Sunday, April 16th, 2006

Writing at Night

My words eschew the light,

Grumbling their bulk into a line

Under the glare of the naked bulb

Like worn oxen under a whip,

Lurching and stumbling,

Tangling their harnesses

And straining already tenuous links,

As if trying to take to the air.

But I need to see the paper

To guide the pen behind the words

And furrow the fields of the page

And sow them with a song.

Singing to the tired team then,

Of the paths of the sun and moon,

Of a longing for the stars,

And of the clumsiness of oxen.

Though later, in the dim, they stir,

Rising up in secret flight,

The words of the night nimble now

Upon glowing, dream-furled wings.

Monday, April 17th

In Lieu of Sleep

I used to walk, squeaking

Through the powder

Sparkling by streetlamps

Then blue with night as I turned

Down the shore and across the lake

I never trusted frozen--

Which is why I crossed,

Courting sensation,

Awareness strained,

Stepping light and slow,

Measured and sure,

And ever listening for thunder.

Even in a small wilderness,

The threat of sleep retreats

Under the weight of fear,

And leaving me

Shaking and numb,

Dreaming on my feet.

Hours later back upon

The steps of my porch,

Brash old footprints crushed

Under an exhausted shuffle.

I am still shaking and numb,

But never from the cold.

Tuesday, April 18th

Not I

It's always us and them.

The many us's, the many them's,

So that any moment

Just who's standing where

Is not entirely clear

Unless you have a point to make,

Which means it's time that someone pays.

And who better than them.

And tomorrow we

Who stand with your us

Will stand repudiated with them

Then after dinner

In your house

Or at work at the next desk the next day,

Us again for the most part.

Which is the only way it can be.

If there were any memory,

Any persistence at all

To this playground meting up sides,

All too soon it would only be

You against the world,

While the world itself

Grips its own throat,

At least until the truth comes home

(And there's no guarantee of that)

That you'd realize that really

Its always been only this:

You against yourself,

And I against me,

Both in the same boat, together.

Wednesday, April 19th

Dry

When the volume is low,

And the day whispers out

Its wealth of words

One at a time and stops

Before my pen

Can scratch its hum

Upon the page,

I know there is a muse

By what is missing.

And the hiss of hesitation,

The scruff of random ink

Gone dead, gone wrong,

Seems a kind of mourning,

A longing that knows better.

Just as when it snows

The thought of Dad

Ambling out mid-February,

In short pants and tennis shoes

To haul the drifts aside

In his addressing of the shed

Just to check the oil

Of the lawnmower,

Speaks less of hope

Than desperation to trade

The blisters of the shovel

For the itch of fresh cut grass.

One discomfort for another:

A cranky muse

For a pyrite poem.

Thursday, April 20th

Prone

She said, "If you lie on the floor,

Ideas will come:"

Ideas about the stiffness of the shag

and the dry and busy smell of dust;

The way the hills and valleys of the spine

Can be coaxed only so flat

But at the expense of the hips and neck;

The way a cat's hard nose

Butted in the crook of my arm

Causes the skin to itch;

The way she said ideas would come,

But not that they'd be any good.

Friday, April 21st

This week, famed test pilot, Scott Crossfield, died in a plane crash. Although this poem is not specifically about the 84-year old flying enthusiast, I'm sure it was shaped by the event.

Called to Rise

Eagle, hawk--any raptor will do--

The twitching of their wings

Concealed with the distance,

Their uneasy grip on the invisible

Elevated to certitude.

But they tremble,

Sometimes claw and kick

For a rung that isn't there,

Swoop, not for pleasure or game,

But for the fear of falling,

The plane of the earth meaning death

As much as it means home.

And only with flight

Comes the understanding

That the sky is more fleet than wings,

More fleeting than the hunger of it,

And more fickle than

The distant eye can dream.

Saturday, April 22nd

Why She Comes

She stands at the window and stares,

Ten minutes and not a word,

No knock when she opened the door,

No hello as she crossed the room,

Not even the whisper of muslin

As she moved the curtain aside.

In a disquieting way I'm forced

To wonder if I'm really there,

But there's my shadow, my reflection,

My opaque hands and too,

The wet edge of my teeth on my tongue.

Keeping it silent and still.

She's on break from the world,

Slipping out of a Gestalt conference call

From the back of everyone's mind

From the great cavern of desire

Where shouts of prayer cascade

And interrupt her every word.

"I want dessert before dinner" she screams,

Without a glance in my direction.

And yells: "And one afterward as well,"

Perfect, I nod, as she calls:

"Did you know the moon is hollow?

When man touched it, it rang like a bell.

She throws herself in a chair and coughs,

"You can vacuum upholstery, you know."

She speaks of long of Olympus,

Then whispers of Rome before rising

To gather herself for the march to the door,

And to mouth a silent sigh whose purse I take

As the muse's kiss of gratitude.