Inscription on a Headstone

Born, lived, died,
happy, cried,
kept body and soul together.
Now they're apart;
take heart:
heaven's forever.

Sorry to be morbid; I've just had this jingling around in my head for years as a fun thing to put on a tombstone. (Depends on how you define "fun," of course.)

December 1 2011

Fog Relieves the Distance

Fog relieves the distance of its weight.
Only the near has clear significance.

Close things are the total of your morning;
everything else is just the sleep that you were woken from.

The sun alone can burn away your dreams
and leave their inspiration.

November 28 2011

The Bones

Throw down the sack of rattling bones.
Let it tear;
let the mandibles and fibulas,
tarsals, metatarsals, and patellas,
pelvises and sacrums,
carpals, metacarpals, and phalanges
clatter loud across the black stone floor
that paves this quiet night.

My soul is not an ossuary;
no catacomb's niches here,
stuffed with the skulls of forgotten men.
If anything, it should be a basement swept broom-clean,
occupied only by the necessary furnace of my life
and the tools and toys and seasonal items needed
for a house in working order and capable
of something close to joy.

This is my aspiration, which I will not clench
in a miserly fist, but will release to fall,
to break,
and from the wreck of these old bones
a bird of peace will fly.

November 23 2011

You Will Be With Us

You will be with us into Winter;
you will taste the snow.
Spring will find you quickening with us,
dazed by the wind and sun.
Summer will stretch you out across the boards
momentarily, until the hunt resumes,
and Fall again will waken memories
of old paths scented and forgotten.

You do not need to notice this circle;
your nose is tracking the moment.
But you may be surprised at the ease with which
the stealthy seasons send their changes in
and deliver to you a subtle prey:
Unmasked, this formerly alien place 
will wear, if Sirius is willing,
the unmistakable savor, ready to your jaws, of home.

November 16 2011

Cathedral

Along the path
the chorus of birches strains to the sky
praising the blue in which they mingle,
leafless,
shriven for winter,
offering their very bodies to the sun
that lights them with a holy fire,
white
in their secret cathedral.

November 6 2011

Stacking Rocks

Someone is stacking

                 stones
                   on
                 stones
in this field of stones,

possibly simply to perplex,
or maybe they are minor art,
expressing balance
and implying impermanence.

The dog does not know them,
and I am careful only to
not let his leash upend them.
Soon enough the wind or water will displace,
return them to their scattered homes
in the background uniformity of uniquely rounded rocks.
The significance of these stones is small,
whether spread apart or stacked. In fact,
the only thing that matters is whose hand
has placed them where. A person tells us
"I am here," but the world says only
"Here, I am."

October 31 2011

Another New England Wall

Downward deep these rocks would drive
into darkness if the soil would let them;
but this practical New England ground 
knows what it's doing. Walls would be no use below;
stone and stick, trash and clay, 
and sand must all sustain them. They
are needed here above, not only to delineate
but to remind each walker and each driver by
of what the bones of earth personify:
the weight of patience,
the burden of belief in fortitude,
and like the lichen slowly flowering across their faces, 
the irresistible advance of glacial time's
long journey toward redemption.

October 28 2011

One Dog Happy

One dog happy
is worth as much
as many days of quiet introspection.

October 25 2011

Another Dead Animal Poem

He wants to visit the dead fox,
being drawn upwind by the knowledge of it there.
We are both consistently amazed by it,
each in our own way.
Where is this fox, he asks with his nose.
I wonder if there is meaning in that rigid snarl,
or the way the poor remnant of a body folds
so sharply backward on itself.
Is there anything here for him? Anything for me?
Let his senses tell him now; mine may never say.
We move on; time is short,
and there are many further things in life to smell.

October 24 2011

Clean Laundry

The clothes have been lying in these baskets
far too long,
unfolded,
cluttering,
and making it much more difficult to find
what we should wear tomorrow
or today.
I cannot, would not simply stuff it into drawers,
and there are choices to be made--
whose clothes are whose?--
and it takes work.
At least it's clean, but laundry never stops,
so there is in fact some urgency:
Don't let the next load make a mountain
that might fall or overwhelm you.
You do the best you can;
it's not ideal, but I'm afraid
that this must wait here on display,
reminding me to find the time and will
to put it all away, each item in its proper place
and neatly folded.

October 22 2011

About Dog Hills

What is it about hills
that makes you want to climb so fast?
You know that's not my speed, but still
I'm thankful for the leash
that keeps you with me, and that lends
me some of your young energy
to help me climb the hill.

October 22 2011

Family Outing

Up the autumn hillside
sunstruck in the wind
he glows
a rangy pup
whiter than the rushing clouds
or the sandy trail below.
Their voices high discuss
imaginary worlds
while she, behind,
is watchful,
guardian of their happiness
and wellspring deep of mine.

October 15 2011

Before the Clocks Change

Up the road
a fall of yellow leaves
stands in for a streetlight's glow,
momentarily misleading me
into more than actual darkness.
I know it is coming soon,
after one last temporary reprieve;
then the actual streetlight will stand in
for yellow leaves in daylight.

October 13 2011

Dream 3D

Thought I'd try converting this poem to 3D. You need red/green glasses to view it.

Dream

Found this oddity from a while ago and thought I actually still liked it, so here it is.

so bright all we reached for
our hands        up          skyfullsparkling of
balloons and joyful sounds bubbling
              talking changes         and all then
we were running and the sand
                      underfoot and is wet
and shining
                          
                            dew

Bad Day Limerick

There are times when the goal of the day
is to get from point A to point A
(where point A is the bed
where you lay down your head)
without screwing things up on the way.

September 25 2011

The Proving Grounds

God smiled on you in the proving grounds,
an interval of sunlight
in a morning of heavy cloud.
I drove away soon after,
leaving you with the upset dog
while I looked for missing answers up the highway.
Saint Christopher and Saint Anthony went with me,
one to help me on my way
and one to help me find.
Given the forecast, I knew we could not hope to see God again
for at least a day or so,
but while I knew that we were heading into rain
I was happy you had seen Him
once
before the downpours came.

September 23 2011

This Day a Blessing

Let me count this day a blessing. Let me count
these two, this she, and he who barks
as messengers, sent by who
is that he is, to prove the more than is apparent, indeed
a wonderful abundance shot with changing light,
reverberant with echoes of a higher music whose
melody rings and lyrics sing a glad and great recounting
in harmony--whose perfect grace is only faintly glimpsed
in its complexity--of this my life,
my heart, my world,
my blessing.

September 20 2011

Summer Hunting

Swallows, dragonflies,
flock and swarm in blue. Summer
hunting fills the sky.

September 17 2011

A Foregone Green Conclusion

Counter-programming: Found this poem about Spring and Summer, thought the verge of Fall was as good a time as any to post it.

Suddenly I can't see through the trees.
There's a density to Summer 
that this cold Spring day presages:
abundance blocks the view.
Winter's density's a different thing
of snowpack and of blizzards
and deeply layered cold, 
beneath which slowly beats a torpid heart.
This resolution season,
anti to the Fall's slow dissolution,
was slow to yield--its buds were grudging,
stuck in burgeoning--but time, dark master, has arranged
its willy-nilly blossom to profusion,
and from here on out the foliage is just
a foregone green conclusion.

September 17 2011

The Day's Well Left

The day's well left to lie in pieces:
shadows
yellow lines along the road
and trees;
a puzzle needing none of my solutions.
God of evening, 
carry me gently forward into sleep.

September 9 2011

Before Irene

At one time I would have welcomed this rain.
Something about catharsis from the sky
seemed to promise a matching resolution in my soul.
But what is the cost in plywood of a hurricane?
And am I willing to pay the price
of a boy beneath a fallen tree
or a mother swept away, calling,
"Take care of the children,"
to a helpless husband left behind,
for a half dozen ticks of a clock that talk
of a purely temporary peace?
Rain's redemption, where it falls,
is balanced by its damages,
and is for the ground it falls on, not for me.
Shiva, make me ever mindful 
of the meaning of these storms;
grant new life and hope to this weeping world
and lay your destroyer's hand upon
the inner landscape I must renew.
Bring your cleansing force to me here inside,
and let me feel the beauty of your lightning and rainfall
in my heart's interior.

August 31 2011

As Though Gibraltar

As though Gibraltar came shouldering roughly up
out of the boisterous sea, making a strait for Hercules
and turning unsuspecting beach to inland Spain,
and I, an ignorant Barbary Macaque, 
went scrambling over that unimagined immensity
still draining ocean from its rocky face,
as though it were already ancient home to me;
this is how we should make our lives' foundation,
so that when our fortunes fail
the ponderous bulk of all that world 
will come roaring up from under, 
thundering loudly of its strength 
and heaving granite cliffs into the sun
for us to groom each others' fur on.

August 17 2011

The Way We Speak To God

The way we speak to God,
in structures built on sand,
in private bedrooms, quiet with no light
and only a yearning lonely ear,
in helpless sorrow, helpless rage,
in contemplation of our age,
in pulling roots and planting seed,
in seeking what we need,
in endless telling and enacting our infirmities;
the way we speak to God,
as when we rescue all the fallen,
regret the left behind,
disdain the claims of others,
undo honor on a screen,
think too late of what is seen
by others, cherish mothers,
show mercy, commit our crimes and hearts,
or practice thoughtlessness:

These acts of ours are loud
but even if they whispered would be heard.
Pray, by all means pray,
if prayer answers well;
but as you stand considering the landscape of each day, 
observe, 
admit, 
embrace 
the way each aspect of us shouts to heaven high, 
and marvel, and remember: most of all,
the way we speak to God 
is accidental.

August 8 2011

Swiss Army Knife

Oh to be
a little while
a Swiss Army knife
folded up
and resting quietly
in someone else's pocket.

August 6 2011