This here is fine, but
a really interesting play
would be about the boat
on the backdrop slowly
coming to realize
that is not actually at sea,
is not an actor but only
watching them play
their parts on a stage
that a backdrop borders
but doesn’t engage,
and how it still stays,
knowing this,
having no choice,
not mobile or motile,
not even with those full
painted sails that it once
was so proud of.
Up with the sun
but it isn’t up
isn’t even blush
or flush with the butte
the light comes from low
but still catches
on the grapes
their matte purple
tinged with dew
and pulling on
the vines
we’ve changed
our places over
time and now
I’m setting
as it rises.
The mornings are cooler now,
the coyote’s returned
or probably a new one,
it seemed a little smaller.
And that wraps up summer–
a boat has cut its engine
and sits on the still lake.
Knowing the ending,
now we wait.
The finches rehearse
their southern migration,
chatter excitedly
about their upcoming trip.
We who are staying
start to grow a thicker coat,
to keep us warm,
hide our leanness
in the coming gaunt months.
The morning tries to burn off
these sorts of thoughts,
the boat moves on,
sun-stupid quails bleat
in the yellow hills.
But in any sink or shadow
or hollow a chill remains,
and this isn’t the first time
we’ve been left behind.
Last night the wind whipped
flagwires in the valley against
their poles, with closed eyes
it could have been sailboats
worried in their moorings
at a freshening breeze.
A goldfinch landed on the rail,
electric against the lowering sky,
then startled away, and all
this time I’ve thought harbingers
were meant to be frightening,
not frightened.
Sky, hill, pewter, rust
brighter this side
of the mountains but still
subdued, the radio
finally finds and settles
on a station, I try to
pick out words, catch glimpses
of mylar ribbon strewn
through trees like tinsel from
a cherry harvest long over
a song comes on slow so
I understand it tú
estás siempre en mi mente,
a nostalgic proclamation
of horns and strings and chimes–
the credits should roll now
as I shoot down this road
splitting foothills washed
in dust haze and gold–
of course they don’t but for
just one moment the internal
and external are perfectly
aligned and the man’s at peace
with all he carries just listen to
his voice and not the words
siempre tú tú tú
the sky too dreamy, on any
other day I would fault it
but at this exact moment all melts
into kindness, that is to say,
we’ve come far enough,
well past forgetting.
It is almost the end
of summer’s
high cathedral days
this ground is airy
storing years
in its loam
a downed branch
genuflects
as I step on its edge
robed in velvety moss
that dampens
the sound, still
small birds dart
seeking safety
in the open, shelter
without closing,
a very present refuge—
oh how these words
have stuck,
and no bird sings
its songs by rote
but no song is either
entirely our own
and there’s still
a comfort hidden
somewhere
in these sounds
among the disquiet
of long-learned
words, a fluency–
still they startle
me, and I too
take to flight.
The first rays of sun
are honey
on the leaves
the back-lit maples
a singing sort of green
but already slipping
into something
more sensible
the beginning’s ending
the first of many
In envy I watch them
palm the breeze
not obliged to leave
not turning away
from the morning’s
kindness
distilling
this suffusion
into sweet
sweet sap
but I have no
alembic
of trunk and leaf
just a few
harried words
and somewhere to be.
At the body shop they said
they could hammer out
the dents, could stretch
and scrape, apply clear coat,
and no one would know
there was ever a wreck.
On one hand it seems
that growing harder
makes breaks easier
to fix, each new hit
an opportunity to
practice gutting
and replacement.
But getting softer,
blows are absorbed
with no resistance,
all giving wholly–
still it seems easier
to learn one’s own
mechanics than
to give an inch,
let alone all,
even if it means
some hidden
damage, and
supplemental
costs.
We walk in our own world.
Fog opens before us,
fog closes behind us
and sometimes we see
shadowy figures,
sometimes the animist glow
of a truck’s headlights
as it spins an empty
circle on hard-packed sand.
We all leave our mark
here, relative to weight,
this ground is laced
with pulverized shells
and rock crab slaughter,
but the tide is going out now,
now innocuous.
A solo seagull tucks into
itself to sleep, mistaking
poor visibility for safety;
what’s most dangerous
is what might be.
A dog appears,
fighting to free a Frisbee
from the suction of the sand,
somewhere, something
is shrieking, bird or child,
and somewhere off
to the right is water,
it must be.
This, our margin
of safety, despite
the curl of its teeth,
the line by which
we guide ourselves
back through an
opaque morass,
even after it erases
our tracks, again,
again a reminder
that there’s often
very little choice
in what we have
to trust.
Early morning tableau—
wan sunlight
and ecstasy of dog.
A thought
arises—
there might
have been a
warmer reception
back into
the world
of the living
if anyone
had just brought
Cerberus his bowl.
OPTIONAL POETRY 