Inversion: air stagnant,
the sun pale as a fish eye,
moon-like, an unspeakable
thought. Everything settles
into the valleys between
these foothills: fog, silence,
hawks. Clouds of boiled
wool, snow-dusted land,
even my thoughts
are dampened–
One bird, and then
another. Tails dipped
in rust, dried blood,
the blank-mirror lake
not unlike a page,
empty acres to fill,
a task or a chance,
like pouring a glass,
or finding sleep,
the readiness is all–
Sixteen in the shade, but a high open sky.
Some places, the sun doesn’t go anymore–
There’s snow from days ago on the butte’s
burn scar. An owl landed on the roof
but didn’t call– a weighty presence,
waiting overhead. The nights get deep
and silent here, the withered scrub
brush doesn’t stir, no wind, the lake
is static, stretching out like expectation,
a hole in the landscape, of unspoken depth.
Sometimes I feel shy
as a rabbit caught
in arrant moonlight–
crepuscular,
I loathe extremes.
What is this light
that floods my life?
Am I prey
or is this love,
finally–
for so long I have
sought out gray:
Too dark for night,
too light for day–
purposed impossibilities.
It isn’t only doubt
that makes my heart race,
but those howls at dawn
chill my heart
to an ice-clotted lake.
Everything is loss:
Of stars, of sun–
so who am I to gain?
Warren-deep, moon
-bright, in any state
that catch-all refrain:
What have I done
to deserve this?
Don’t call me in the winter,
I don’t want to be found–
begrudging dawn
for how it plummets
into day, this bed
a nest, a raft–
it seems foolish
to leave it,
to give in to
insatiate minutes,
no, just like the tide,
I’ll go out when I’m ready–
Sadly, I part from you;
Like a clam torn from its shell,
I go, and autumn too.
—
Distance, felt viscerally.
Almost winter, this cool sun
returns me: I rode
a retired racehorse, once,
around a frosty outdoor
track, he was prone to startle,
making counterclockwise loops
at an unhinged gallop,
reverting to a yearling heart.
Ashamed of its unruliness
I put my through its paces,
but really, who works who?
This day is so clear,
a sylvan sky above
a clatter of towers,
and acres of hours–
how I wish
you were here.
Mums are finished
nothing left to write about
except the radish
—
And I return to lemons,
their solar scent,
spice dishes with a heavy
hand. I might collect jars
of jam, seeded with constellations,
figs from the Adriatic,
salt, pine, and citrus–
once I wandered
the walls of Dubrovnik,
above the red clay roofs–
and yet it’s still winter,
and here I am,
haunting or haunted, steam
rises from my soup.
Awakened at midnight
by the sound of the water jar
cracking from the ice
—
Basho, I’m too well-acquainted
with the small of the night,
the lonely hours that pull
one out of sleep, so desperate
for company.
Seeing only frost
from my window,
a hoary silence,
and lacking discernment,
I thought it had snowed.
It’s noon, now,
golden, and I’m a foreigner
to myself.
(I don’t normally do writing challenges but was tempted by this great post by Crow, to spend three days exploring quotes as writing prompts. Expect more Basho…)
Again the dockyards, again,
so much space
in this sky, this air,
it’s getting intolerable:
Nothing weighs on me
like nothing
.
By the museum
on the south shore
an art installation,
a small house filled
with a snarl of branches,
meaning, I guess,
that the facade we build
is still an extension
of our true nature,
or something about
the impermenance
of shelter,
but then again
I’m usually too
literal in my
interpretations
.
But further down
on Mercer, two giant heads
built from enameled iron,
characters and symbols
wrought from multiple
languages, two lacy
craniums, and you can
go inside them,
confront another
hollow place:
Words do not suffice,
not even here, so full
of holes that you
could slip right through–
Maybe it’s a lack
of solid ground, afloat
in a sea of glass and iron,
but my tongue is growing
sharper. Scaffolding
and sterile girder,
these do not unfurl,
have no grace
of life, just conceal
so many empty rooms,
like lidded eyes.
The sky has a presentiment
of coming weather, grows
dull even as a crack
of blue appears,
but it’s just another
space for lease, too
toothless
and meek to last
for even an hour.
I’ve had enough
of so many words,
now reduced down
to daily records,
to limp binaries:
No rain. Rain.
Entre chien et loup, now,
when you visited
it was summer,
but you’d recognize
this grimy rain
from living up au Nord–
ça fait un bail,
I know, a voice
from years ago
sending thin words
out over the Atlantic
into a late night
but putain, mec,
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OPTIONAL POETRY 