where I stand
here on the beach, pull them into nothingness
without her even knowing as she goes.

Certainly this is more
than one should ask a child,
but you know it is also right to look
for aid and to admit
the limits of our powers. Here,
on sand that sinks beneath her toes,
I see a saving force whose grace
is surely, if there's any in this world,
from God, whose strength is limitless
and lends itself with no restraint
so she may run,
and take me with her.

March 4 2010

We Start at Random

We start at random because
there is no better place.
The first marks that we scratch
upon the world are bold
or tentative, but lacking any grace.
Only as we grow do we acquire
the knowledge of what works and what
can safely be consigned to fire.

March 1 2010