ALL RESPONSES |
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I went into your room to check for intruders,
an unmeditated act from years ago,
when you were in the woods and I was here by
myself
and then paused,
looking for the children in their room
across the yard,
at the fireworks popping echoes over the park
all the way downtown.
I thought, what if I curled by your window, so low to the ground
and watched until they were finished,
but I’m not like that.
I did the dishes instead
and the fireworks went on
that heavy small reverberation
and the cats remembered storms
and ran for cover
and I smelled the smoke as it drifted
away from the river and through the screen
and the soapy water slid over my hands
ran to my elbows and dripped onto
the floor.
I take off my clothes to see myself as you look at me
I have never been able to join
the shape in the mirror with the one that I breathe
from,
but I think of your body
when you are far from me
and cannot separate it from mine.
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These words
were once
sentences
and letters,
until they fell
into a pile
on this page.
Now they look
much better,
because
of the way
they were made. |
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Gravity settles the glitter left from last night.
I could almost say that we connected-
-The daily reminder is that you are no longer mine,
no matter the transparency of our hands when they touch;
no matter the intensity when our eyes create circles of rock
eroded by our loss for words.
I cannot wait for you to find me
a fantasy ghost of traveling hope
alone on this island-
I pour the foundation.
Only I can pave my pathway,
the one I step alone; way out on the sea
away from his ropes.
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In the humid hour of a summer evening
the aroma melts me, dripping
memory into the kitchen,
shedding itself on my counter.
The onion's first breath is at the slice.
I am my mother:
I rinse under cool water,
I peel the protective layer,
I let it sizzle on the stove-
just for the sound.
The comfort of the chore is that
it's all been done before-
she rattled pans in the cupboard,
she cut the onion and
warned me of its sacred smell. |
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A baby
clean and
tender
will wish
at eighty
you’d saved
the bathwater
too
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There is silence –
Until you hear my voice.
My voice!
Diamonds! Darkness!
Until you hear: MY VOICE!
Starlight! Moons! Amber embers!
Falling water! Depth! My voice!
A shade of blue you hear,
and want to scream back:
Rage - Red Radishes!
Say love: It becomes scarlet, silk, savage.
Say sun: It becomes plump, polished, polite
I say nothing – and it becomes something.
When I say full, it’s hollow.
I say make, and it’s done.
My voice!
Clear – troubled, rough, bent
spent, broken, taken,
stoic, mosaic, traumatic,
protracted, distracted, distant!
My voice! |
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The kingdom, over-run with poets, faced
a crisis. Come night they would fill the streets,
their iambs and dactyls flooding gutters,
drunken rhymes enchanting apple-cheeked
maidens from safe sleep to unseemly unions.
None were safe, none were safe.
Some mornings the walls ran thick with
inky verse, the human condition laid bare
for all to see, and the villagers gathered to read
and weep at the beauty and truth of noble balladry.
Oh, the kingdom called out for a savior.
Do not feed the poets, the king proposed.
They lower our morals, reduce productivity.
Ink shall be rationed, paper taxed, and
those who speak with metaphors will be placed
on a watch-list.
His adviser thought otherwise, and made
another plan:
They crave attention, he said, these
petty scribblers. So give it them.
Throw the poets a bone. Make it a fish-bone.
Make it the whole fish. Pretend you love
them, keep them close. Better, find one and
grant special favors. They shall be so
incensed at this one's favors they'll
fall to infighting. Their efforts will
be on pulling him down; they'll meet
in coffee shops to plot, their drink
will be in sorrow, for poets love least
poets others love best. And the public
will see them for the petty braggarts
they are, and shun them rightly so.
The King scratched his chin in wonder
at this sage advice. He looked his adviser in the
eye. Have you any candidates in mind?
The adviser pulled out a scroll and eyed
the verses of his own heart scratched
upon the page and said, Sire,
if I may humbly suggest..
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little bits of my heart flung like
confetti after the wedding
hail that plunks a hole in the car hood,
determined bit of sky
the day we went to the forest and twined
ribbons on branches, blessing the trees,
sacred symmetry, chants to bring rain
the moon kissing me silly and the way we smoked
on the back porch after the parents went to bed
and the flower petals kissed by frost and
the acorns with their optimistic cheer
the music Eric Clapton wrote
when his heart was too broken to sing
and the way we stood, heads bowed
and bits of sacred tobacco burned
in the fire we made from twigs and grief
the bubbles that glimmered with
iridescent magic while my grandson
laughed and reached up to grab what
cannot be kept
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1.
Still yet unfolding
for a sip of dew,
it slipped off the steam
2.
jerked away,
it was a gift carried
in a lover’s hand
3.
It has not fallen,
hearing the late nightingale
it bowed its pale face
4.
torn off the tender stem
in raw hands of sudden
swift fate
5.
By flame of golden
sunset skies in soft
surrender, it fell
6.
left with a memory,
only the thorn chose
to cry
7.
In silence the night
filled with a silver moon
and red petals
8.
as the woman leaned from
her heated summer window
to drink cool moonlight
9.
Scalloped blossoms
in her hand to
scent a bridal bed
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As a child there was always someone
there to pick the pieces up.
When shadows from the window moved
black arms across my wall, whispering
through the screens—
you touched me and we slept the
shadows away.
You wiped my lips clean,
placed dolls in their bins,
and guided the pencil
as I wrote my name.
Twenty some years later
my walls keep falling, their
wobbly bricks of hope crack,
pieces lie at tired feet and
I still need your hands.
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My mother
warned me
about guys
in a bush.
She said nothing
about poets,
a silence
or ignorance
proven to be
far more
dangerous.
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There’s that certain phase
of morning when the mind
pours back into itself
making me think all kinds
of weird thoughts: a shirt
lying on the floor before
the fullness of my arms
makes it again useful
or remembering the dream
where I am a duck on a lake
of symbolism, trying in vain
to make my quacks echo
Some kind of bird is making
a noise in the backyard like
a violin from a late night movie
and yet it is there, lending
its shade to the morning grass
I think I may write a small piece
later; after all, we make habits
out of words no matter
where they fall, don’t we?
Hell, all I need is a pencil
to write them down |
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It might
have started
small – a
crayon
dropped
for a pencil,
time and
growth
marked now
by carbon,
by lines
turning curved
and looped
and forked
across,
first, the
disintegrating
paper of
early school,
then the theme
books of high
school essays,
then the
denser
dark lines
leading
into grad
school and,
eventually,
into the
middle
years, til
the right
words float
tight, reach
great batches
of they
who have
gathered
to catch
perfectly
beaded-
together
letters,
and to
bang some
gentle gavel,
announce
to the court
of the reading world
this verdict:
She is poet. |
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god
and I thought
that I was
unreadable
but here
there
are moments
of silence and
disaster
too many
heads bobbing
down
up down
to the ground again
finding truth
in large statements
finding comfort
when I first thought
about how I too could be
set
feet in concrete
for a second and then
pulling them up
pressing down with palms
pulling my hands up
to leave an imprint in
this most unsettled
of surfaces
when I thought
that inaccuracy
could be
the most accurate of statements
because of its openness
I said to myself
god |
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You will first need to purchase some basic ingredients:
278 cases of beer
14 half-gallons of Jägermeister
126 bottles of wine
74 bottles of whiskey
23 cases of rum
82 bottles of vodka
Add some tequila to taste
Stir gently in a tall glass, and drink.
When you wake up, enlist in military service.
Give away everything you own.
Don’t look back.
Warning: If the procedure detailed above fails to inhibit the Muse, ingest repeated doses as required.
If the Muse returns after 20 years of treatment, the only cure is Death.
Proceed with caution. |
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The silence we don’t hear
makes the most frightening
noise
it’s nothing like the screams
we might think we hear
and more like the crack
of a backyard oak tree
during a cold snap
in the deads of January
stress not seen until summer
has passed and leaves
have dropped
eventually, of course, it must
be cut down, but not before
suffering in silence
Or it might be the eldest son
leaving after acquiring a license,
his mother’s resigned sigh
and the nervous closing
of her eyelids
It could be the cigarette
smoke trailing above
the hand, his blood exhaling
blue corpuscles
But it’s really more like
the heaving of a heavy stone
into a shallow lake, the sound
it makes while settling
Barely there and just
out of sight |
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her hand pulled me up
off the ices’ edge
away from the permanent frozen cymbal crash
of a waterfall trapped by winters’ science
she was so beautiful
the murmur of lights from beneath a waterfall
the catching of a minnow
in a narrowed plan of current’s gasp
Anoka in the wintertime is a great place--
no homeless people begging on the streets--
fewer children running round yelling; most
babies covered by blankets
and clouds, but
she was so beautiful, giant puffball blossoming,
as if mushrooms can blossom, no
details anymore. no details.
kiss her lips in this
small forever, tying your hands
so that she can free you, like emotions
let loose by mere words. she
was so beautiful. |
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Conclusion: Make new poems out of this. |
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the hard drive sits
atop an aging ATX case
fingers of communication
set into it; fingerprints rifle
through a million dots and dashes
until the one kernel of knowledge
catches on the magnet eye
she looks back
into memories faded yellow
with photographs and feelings
pinned to the corkboard of her bedroom
trying to recall where
she first saw him, even
before they met
once the bit of knowledge is freed
it floats up
like light defying science
even though she has found
a possibility, the photograph is
of another place entirely
she lays down
forgetting why it was so important
to see the moustache he wore when young--
the pantheon of seperating flesh
stretches out until it touches the sky--
the motions of lips without any words--
until her dreams form little bubbles, which burst. |
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The evil psychologist administers an examination
to determine the condition of the target cerebrum,
but hesitates while interpreting the desired method
of selecting answers, which will reveal patterns
known through painstaking research to indicate
possible anomalies in normal mental functionality.
The test has changed. In place of multiple choice,
computer-based questionnaires familiar to her peers
is an interface that confronts the subject with images
designed to motivate the mind towards creativity.
Therapeutic applications are immediately apparent;
but, she asks herself, What sound diagnostic analysis
could ever be derived from grammatical gymnastics
developed in a contex of organically cultivated syntax?
The source is suspect. This could be an academically
condoned experiment, or a serious security breach,
perpetuated by some techno-literate terrorist geek,
who seeks to undermine prevailing mental health
practices with a preconceived digital onslaught.
It would be best, she decides, to behave as if nothing
outside of accepted procedures had in fact happened,
and to subtly alert the authorities at first opportunity.
So, with this self-assurance, and a very deep breath,
she clicks the mouse, types in the requested data,
and proceeds to evaluate her most difficult client. |
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hidden there
protected by Word
or Works—
good to see you again
she says
how’s the family
the old grandfathers and mothers
the little logos
those who have made it
those who have passed on
she does remember you
now that you are front
and centered
she ponders what lies
between your lines
what empty spaces say
she prints and reconsiders you
she looks for clues
if there were no open arms back then
look, poem,
you have come home
stop in again soon
no need to call first
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Sometimes the world is achingly beautiful.
We are crammed in the bus, just crammed, and the night air is sulky and sweet, summer winding its way around our throats, a silk caress to soften our scowls.
While waiting at the bus stop, I saw the neighbor sitting in his lawn chair drinking a beer and listening to music and you could just feel his happiness radiating out to the street, kicked back on a Friday evening.
The girls giggle on the bus in their tank tops, red and orange and green, and the black girls get on with their bangley earrings and gold sandals, while the bus lurches through the dusk falling on us like a tide of good wishes.
People are glued to their cell phones. It is almost like the people who talk to themselves in Central Park in New York City, sitting on the benches with nowhere to go, unable to imagine getting out of the city or away from the voices in their heads. We all have voices in our heads these days.
And a man gets on the bus, trailing a scent of cigarette smoke and bitterness. At first I am not listening but then I can’t help it, his voice is low but intrusive. He is saying, Where is God in all this mess? There is no God, look at he way he lets us suffer/ If I met God, I would spit on him, I been suffering for 30 years, can’t eat what I want, go where I want. I have no life, just pain, man. What more can God do to me, huh? Only thing else he can do is kill me, and I wish he would and just get it over with, man. And I can’t tell if he is talking to the black man slouched in his seat across the aisle or just into the air of the bus. The black man in his dirty t-shirt and broken sneakers whose bowed back told his tale of woe, says, Where the love, man? Can’t you give us some love? and reaches out a hand to shake his.
The couple across from me with the chubby, bouncy baby ring the bell. It’s my stop, too, so we get up to get off and I almost turn to the man and say, Look, God came to see you today. Look at that man shaking your hand and that baby giving her smiles away for nothing. That’s God, man, wake up. But I don’t.
I get off the bus and think about how God once deserted me and how it almost killed me. But didn’t. And I walk away to a party where I know no one but will have a swell time anyway, just happy those days are over and I hope the man will find out some day that he was wrong.
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a metaphor, falling objects
not dangerous so much
as significant,
not so threatening
as certain.
brilliant, stressing
that they matter.
we are obliged
for the reminder,
or,
was that,
fallen?
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Five-year-old’s dropped egg
Let go from his outstretched hand
onto fresh asphalt in 101 degree temp
“See I told you it wouldn’t fry.”
A rock
shattering a glass ceiling
Underneath
a strong sunflower burst forth
smiling hello to fresh air
Hello world
Flinging off
the High Bar
Landing perfect stance
Arms stretched above my heaving chest
Triumphant nose held high
My precious ’74 Flying V
knocked from her stand
Overzealous groupie rushing
Cracked right at headstock
Learned a lot about
lasting value from that
Toppling from a 12-foot ladder
44 years old and I thought
Superman could overcome
Center of gravity
Three cracked ribs
Months of nightmares
I ended up flat
Pancake with blueberries scattered
mottled surface
singed by the uneven grill grease
And still I can fall so many other ways
May you fall with the grace
Of experience’s wisdom
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If love were only a word
rather than a reason, every
one would simply throw it
away
Cupid breathed on me
once and I was blown glass,
pulled down-blue see through
and hand shaped
I gave everything I could:
my golden rod, tireless
eyes, signs, and all my
colors
And names for all those
words you couldn’t pronounce:
the tree, the bird in flight,
the brown boulder beneath
the brook and the fish swimming
past
It’s all a game, really
If there really is a God
and one day he calls me,
i will simply walk around
for a while and hope
he moves on to someone
or else |
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