OPTIONAL POETRY

Now it maddens me not
to know what bird
is making the call in
the dark.  A little
knowledge making
clear all that I don’t
know. What did it say?
Why did it stop?
And now begins again;
what is the story?
Fog before sunrise
electric and eerie.
I look in the cedar,
the waxy bay laurel,
find no feathered shape
to match the voice,
the morning is speaking
and I can’t see how,
only the blank faces
of houses, blinds drawn
across their eyes.

[wanted to put in some crazy lines breaks here, wordpress not cooperating this AM 😦 ]

The fog today so gray,
so low to the ground,
like smoke on a humid
day, and from it emerged
shapes of trees, prototypes,
not yet beings–
the sun on fogged glass
was blinding bright,
reflecting back instead
of showing me outside
as cars hurtled down
the highway as if it were
nothing, our only concession
to think twice before changing
lanes, too well aware that
unseen does not equal unreal,
we lose that luxury at
70 miles per hour.

[Hydrangea]

Heartfelt, thankfulness,
sorrow, frigidity–
the meanings are mixed
when it comes to these.

A few blue remain but
most petals are sea-green,
burnished at the tips
by a deep dusty pink.

The rains have returned
leeching acid from the soil,
the plant conveying
the state of its roots–

in neutral soil it could
say anything,  leaving one
to infer. Most now are
the consistency of brown

crepe paper and fall
with ease, melting into
the dew-damp walk.
Silence and space–

the most luxurious things.
On this morning cold air
fills the gaps left by branches
growing bare, the implication–

what we want
and what we don’t want,
all at once, inconsistency
the surest sign of life.

The clouds in White Center:
Charbroilled smoke
from Zippy’s Giant Burgers,
altocumulus hued pink
from the first real sunset.
It seems flatter here.
The mountain peak
hogs the view down
certain streets, and in
the parking lot one over,
an argument,
a dog barks incessantly–
no, they might have been
agreeing, loudness
skewing immediate
perceptions, the air
just after sunset tinted
like a window, not quite
night yet, but everything
softening, and I know
they call this place rat city,
but tonight it’s almost
pretty. No, it is, really,
there’s no monopoly
on beauty, you find it
where you will.

A garden-variety massacre:

Powdery blight, tomato
stems felled, liquifying, putrid,
thin and brown, fruits on the ground
in varied states of decay, forests
of mold hairs, copious and fine–

Under gray skies
in sodden soil collapsing
husks returning to whence
they came–

There was a storm
that shook fruits free,
there was hard ground
that split their skins,
there was a rat
that sunk in teeth

and then there were seeds

so many small promises
that even neglected even
laid to waste

nothing is wasted
nothing has gone
not really, not
completely

In your absence the dog
has elected to sit outside

moping on the deck
in the late morning cool.

In the forest, a constant
call and response, and she,

though pampered, still animal,
more attuned to the language

of birds.  I read a book on it,
am now trying to tell a cry

from the canopy from a sigh
from the floor. Or a whine

from the door–
she doesn’t want in,

she wants me out–
there was a chapter

cautioning against
anthropomorphizing

but creature comfort
is a very good term,

relatable, in that she
wants and wants

and what she wants
does not fit into words.

A little drunk you stopped
and stooped to see what
LP was splintered on the walk
as two men smoking outside
the tattoo shop looked on,
amused, Ah! Sweet Mystery
of Life— we walked back past
the taqueria and playground,
the pot dispensary, its night
-melded neon, a temple with
rows of prayer wheels outside,
you turned them one by one
in front of me, but said you
said a few prayers on my
behalf, love still the end
and all of living, hope
skipping back, and
the broken record, it
could mean something
but really who knows what?

More rain, irregularly–

halfway across the bridgespan
but no further

still, the return
of clouds is a comfort,
having complained about them
all my life

they’re still mysterious

here sky-like, there,
hurt pink, hematosed,
light pollution probably–

now it’s stopped raining
and the silence
is distressing

erasure by halves
worse than none
at all