ALL RESPONSES |
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The Wolfwalker walks in the quiet night
She cries loudly at dark holes
Her voice carries truth with the might
Of the sound of former bells
Die Wolfgangerin geht in der stillen Nacht
Sie schreit laut an dunklen Löchern
Ihre Stimme trägt Wahrheit mit der Macht
Des Ton ehemaligen Glocken |
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There is no way to know, really,
the words, your saliva,
my insomnia:
the words are nothing but
an extended prayer;
your saliva is a kind of madness
after the madness; my insomnia
allows me to ask you for more
You ache in me
Your breath will crush me
this summer; each dawn
will bring your color
to my skin
There is a stairway
and I climb Up and Down
and it will be my death
for you alone
Where within me
can I take you along? |
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Some photos lend themselves to being what
they are, a flag in three parts, three fields:
two borders of extreme darkness as in failure,
everything swallowed, where everyone’s gone
is an unknown.To arrive at meaning, the viewer
must rely on a rambunctious and not always
trusty guide: imagination, the heart between
opacities. For in the flag’s center field is a stone
staircase. It rises or descends. Becomes
a country of its own, a way out to beyond, tucked
in on either railing by lush forest. One wonders
whether or not to ascend. –Do you see any
bones? I don’t see any bones. No evidence
of those who climbed and didn’t make it.
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Treading lightly, one foot steps
deliberately in front of the other.
The seconds are closing fast.
Like the long green limbs of praying mantis
this dance will eventually kill one of us.
We stomp on the surface of the earth-
scattering dead rose petals and bark.
We carry driftwood in our toes,
ask questions about God’s truancy.
Just outside, the sky is falling
as we begin our ascent against it. |
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“To dream
that you are walking
up
a flight of stairs
indicates
that you are
achieving a higher level
of understanding.
To dream that you are
descending
a flight of stairs
signifies
you will face many
difficulties.”
I pretend that I
remember
Ascending |
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I climbed these stairs the summer I first fought asthma.
They stand somewhere between my childhood and adulthood,
finding purchase between houses, watching for joggers
that want a challenge.
I used them to make myself wheeze -- climbing up, and
walking down, climbing up
. . .
It took an entire summer to find my way up continuously.
Afterward, I sat on the bench
that guards the top of their stone causeway
and burned the last gas they forced out of my lungs,
and coughed, and stood.
I went back again recently, but the stairs have wandered off
to a different section of town. I hear they cut
through Summit Hill now. But I beat them. I moved
past the trap and out into the street -- eventually running.
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Behind the museum at Sibley Park Zoo
(is it still there?)
across a little paved road,
steps of my childhood rise
up the steep hill in the middle of the park.
We carried a galvanized iced bucket
of Mom’s home-brewed root beer—
reward for the climb.
Once up the long stairway
we sipped the coldness,
watched deer watching us,
listned to birdsong we didn’t need to name—
we only knew the songsters were listening
to us too.
Sometimes we’d access the hill
on the little road beginning
by the old folks’ home
or the steps on the bandshell side of the park.
Sometimes we climbed the steepness in the grass
no steps at all
thinking of Indians and buffalo not caged
but roaming free.
When we descended
we told one another tales
of how the bear killed the zookeeper.
We knew of his children.
Before heading home
we watched one last time
the peacocks
spreading their tails.
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Those last embers crumbling from your tongue
flavor rocks with pale, dead fire.
Some stones echoing your words,
my tongue stumbling over others,
and when I notice the cold smoke from your breath
twist upwards with hot steam from his,
The Keystone in my hand is empty,
and it’s a long, blurry way down
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pages are blank
out of solidarity with memory
which is peeling in sheets
like street posters hung in reverse
the glue going back into the bucket,
the brush getting ever cleaner
ever less sticky, the corners
rolling under, dry and new &
the rain, it doesn't fall upside down
just ask the clouds (I am
not about to waste my time on clouds--
those dirty nomads wandering where
only birds and humans traverse
Not even the sun will stay long
'Just passin' through' it says on its
way to tomorrow, on it's way
to wherever we are not
clouds just make excuses for the sun,
passing over like a kerchief, like a fan,
like a blush
never staying long,
always in a rush. |
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Lydia Small has been on these stairs
since before they mattered
She knows all her steps lead to unwashed death
or a bed of sleep
Better to climb again than to stand there; let life
guess for her |
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Or a mountain, a valley and ladder.
Easy symbols or visions, of something that matters,
an easy heartstring begging for plucking,
the distance is hazy, life balanced on luck. In
ancient times it was bison. Stars wheeling
across unyielding black. Cards dealing
fate with dashed towers or Paris and Helen,
daggers through hearts on the chest of a felon.
I don't know what this is, a staircase all hazy,
but climb anyway, with my head light and woozy
to wherever it leads... bones, lotus, the cross-
buoyed by Jungian archetype we rise -
a very real railing to steady my hand,
and wild roses to break my fall. |
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straight shinny steel steps stare into my soul
sailing sky high above and sinking sea deep below
steep beyond one’s future and shallow before one’s past
standing strong this structure is still cast
slippery slanted slate stairs slide my sole
swaying side to side and straining such serious toll
slow are the changes ahead and speeding by are life’s little wins
showing strength in spirit suppresses our saintly sins
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Recruiting deep we
bootstrap our way upward
inch by muscle
tearing inch
even as heart and
purpose slip our
sweat slicked hold
we scrabble up the peak
shrouded in eternal haze
ball, heel
L – i – f – t
ball, heel
L – i – f – t
ad infinitum
knowing if we
do not reach the top
at least we’ll reach
the end.
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We entered the chapel soundlessly,
unpacked blanched reams of paper, pointed
out walls to host file cabinets, drawers
filled with red pens, the communal
printer below the biggest crucifix, bronze
turned muddy from the daily dedication
of holy water;
While we worked, men cast away
clumps of mildewed plaster, peeled
remaining crucifixes off the walls,
scooped up the sculpture of a saint
who plucked out her eyes after
seeing God and banished it
from our own sight;
Desk dividers unfolded
on the domed altar beneath
a mural of angels and clouds,
proud guardians turned to ghosts
with each coat of white paint,
fluorescent lighting bleaching
out last echoes of prayers
and the gold crown of Mary;
They couldn’t replace the stone
steps, our feet fitting
the divets, filling
the grooves as we followed
the path of the nuns, single
file from the kitchen up
to the chapel, each one rising,
eventually, to her destiny, leaving
behind many prayers and then
this nothing.
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once upon a time
clock striking “Midnight! Midnight! Midnight!”
all fairy coaches return to pumpkins
all gossamer dresses return to rags
all dreams collapse upon the hearth
once upon a time
glass slipper
left behind
once upon a time
prince following
love-lorn and confused
"Did you hear me, girl?
I’m talking to you!
Who do you think you are, anyway?"
to come so close and yet be so far
to hold in your hand
the invitation and not to appear
is shredding your soul
to let the wicked win
so you take up the hem of your garment
in your own hand and flee
at the appointed hour, then wait,
hoping destiny will find you
perhaps all the rest of your life
perhaps only until time to announce
the truth
perhaps only until your tears have
wiped away the ash
and you are revealed
perhaps only until you are
ready to climb back up the stairs
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These stone stairs,
familiar,
a trek above my vision line.
The top landing,
always blurred,
every step draws
more breath.
I'm not even close,
but I know I grow
stronger inside
from each foot
forward.
No reward
other than the task,
when night finally falls
with finality
and the smile
after my climb
rings truest.
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Swaddled in corn silk, the cob
knows its core and kernel.
The cow knows her grass fed
tradition, alfalfa at day’s end.
Purpose is bromeliad,
shape shifter that makes hay
while the sun shines and peels
back and back to the silk.
Purpose is a stairway in all
its mystery. Either way
is the right or wrong way,
each step is dada.
Top to bottom, side to side,
the ride is moon hopscotch.
The planet rides bareback.
Muck and misery seeps into
its hooves. What we crave
is what will.
Birdsong, birdsong,
muck and misery,
birdsong, birdsong,
muck and awe.
Ask the corn and the cow.
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The chrysanthemums outside my kitchen
window turn red and yellow behind white
blinds. If I were a painter, I would paint
only windows.
Right now I’m thinking of the creamy stars
I could only see from my east bedroom window;
the ones behind my mother’s homespun curtains.
They only glowed when I looked for them;
at least, this is what I told myself.
I also think about the mallards beyond
the chrysanthemums, why the drakes are
always in front of the hens, the changes
in Minnesota weather; but mostly I think
about the woman at the convenience store
the other day; how she cursed the Hispanic boys,
and how their mother hissed at them to be silent.
Once, I watched a neighbor down the street
hew a tree. It fell the wrong way and crushed
his Ford pickup. I learned many new words
that afternoon. Two weeks later, my neighbor
left for VietNam and never came home. |
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WHERE THE KING WILL STAND
Many steps to trace with feet
sweat and dirt
the imprints of life on gray wood
proved by years of wear.
Summer is made to collect memories
as pebbles at the lake's edge,
the ones falling off the ripped seam
of kid's pockets.
You collect rushed breath,
the sun,
the droplets of sweat on foreheads
while they run up your steps
hearing the hollow sound
their feet make on familiar worn wood.
One hundred and ten to the top
where the winner will stand
with shining eyes and reddened face
wearing a crown of green grass and leaves
proving
the strength and will of youth.
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At age fourteen I dig my name
into the first and last stair.
In later years I secret acid
from the high school science lab and
etch my middle initial
on the middle stair so lost to eyes,
but I show my daughter eventually --
we share this long trip, even the scars. |
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Black hole. Matter sucked into
Dead Nothing.
Nightmare corners
Underneath your bed.
A man’s heart. The grudge
For unrequited lust.
His brigand’s blood
Cold like the inside of a Guinness
The tyrant’s mind.
Segregated,
Ethnically cleansed
Humanity
Piled in muddy trenches
Oil. Earth
Given The Shaft
At 5000 ft
Underworld entrance
To executive conscience
Womb. In the beginning
Absolute zero
Sleep, id est, rest.
Lights out.
Peace |
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time passes so quickly these days
it wasn't long ago when i could run up and down these steep steps a few times to do my aerobics exercises.
now i could hardly get to the top without stopping every now and then
to catch my breath.
the guard rail comes in handy.
it would be a pain in the kalamazoo to tumble down the great Stairmaster at my age. |
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It should have been a path.
It should have been made of
pebbles and mud, not much more
than a space between trees
a little part
in the hair
of the forest.
But it’s paved.
It’s paved and
there are stairs,
a hundred tiny stairs
of uncomfortable proportions,
strange small sizes
each tread too narrow.
They are stairs
that make you feel
awkward and
stutter-stepped
never sure whether it’s best
to take one or two at a time.
You take them one at a time.
Awkward though it is
it feels somehow less
dangerous, what,
with the railing on left.
What is this, England?
You feel like shouting,
“This is America! Keep right!”
and you feel like finding a ranger
and complaining.
Right, keep right,
we are a nation of
right-handers and
don’t you know
it’s always easier going down
than going up.
Up is when
we need the railing
and the pulley-strength
of our fine
American
right hands.
You try to pretend
you’re in Scotland or Australia
but of course they’d never put
paved stairs
in the forest there.
So it doesn’t work.
You know where you are.
You’re in America,
where we keep right,
but bear left
for the sole purpose
of annoying somebody.
Pausing on a trail
makes you feel serene.
Pausing on the stairs
just makes you feel old
and what’s at the top
anyway? Probably
a gift shop.
Hopefully
they sell drinks;
stairs make you thirsty.
You probably could have just
driven to the top. Would that
have been
any less natural
than stairs?
Stairs,
to remind us
who owns this natural world.
There are narrow-gauge railroads
and chairlifts to our mountaintops.
In the desert, nothing lucrative grows
so
we park our armies there.
You were hiking in Mojave
when the Stealth flew over.
You had to stop, breathless,
and admit it,
it was beautiful.
More beautiful than
nature was and
probably less deadly,
even though
the old hippy in you
wants to think
of nature
as benevolent.
It was beautiful, that goddamned plane,
reminding you of the eagles you saw
outside Anchorage, Alaska.
Only better than that.
More rare.
Fucking airplane, fucking war machine,
more beautiful than eagles were.
More memorable. Admit it.
So maybe these stairs are better than a trail.
Maybe they’re more beautiful.
More picturesque,
more sculpted.
You stop to take a picture. |
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deliver time sideways twistinghand
what are called by commandos
being man,
dislocation of guy wires spilling upon the blockade's flotila.
your all nude unborn deck asking where you labored your baby strung out as Christian holly
held under the water
your boy named Sue, her body leaping out from the body clotting mid-air
hitting its part of the paper, songs singing
at the border by Valdez, the old Iranian drawing the
cool grey Mediterranean, now running farther out than you remember
of girls kissing girls.
Hollyeyes bullying brown from under a mean brow
stubbornly good looking for looking out
pooring her fast fallen allover the green floor
such lips and hips moving
swagger such smiling and lick them
clutching that all Cherokee knife
of this place
naked and the lunch, we have to keep down in a purse, its infancy thrilling
and wrestling
shifting the pockets of Glass eye, streaking blue
the green mmms fools, shaved face down. blank - my kettle's friend, her river below, and errie dingy bird
doom, and plooms below the ocean
long thin white cues’
Muscling tomorrow. |
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She wished she could retrace her steps
start out early at the first hint of daybreak
follow the mossy path down to the lake
sit on the rickety bench and
gaze at the shadowy dancers
glide across the water
but it was late
and the sun had
exposed every corner
of the cluttered room. |
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Sometimes it is the end of a descent.
Here is the forest floor.
You may lie down.
Crimson bird, the emerald stair —
The passage and its imprimatur are yours,
sealed. Those narrow days are done.
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I stood shaking at the bottom of the stone stairs, staring all the way up in apprehension. How many times had I climbed these as a child, when witches were only funny, laughter was only at yourself and time stood stoic for everyone? At the top (where the water tower rises above the city like a Dunce’s Cap), many memories had taken parts of me away. Wracked by guilt, I took the first step and swallowed the first sour note.
Shadows
Junior year and we were drunk. Summer nights always end in trouble for the young. The poor man under the bench just wanted to sleep somewhere cool, where the cops would never find him. That is the one sentiment I can still relate to this day. Someone took his picture, flash camera in his sleeping face. When he swore at us and tried to crawl up, we broke out in riotous laughter and staggered away. Around the other side of the tower my friends bolted downstairs and slid down the dewy lawn, but I wandered further away on a whim. The partially hidden couple must have known people were around. They were younger than I was, maybe even middle school age. The girl had thrown her tube top on the ground, her bare chest swirling in the wind. Her skirt was around her stomach, as the boy fingered her fast and sloppy. Not knowing what to do, I hid against the wall and stared in shock as she got louder and angrier. When she came, she squealed once and then gnawed on his neck as if it were a steak. I remember seeing blood as I stumbled through the night and found my friends. If that was sex, I was glad I wasn’t interested yet. I would later be told I vomited and passed out. I would like to believe that whole night was a monstrous lie, but if all the people there all remember the same lie, doesn’t it become a truth?
Present day, and I was halfway up the stairs now. There were hundreds of people around but I hardly noticed. They call it an ice cream social but this was the one and only time a year when people are allowed at the peak. I was going to get in line and make it all the way to the top. I had to let my myriad ghosts go. I had no interest in ice cream, or witches.
Ghosts of The Voyeur
Summer of 2003. Not only did I lose my long-time girlfriend right after I started ring shopping (turns out she was never faithful) but my job burned me out. On my last day I remember talking to my co-worker Nate. He was one of only three people that I considered a friend at work. He was fighting with his girlfriend and had to move out for a while. We had a sympathy shot after work and parted ways. The next day I heard from some friends that some guy had snuck all the way up to the very top of Witch’s Tower and jumped. I saw the news but they never released a good photo of his face or a name. It never occurred to me that things like that actually happen here. I stared at the grisly photos, shamefully wondering what it was like to fly as the witches do. I even imagined I was the coroner, and sifted through evidence in my mind. That kid must have been pretty messed up. At the end of summer, at my new job, an old co-worker broke the news. Nate jumped and died like the rock star he fought to be. His girlfriend found him. Among the old crew, I was the last to see him and the last to know. I was forcibly sent home on a sick day, numb more than sad. Isn’t that what photographs do to people, make them numb? I still have nightmares, except every time it becomes me jumping out that window as children laugh. Can someone tell me how it feels to hit the ground in your dreams?
Back out of my head as the line ahead of me kept moving up the long stairs, until we were informed that the tower was closed. I missed my second chance. Of course, the crazy stories continue for new generations, with disaffected kids hoping to keep the legends of a neighborhood alive. Meanwhile I have to wait another year to see if I will ever feel guiltless again.
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BREAKING THE EDGES
There is something familiar in this image.
The steps of a wooden staircase
disappearing into
bottom and top edge of the photo
not disclosing its start or destination.
A good portrait of my life
as I wonder what I am supposed to do,
where I am supposed to go
while the answer is hiding behind the edge
of my consciousness.
There is nervousness
in the out-of-focus steps,
it feels as if they want to jump
out of the photograph
as I do out of my skin.
I wish
to spill out of every limitation
blind to fear and its binding consequences
and find the answers,
whatever they may be,
to the questions in my life.
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Weeds became border
Tall as ferns
Joining hands
As the rows rose then fell
Into shutters tightly wound mouth
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Late at night, it could be
that the steps leading up
lead down, also,
if your eyes are tired
and bloodshot -
the blue in them, bluer for the red.
The steps still lead up -
in daylight, greens shade your eyes
distinguish the up from down-slant.
The hold of the glance,
the slow movement of everything
walks you, step by step,
into the future of your decision,
the hope of your choices
to be wearing nothing but truth.
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