ALL RESPONSES |
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Rattlled magpies
fled like amatuers,
ravens screamed
they weren’t wanted.
In the seconds
it takes to breath,
thirteen random people
were awarded large
concrete markers
at a place they never
played as children.
Down below,
angels entered the cold
Mississippi waters,
laying their hands lightly
on strangers’ shoulders,
whispering promises.
And the rest of us watched
an underworld beneath
a blue open sky. |
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Flattened infrastructure, twisted steel below,
the building blocks of commerce.
Living each day, unaware of our connections,
the building blocks of fate.
We traveled slowly, rolling forward at a crawl,
someday there will be questions.
Not knowing when, or who, or why,
someday there will need to be answers.
We love what it stood for, and what it stands for now,
an iconic thoroughfare, and the unity and courage of a state.
The pieces will leave and we will put ourselves together again,
move on, live again, but never forgetting.
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God looks down and sighs
as dust covers the scene
and waters make way for
the weight of the city’s despair
Repair stands stunned off in the distance
as Robin Trower plays his Stratocaster
and Hendrix chimes in from the heavens above
providing a bridge back for those who morn.
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strangely i’ve never
been able to write
about tragedy
until the momentum
is long over
perhaps it’s the media
hype
& the feeling
that it’s all overdone
everyone is talking about
how lucky we are
that more lives
weren’t lost
but....
for families
who’ve lost loved ones
or still have no word
this is huge for them
like the man
who has not heard
from his wife
who had their
tiny baby with her
this kind of thing
happens on the
west coast
the east coast
down south
anywhere but
here in minnesota
we don’t have earthquakes
but if anything
this should teach us
tragedy can happen
anywhere
anytime
at the beginning
of every day
tell your children
& your spouse
you love them
you may never see
them again
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bridge goes down
wednesday august 1 2007
once
we sang certainties
connected dots
diagrammed our days
held ourselves accountable
straight ahead
no looking face to face
now dots become a broken line
hither and yon held
in parentheses
so much confirmed missing
we see ourselves mirrored
in faces below
the river fragments our sentences
shapes our search for first words
we grieve the lost
while yearning new trails
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6:15 on Silver Lake Road
I drive, like any other day.
“Bridge down, Minneapolis”
the radios says.
I nearly stop—dead in the road—
Did everyone make it home?
And here we are today,
known to the world
for something uexplainable
reasons unattainable.
We wait.
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I want to tell you a simple story.
This morning, under the sprinkler
spray which swishes the evergreen
every ten seconds, a goldfinch
took a shower on this hot muggy day.
And if delight is hopping
from branch to branch, side
to side, showering to stay
cool, her time in the tree was all
outbursts of delight. The tree
sparkled, too, with droplets
like dew. The bird flew away
first; two droplets remained,
glistening for about ten minutes, then
they, too, were gone. This happened
on a day not as muggy as August first,
in a yard not far from the river,
and seen by a woman who used
the bridge that collapsed but didn’t
drive over it the day it fell. And now
she watches with renewed fascination
scenes in her back yard and collects
whatever joy she can when it is present.
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The phone first rang at 6:15,
a friend wondering if Kate was rowing
if she was in her boat under the bridge.
I thought of my fellow teammates,
heading to a game in Maplewood
the one I skipped to have dinner with Kate
Knowing it was the time
I would have crossed the bridge--
Heather had, minutes before,
Kim and Kelly plummeted in their car, called
from the bridge, now in the river, both of them
wet and covered with glass, but unharmed.
Roadways buckle, connections snap
metal twists, glass shatters
Lives too, in a moment.
We stood on Kate’s porch,
sweating glasses of wine in our hands,
watching as somewhere north of us rain fell.
The sound of sirens broke the air, as the sky
turned yellow and still. When the sirens stopped,
we could hear our own hearts beating.
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I walked along a Roman road Along a Roman wall
Built to keep Allemanni out Two thousand years ago
Bridges bringing legions Burned when they fled
But ruins remained, inscribed With bold, straight letters
Imperial proclamations cut In everlasting stone
Announcing completion of Another marvel of Rome
Stood for one thousand years Until pillage and weather
Finally began to wear down Fine marble and mortar
Leaving a few wise words And some stray languages
In the cool outer provinces Spoken by savages.
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I called Jane, my sister
with different parents, Wednesday night
You and yours okay, not on the bridge?
Yes, we’re fine
she said but didn’t say that one
of hers was not fine
And I called my others
my mother and in-laws and brother
not knowing Jane’s mother died
Not on the bridge
in the hospital
lung cancer
no one on the shore to pull her out
I didn’t tell Jane that my life’s
cut in half not by the bridge but
by my new class glasses
that I still look for futile rescue
We talked instead about the bridge collective
grief made a list of those we know
are safe
hoping secretly we won't go missing
And we sang, me and my sister with different parents
so we don’t have to grieve alone
Every little river must flow down to the sea
I don’t want you to weep after me.
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what words are there
for things like this
the fog rises up,
we blow another kiss
place coins on our eyes
that once were flipped
into the air with
a flick of the thumb
forged metal against
tender nail hum
rising,
turning,
stretching
the rays
taut and
slightly fetching
before
falling,
stomach failing
we find ourselves
lost in places
we find ourselves
trapped in spaces
we find ourselves
slipping weightless. |
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Don’t write about what’s going on.
Politicians and liars, greed and desires
they’re always going on.
Leave them outside the poem.
Don’t describe your green-eyed summer
pond or the winter sea’s red tide.
Don’t write about war,
what you are against or for,
it’s the same damn war.
Don’t talk about language,
Don’t talk about loss.
Don’t say truth or beauty
or your grandmother’s bones.
No one really cares
how your soldier brother
came home alive but dead.
Whisper nothing of the river
glittering beneath the arch
nothing of moths, their flutter arcs
or the bridge-how we watched it fall.
Don’t write at all.
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Adam plucked the apple from the branch
and tasted the sweet juice of choice.
He took his family and crossed the river
dark with the memory of places upstream.
The water curled like smoke, speaking in tongues
as it stole pieces of stone, pocketing them out to sea.
Adam learned sorrow only by exodus
and taught it to his sons.
He mourned the loss of Eden,
leaving its reality to myth.
Sometimes, it all comes down to this:
if you have a bird-in-hand-worth-two-in-the bush
do you instead choose to follow your heart?
Because all roads eventually lead to Rome
and the road not taken makes all the difference.
You took the job downtown Minneapolis
because it paid well and supported your family.
There were three routes available:
all cross the blind river, dark with murk,
all roads lead to more money
and untold life-choices available with more money.
You didn’t take your normal route home,
opting for the one you thought fastest,
given traffic, road construction,
and your stomach’s waking hunger.
But the bridge collapsed your dreams.
Then your other two alternative-destinies
became like stones drying in the sun
carved out of a low river, looming giants on land
waiting to become mountain.
But instead, you chose an odd route home,
the one where the river was high,
flowing fast over stones
covering them with waves
that sank them to muddy bottom
where they lie buried to aging light
awaiting rescue
from a wild running river.
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I’d been over it earlier that day
and had some lunch downtown.
In the evening I took a different way,
side streets through Dinkeytown.
Just a little drive. Michael and I
Having our beer, about a half mile away.
We heard nothing, walked over the 10th St. bridge
saw the road ramping down into nothing but debris
and then the river, which will take us all away
in the end of course, after a little drive—
just crossing over on a bright summer’s day
to some place where we won’t arrive. |
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I cannot write a poem about something so deep—
how it opened a murky mouth to speak
stealing lives in many forms
in ways uknown
to those who still breathe.
How do I write this poem, paint words with color:
the child’s pink dress
the waiting date
the dad, the mother—questions that swirl around fate?
How do I bring back the creak, the human shrieks?
August heat.
I cannot write a poem about something this deep,
the broken pieces, life's debris;
I wish I could write you their poem.
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When I spill red wine on myself,
it reminds me of southern France,
and the vineyard by the Ardeche where we slept.
The Rhône was more than a river,
it was time, and our VW bus
was the key to paradise.
First, get away from the cities
with their art museums and hospitals.
Your tavern will be an orchard,
within sight of of the vines
whence comes the wine you imbibe.
There is no surreal quality to life here;
this is as it should be.
Yet, something seems wrong,
without the noise and the stress.
A walk to the nearest village
for bread, sausage and cheese
occurs slowly, an occasional bonjour
wakes the sleepwalking traveller
into decision: baguette.
People on the narrow winding streets
know you are foreign, but so what?
In a minute, you will be gone.
Still, even in the tiniest of towns,
there is a tavern with a view,
where the food is served in soft sunlight
with water and wine.
Garlic is great, garlic is good,
salt and herbs bake well togather.
The second bottle of vin rouge,
mixed with oxygen and photons, glows inside.
The others shine too, their smiles real,
fixed in fresco for millenia.
Pretend you’re Picasso,
sketching caricatures on napkins,
in hopes they will pay the bill,
an anecdotal event to be swapped
between waitstaff for years.
Maybe it is best to sit by the river
under the shade of the trees,
digging your heels in the pebbles and sand,
with the jug of rosé you purchased that morning.
Reflections of clouds and rocky juniper bluffs
in running water will remain
longer than the best sauce,
as the river returns as metaphor,
and garlic wakes you from idyll images.
I know, because I’m not there, but I was.
Every shallow summer stream runs in me,
a million suns moving between mountains,
the coolness of the medium a bath for sunburnt mind.
Is it over? Never. This second is forever.
Too much to write, and so much time.
The lyrics of our favorite songs
float behind our eyes in a muddy pool.
Things we never think about become language,
while the analyzed sinks in a deep well,
work for the thirsty.
Cats are smart, birds artists,
and athletic vines climb rotting fences.
What matters, what is, sleeps concealed
in full view, camouflaged by perception.
Seeing is not believing.
Feeling is remembering,
and God’s lonely eye tells us
it may already be too late.
So, enjoy. Drink, sleep, think, dream.
It won’t happen until you give up. |
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free falling
in disbelief
from the grace
bestowed by two (misspent) centuries
of unrivaled opportunity
into an abyss
of unknown and dreaded
dimension
committed only
to market principle:
ever more
for ever less
The American Way:
where consumers barter tax dollars
that cut into personal fortune
only for personal value returned;
investing not
in America’s far removed future
or repaying its bounty of opportunities past
ever more for ever less
we draw the luckiest of
the Third World’s unwanted refugees
from south of the Border
south of the equator
from across the globe
in Africa and India
here to share
the American conceit
Someday, perhaps, to serve
as survival guides
in an uninspired future
that awaits our waking
as structures fall
systems fail
trust is defiled
promises broken
in a lengthening list:
WMD
New Orleans
Social Security and corporate pensions
falling bridges
leaving us a nation
of unsettled children
chasing after toys
to soothe and comfort
while a sinking nation
cries out
to be rebuilt
before dawn’s light
reveals an oddly familiar
but desolate landscape. |
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Steel gives way to air as concrete
and water mingled with glass, rubber,
gasoline; my empire became river-borne
debris and then it was the river Styx
I led them across. My final burbling advice:
In the end, realize we are machines
built for defying gravity as long as we can,
systems to deny entropic decay. Vigilant,
weary, high-wire walkers designed
to carry ourselves as far as the grave
and no farther.
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Ode to Death
There is a human beauty
in the eerie silence after
a death. Not what you’d
expect in a grief too big
for the heart to hold.
The silence is where
an entire universe in a soul
has perished. He can’t come
home again. Except when our
arms are unfolded to the
wind, only when we are
carried beyond destruction
to prayer. Bowed to our knees
we either wake up or lose it all.
No reckoning as fast as
sudden death, no memory harder
to bear. But surely as the sun
hits the rim of the world again
in this world or in the next,
the river moves on, the open
sea beckons.
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what do we do?
no heroics
will make the natural
or the man-made world
one bolt safer surer
than on the day
it fails us in a second
what do we do?
gasp open the door
of a school bus
not sure if solid
stuff will hold
but because it seems
the only chance
and better than dropping
drowned into the river
what do we do?
shake our brains and
grasp another hand
what to do
limps beside you
on television worldwide
they don't ask
what they should do
they just keep rolling along
a thousand cell phones
punch nine one one
then home
then lose the signal
police and fire
don't ask they all
come running screeching
to change the picture
even if they're downstream
by a mile
perhaps we turn
Gold Medal park into
a henge an outdoor theatre
old man Ganges
on the upper Mississippi
to wash away the traffic
in our heads
hammer flatcars into
Viking ships and send
the perished down
to New Orleans.
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for that older woman
who once rocked
someone else’s cradle,
adopting two girls
from South America
i imagine her with slippered feet,
humming a simple tune
in a foreign language
she paid her dues, served
her time as mother
she’s now ready to move
to a different vessel
on a shady shore
the water foams, the water
churns, as she paddles
her craft upstream, water
parting in a new wake
people waving & crying
from a collapsed bridge |
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bottom of the incline
all the water
is rushing down
from above
I want to say something
significant, but don’t
know where it is.
silver hope shimmers
from the upper reaches
of my vaulted heart
I get tired,
the water washes
me down,
holds me down
against the bottom,
and I become accustomed
to this new place, idle,
where the eddies
cannot get me,
where the bubbles
slowly and gently
issue forth from nostrils
and lips
no air.
no fins.
no gills.
just mouth
just nose.
I drink to fill my stomach
I drink to quench thirsty
deep pocketed lungs,
(&)
exhale water into water.
exhale memory from mind. |
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The rain fell first in small drops
then bigger ones as to demand our attention.
Our eyes stared at the road ahead of us
while our voices remained silent
at the sound of the radio announcer
and the news of you.
Our throats ached dry,
while our eyes widened
by the words we were hearing,
showed how lost we felt.
"The 35 W bridge is down...
many cars fell into the river...
unknown number of wounded and victims..."
The words rolled down our consciousness
like Novocain, numbing us,
making us stare
through the tears-like drops of rain.
"We drove on it this week..." Is my thought
One shared by the others too.
No one can say why
it had to be you and not us,
why today and not two days ago,
but the common feeling in our car
was of sadness for the lost ones
and of guilt for having survived
the bridge of 35W.
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too many voices
simply gasped
and then turned away saying
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Moment
-August 2, 2007, Minneapolis
I am thinking of love again,
and the fallen bodies
buried deep between waves,
and the winter white icing
on oatmeal cookies left in the passenger
seat, the notion of more desserts,
support, the burning bush, prayer,
the moving train beneath,
the hiding place, moonless sundown,
water’s phosphorescence,
the twenty dollar bill under a shoe, the breaking sound,
all that speed, the cool river,
heat of a hand, every unneeded
answer, a wing through a window,
a dry leaf crackle, and the broken
bridge, the cars, the wreck
we never suspected, and the list
of things to do, and love
yet undone.
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