What settles?
You. A draft.
The foundation
of a house.
This wind picks up
but never gets
alarming.
And I can’t tell
disappointment
from lack
of inertia,
as they’re both
so drab and gray
and boring.
December 19
A strange pull, now,
and emptier space–
no, loftier,
what the sunrise
lacks in warmth
it makes up for
in expansiveness.
All this time all
at once, do I tread
it, eat it, rest
under it? This
is undiscovered
land and the things
that I so feared
are rendered
differently now,
in safety–
with ample room
for consideration,
less careful now,
less constrained.
This landscape starts
in red-barked
saplings, lichen
crusts, deep pastures
out to the foothills,
and a hummingbird
sparks near pine boughs,
changing the scale,
up, down, either way
there’s all the place
that we could want.
December 18
There was freedom
in those hills–
we carried out
a bit with us
with wind-burnt
faces and slightly
wild gazes, but
it fades so fast–
this the hard part
of a return,
a sense of loss
that these piles
of rancid laundry
do nothing to assuage.
December 17
We slept in a graveyard of trees,
a cradle of fire, formerly,
and the outermost edge
of the Southwest desert.
The sun slipped away
all afternoon as the wind
picked up across the further
steppes, traced mesas
with their new dusting
of snow–
So we slept early
and shallowly, as dreams
of deer passed through
camp towards the ice-clotted
spring further on.
Crystalline life,
all that I could need,
or want, breath
or heart, here inside
this ice-crusted tent–
A home is where
you are, no more,
I see it now
but had to go out
so far, the furthest
I’ve been, the hardest
edge, the deepest sky,
the slew of secret stars,
the sun spilling over
red rock to bring the dawn,
stirring bones to life,
all gifts, all rewards,
all greetings that say
welcome,
welcome,
now, farther–
December 11
Optional poetry is going on a non-optional vacation! Please feel free to peruse the archives, or check in next week for (hopefully) a slew of inspired new poems.
December 10
Strange thing, an allergy.
An act of protest—
Even at the molecular
level I am in revolt.
Punky. Itchy.
It smacks a bit
of betrayal—
Why rise up
in welts
without clarity
of position,
or at least
a list
of demands?
I say
the unexplainable
should at least be
placatable—
each drag
of the nail
is relief
and regret—
to say, pick a side,
is only reasonable.
Here, I’ll even draw
the line.
December 9
I woke with a want
for the ocean
gray and desolate,
with winter surf
veiled
under soft,
steady rain.
A desert
won’t be
the same,
too still and open–
the ocean
closes in,
relentlessly.
But the stars,
you say,
they’ll be amazing–
Yes, if only
I wanted clarity,
but the act
of waking
was enough.
Now I want
to be muffled,
I want to be
hidden,
to watch
the squall lines
build
and then
swallow up
the shore.
December 8
You said
sips of breath
but I remembered
gulps of air–
I’m American, Rumi,
a Texan to boot,
but still I can
do nuance,
and know too
how the throat
tightens from peril,
at giving all
or giving up—
I’m leaving soon
for the desert,
winter-stark
and emptied,
with nothing to find,
or so I hope,
so tired now
of looking,
but God help me,
I can’t stop.
December 7
After all this talk of phases
and phase changes,
of dawns where the fog
plays at being water,
the air grown palpable,
the most regular of things
seeming reachy,
not quite
as we thought, as if
caught in the moment
when a dream
is revealed as such–
Yes, that plane will leave
no matter what,
this modern migration
not accommodating
of stragglers
who stayed up
North too long,
outlasting the cold,
floating past all sense
of time and urgency,
it’s just so difficult
to be bounded now–
this minute is all
mine, and the next one,
and the next.
P.S. officially a published poet now:
ha!
December 6
The wind spent itself
last night–
it’s now so still,
the noise
from the far road
drifts up
from the valley
like some distant
ocean roar.
The morning
hesitates–
the sun didn’t show,
so must it go on?
Nothing moves,
not a single thing,
no bird, no branch,
not even the wind
-slackened maples
down the bank–
the air is thick
with deliberation.
OPTIONAL POETRY 