365.365 - obsidian

the poem, he said
the poem it builds
it don't care what else you doin'
it forms
it shapes
it finds what to grow on
what to cut away
it don't use your fancy kitchen knife
it use that black glass
obsidian
it shapes the black glass
to its own hand
nevermind yours
and then it cuts
trims away fat
slashes off the soft meat
leaves you the strong meat
meat worn by walking
by running maybe
by getting itself into trouble
and finding its way back
meat attached to the bone
when it's done the poem
stands carved to its minimum
when you're wise you take it
just like it is
when you're not
you add frosting
beware
I have told you

364.365 - grandmother

seven times she said
"I must burn these"
and seven times she put it off
and her granddaughter took them
to her mother to protest
surely no one had ever written
such naked love and lust
surely no one had ever
done such things with her
surely she had not saved these...
these... why she could hardly say it
...love letters if you will
not to the woman they had known
her mother glanced at a few
and gave them  back
"perhaps she kept them for a friend
perhaps... well, she was young once
what is the date on those?  well, see"
the mother went back to arrangements
the grandaughter to the desk
where she thought to discard them
maybe she should just burn them
but no, maybe she would take them home
and tease a lover into... oh, surely not!

363.365 - not-sense

there is a kind of madness
in the poems I read tonight
a sense made of not-sense
like a bullet flying backwards into a gun
into the cartridge where the fire
unburns back to powder
and the trigger unpulls
the man so certain a moment before
looks confused
looks at his gun
throws it away and runs
down the sidewalk and into an alley
high on the stairs of a fire escape
a jack o'lantern uncarves into a pumpkin
then falls falls falls
to land on the man running below
who suddenly blind
runs full tilt into a trash dumpster
and staggers out into the alley
just as a car races through it
the man seems to fly
and lands hard upon some garbage cans
the car disappears into the street
the man tries to sit up and falls to the ground
a boy who has only watched events in the alley
approaches
waits til the man's eyes meet his
says "that was so cool!  do it again!"
the man laughs
and the boy who has heard that laugh before
flees

362.365 - the invitation

a man spoke with Death
some say Death answered
others say no
it was like talking to any god
perhaps he or she hears you
even more perhaps he or she answers
in a way you can divine
in any case he spoke to Death
why do you hide in shadows?
in night?  in niches?
if you came out and showed your face
if you smiled now and then
nodded to return a greeting
perhaps we wouldn't pretend
you are not always near
always waiting
we might grow accustomed to you
friendly with you even
invite you to parties
so you needn't crash them
might even welcome your arms at last
might envy one who had accepted
your invitation
and if you do decide to come out
join us in the sunlight
then maybe wear some other color than black
probably stay away from red as well
blues would work
greys, browns, lavender, I think
you might prefer yellows or oranges
come on
come out
share the days and nights with us
laugh with us
take the chance
we might learn to like you

361.365 - seen by few

two cities coexist here
one everyone sees
banking, high towers,
asphalt rivers flooded with cars
contractors, stockbrokers
car salesmen, dentists
architects, soldiers, cops
soldiers, cops
soldiers and more cops
and poor folk all in a row
probably there is a heart here
and some would say a mind
there are poets who find romance here
others who find courage and will

but I see the shadows and ghosts
another city the new builders
thought they destroyed
a white mud brick house
two walls standing and half a roof
a blue mud brick house
where half a piano lies
in half a room
and monkeys stare at humans
who invade their world
a stone tower stands
what is left from a castle
some family built
expecting the new world
to be kinder to them than the old
at the foot of the tower
someone plays a guitar so passionately
the woman in the top of the tower undresses
even though she should be
getting ready for dinner
her daughter in a bedroom
behind a wall we can no longer see
tears petals from flowers and drops them
to swirl around the guitar player

ten miles to the south
come the trucks and the crane
who think to end this foolishness forever
but are instead eternally trapped
in the amber the church bells make of time

360.365 - the new order

"it was," the Disembodied Voice proclaimed
so we all knew whatever followed must be true
"the first successful transference
of a madness to a god"
the press conference went silent
before pandemonium broke out
two dozen questions hurled at once
at the unoccupied podium
and the security guards began to clear the room
it must have been a catching thing though
Mars declared for sociopathy
Venus for nymphomania
there was no apparent change in behavior
for Loki or for Coyote
Zeus selected megalomania
Apollo narcissism
until all the good ones had been used up
and Jupiter and Odin wondered out loud
if the lesser madnesses needed to be assigned
perhaps to the lesser gods
they needn't have worried though
all the madnesses soon were gone
and there was the almost to be expected grumbling
about the arbitrariness of the selections
many were sure they could have parceled them out
more appropriately than free choice had
the world, meanwhile, carried on
pretty much like it always had
including that certain Brahmin worried out loud
when the new maladies would strike

359.365 - writing a waste

I do not know what to say
all day, off and on
I've sat and listened for the poem
today's poem, the image
metaphor, the click of thought
something important enough to write about
something someone else would listen to
and think, "yes!  I know that!"
even, especially, if they hadn't
before they read or heard it
all day, off and on
I've stared into the wrong side of a mirror
waiting for the image to appear
all day, off and on
I've listened to the traffic outside
to people passing by in mid-conversation
trying to catch a rhythm
or even half a thought
I could match with another of my own
and maybe build the clopping of horse hooves
into...  into...
tonight the wind sighs, rattles my window
knocks at the door
surely the spark of a poem hides in one of those
no, I am emptiness, a desert even a lizard spurns
if I must write, then I must write that waste

358.365 - a lesson

once, when an old man lay dying
out among the trees and the brush
near where a mighty river
flowed into the sea
his grandson found him
and exclaimed and gnashed his teeth
"stop it, grandson," the old man said
"someone will think you are a white man"
the grandson stopped his rant and begged
"grandfather, what must I do?
how can I keep you in comfort
and get you back to our lands, our family?"
the old man laughed, "I am not in comfort
I doubt that you can find a comfort for me
as for the other, are you not family?
do I not grasp this earth and make it mine
at least for the time I have left?
be still, sit down, I must speak to you
must tell you of serious things
you have not learned or have forgotten"
the young man looked ashamed
"grandfather, you have taught me much
the creation story of our people
and how our family came to be
you have taught me how to sit still
to stand quietly, to listen, to see
you have taught me scents
you have taught me tastes of many things
and how to touch and learn from my fingertips
you have taught me to hunt and to fight
to converse with our enemies
you have taught me patience with women
and the pleasures that follow patience
and the wisdom I can learn from women
if I will just hush.  what is left?
what more must you teach me?"
the old man smiled and eased his body
"to sit with what must be," he said
so the young man sat
he held his grandfather's hand
he sat and the old man lay
the noises of the forest entertained them
an hour passed, then another
the old man smiled and whispered
"perhaps you have learned"
he closed his eyes and relaxed
and after a while the young man knew
the old man had escaped
he wept then, the young man did
then did what he must to honor the dead
to honor his family and people
to honor their ancestors
then stood for a moment in quiet
and left

357.365 - unused words

but what about all the words, he said
you don't use
we sat on a bench that overlooked
a field where it seemed
two hundred kids ran around
after five soccer balls
or maybe each other
half a dozen parents stood around the field
some of them grinned
but maybe three dozen surrounded
another field across it
where two teams played dignified soccer
with referees and coaches
rules, tickets, and scores
they lurk, I said
play on a nearby field, perhaps
I nodded toward what we watched
but he looked at me, puzzled
I tried again
they're always about
playing disorderly games with each other
each ready to be a substitiute
if we run out of team members
I thought a moment
a few, of course
will probably never play
not on the real field
antidisestablishmentarianism
for instance
I've never thought of a use for it
and it's too cumbersome for play
a great dray of a word
requiring Clydesdales to pull it
all my horses are smaller
more nimble
could barely move the wagon empty
yet quite capable of moving you
from where you are to where I am
he stared at me a while
as if I should go on
then made a dissatisfied face
buttermilk, he said, rutabaga,
airfoil, Neufchatel, spigot
perfectly good words
I smiled and nodded
he looked back at the two fields
maybe watched for a while
then turned back to study me
I think I get it, he said
then stood and walked away
muttering embalmed, station wagon
elephantine, emerald, quartzite

356.365 - ancestor

nowhere do I see
the mighty armor of our ancestors
the ones they tell us of in books or plays
who led armies, won battles, thrones
and helped shape a new world
I suspect none of them were my ancestors
little men of little passions
small families huddled in small houses
sleeping with eyes tight against the night
ears stoppered against noises
hands clutching covers instead of swords
and in the daytime farming furtively
their closest kin the mice who stole from them
I hope I wrong them, I hope at least one
lost temper and used hoe as a weapon
even if he was immediately cut down
his family and neighbors woudn't think
to raise a statue to him
but mentally I sure do

355.365 - peril

I remember a clear afternoon
me and my Harley partway down
a steep hillside
what wanted to happen
was a slide and a tumble
two bodies at the bottom
neither with any way to get up
or get help
what was needed
was some traction, a pathway
despite the slipperiness
and the control to climb it slowly
with gentle applications
of throttle and clutch
defiance of gravity
long enough to get back
to the road
somewhere inside myself
I found patience and experimentation
and that gentleness
and made a way back
from where I never needed to be
except for my own curiosity
my own dare
I remember sitting on my Harley
on the edge of the asphalt
when we'd made it back up
grinning down the hillside
at where we might have ended up lying
grinning again riding the curves
of the asphalt
remembering
and glad to be back on the road

353.365 - surrender

no, it's not like giving up coffee
I don't even know how that happened
only that I spent eleven days in the hospital
getting past congestive heart failure
and when they let me wheelchair out to the car
I didn't need coffee and haven't since then
no, that wasn't easy, that was eleven days
weaning me from coffee and the life
that went with it, a life I can barely remember
almost a year later, giving up riding my Harley
was dropping it a second time on my left leg
was shattering both bones in my lower leg
was giving up highways and roads
but keeping freeways and streets
dwellings and stores, warehouses and gas stations
but never again the swell of the ground
or the thrill of an ess leaned into just right
never the smell of wheat whipping my face
nor the icy sudden scent of wildflowers waking
into spring, nor the other icy sudden dodge
of a car driver's move without thought for me
ah, you bastards, I outskilled you half a million times
and even at the end, it was my own legs failing
my own reflexes slowing that told me to dismount
and make you climb a sidewalk to kill me
or crush me as one of your own, you didn't chase
me off my Harley, I gave it up and still miss it
and still know that was the choice that made sense
but oh, when I think of what I gave up
sometimes the choice seems so wrong
I almost want to undo it

352.365 - after watching "13 Rue Madeleine"

"yessir," he confided
and I couldn't help but notice
the bumpkin in his drawl
he looked at me wide-eyed
blinked twice and nodded
"it must've been a wonderful time
way back then" he paused
nodded again and stared at me
"saw me one of them movies, y'know?
the good ones, black and white
wasn't nobody but white folks in it
and women wore dresses that covered'm proper, y'know?
was made 'bout the days when World War II was startin'
we found out the Germans had spies over here!
natcherly we had to make us a school
teach young men and women to talk like Germans
or French or even Brits when they needed
had to teach'm to lie, steal, and cheat
they was good American kids and didn't know
nuthin about them kinda things, y'know?
then we gave'm some tests and flew'm
across the ocean where they had to fool
the Brits who were spozedly on our side
'cept we could never be too sure
sometimes they were on their own side
then we had to drop them into France
where the soldiers wuz German
never did figure that out
but it must've been so
and those kids they were sharp
they knew when to talk French
and when to talk German
and they fooled folks mosta the time
'cept when they didn't and got shot
but they died heroes, y'know
you could tell
'cause we won the war
just like it sez in the books"

351.365 - Nebraska

I once thought of it as freedom
miles of emptiness
nothing to stop even the wind
a car can drive all day
and the driver not know any change
but now a friend
not Nebraska but a woman
who once hailed from there
and has been ensnared
pulled back
and kept against her will
by the state
caught in its own coils
doing evil now in what was surely designed
once for doing good
or at least preventing evil
the state bobbing relentlessly
as a pump drawing oil from a well
and people can only watch apparently
another poet sings Nebraska
and I hear his poem spoiled
instead of my hearing freedom
I see now a prison
and a jail
a bureaucrat's office
a doctor
endlessly testing and testing
for the evidence of drugs he will never find
testing and testing
Nebraska does not even need a cage
to keep the woman trapped
where would she run?
and how far?
and the doctor tests again
and still finds nothing
and the bureaucrat tells him
test again
and the days in Nebraska
run on the same
and if there is an afterworld
Kafka smiles in it and whispers
Nebraska

350.365 - why I am thankful for a world that contains Donny Jackson

not because I know
or even can imagine
how he does it
but I have heard him say
he sits with it
until it is ready to speak
he did not tell me what "it" was
but I had a guess
the essence of the poem
the hurt child
or the young woman bruised
the boy or young man
caught on the edge of life's knife
and I who felt
almost like an intruder myself
listening to Donny confide
imagined him sitting up long nights
silently beside that essence
a companion more than a nurse
a silent understanding and compassion
waiting out the bewilderment
until the essence stirred and took shape
still a shadow in darkness
but now with arms and legs and hair
a face Donny could almost discern
looked over at Donny
and shared the horror of experience
for Donny writes like I do
or like I think I do
he makes personal and clear
those times when being human
bears witness to the ugliness
the rest of us inflict
upon those chosen as scapegoats
I write what I see
when moonlight probes a diamond
I did not know I held
and for a moment what people feel
caught in the turmoil of the threat of death
reverberates in my whole heart and mind
but Donny, or I-think-Donny writes
after a similar reverberation
shakes his whole body
emotions he forgets he has
a mind wide and deep enough
to cradle another soul
however long it takes
for metaphor to grow
terror to shape teeth
and all the worst of what men do or say
to also find what makes them still human
and makes the darkness so dark
we almost cannot stand the starlight
that shows ourselves that much more clearly

349.365 - the fortune

the fortune teller sat there
embarrassed, I suppose
she looked at me
I thought I saw sympathy
but may have just fooled myself
"there will be no charge, of course"
she said, stared at the door
"but," I said, "what did you see?"
she looked at me
she looked through me
past me
"that's just it," she said
"you will pay me
I will decline
you will insist
and then you'll stand
turn and walk out of here"
she paused and touched her ear
"and then nothing"
"oh, come on!" I laughed
"do I turn left?  right?
walk straight ahead?
is there a woman?"
she met my eyes a moment
then stared at the door
"you do not understand"
she said, "I don't.
you walk out of here
then I see nothing"
annoyed, I stood
threw a fifty on her table
stepped to the door
glanced back
she stared at me and past
hands over her mouth
I ducked out of her tent

348.365 - the pegasus

the unicorn landed on the path
in front of me
folded its great wings close
stared at me
shook his massive head, horn-crowned
and looked relieved
"at least you can't see me," he said
and looked about himself
at rocks and forest, gravel on the path
maybe the moon above
barely trusting myself to speak
wide-eyed, I nodded
I pointed, touched my nose, and traced
the spiral out toward him
he looked annoyed and shook his head again
"I'm told you can't
that makes it so, it's pointless for you to argue"
I had heard managers
preachers and politicians, so knew the logic
or lack thereof would triumph
"but I can," I said, out loud, as if that proved anything
perhaps it did
"well, if you must argue," the great beast said
"impertinence!"
it unfolded mighty wings and leapt into the air
swept down those wings
and from aloft looked down on me a moment
then shook his head again
winged off away with one proud blare into the night
and I suppose
I missed whatever potent message he brought me
by arguing trivia

347.365 - final words

the old poet smiled when asked
what he would have his last words be
grinned, coughed, and whispered
"many"

346.365 - three poems

       the cowboy

culls one more horse out of the pack

rides it until it throws him

knowing, one ride soon

will be one more than his body's good for

this afternoon though, at least so far

it is the horse that will wind up broken

       a different aspect

              for Alexis Rhone Fancher

we knew one side of you

we thought we knew you

and then you shifted

the stone in its setting

and oh!

there was so much more

       anomaly

the hiker stops and stares

the great stone, taller than four or five of him

seems to rest on the sand

a monument perhaps to some vast ship's prow

that had wandered away from that ship's body

and come to rest high up on a lonely beach

this one, this stone, would have plowed miles of sand

to reach this place and tower over him

at once so still and complete

and incomplete without the vessel

that would explain such a prow

he smiles to imagine that ship also turned to stone

shaking itself out of the sand to rejoin the prow

then yells when the earth shakes as if in answer

but this time only leaves what looks

like a wake for this prow's former traveling

and dust hanging in the air

a ghost, perhaps, of the great ship still coming

345.365 - what shall we say

what shall we say in self-defense
when our nephews and nieces
or, heaven help us, sons and daughters
say to us, say, you were alive back when,
back when - and here we have to let them
fill in the blank, something important to them
and we stare a moment then look embarrassed
remembering we were drawing a bath
or hoping to get laid, or target shooting
for heaven's sake, nothing important
not even to us, but important enough
at the time that we completely missed
the bullet through that window
the riot after that speech
or whoever it was completing that painting
whatever we say they will look unbelieving
sure they will notice and attend
the significant events of their lifetimes

344,365 - red madness

I got lost in the instructions
when they told me to think green
but I was worried about a red scare
and the sirens hadn't even started
but the butterflies were turning pink
and the red squirrels had hidden away
the red foxes only came out of their burrows at night
and then only at the quarter moons
when the hounds sang their regimental songs
and the hares dashed into vegetable gardens
it was a mad time the preachers agreed
with madder times coming
and we all needed to congregate in prayers
until the hounds could return normalcy
and the sun could take back the night

343.365 - hard sympathy

the dragon does not roar

nor exhale flame

his or her eyes droop

and leak as if they wept

a dragon weep?

this alone is almost cause

to give up on my fantasies

but then the dragon coughs

deep wracking coughs

that start almost in gargles

I want to pat him on the back

and sympathize

get him some lemonade

offer a lozenge

the dragon glares at me

dares me to use my sword or lance

or get the hell out

bother him again in a week or two

this is no time for heroics

but if all I seek is deception

then do my damnedest

the dragon closes his eyes

lays down his mighty head

I hunt through cabinets

and closets until I find

a blanket I can pull over him

he mutters curses

but tucks it closer

and growls that if I come back

he'll try to remember

and if he does he'll make

my death a little easier

342.365 - sparks

fire!  light!
missing from the roil yesterday
that took me over
that dragged me under
has found its way back in
has found a corner near a temple
to dance and blaze in
shine out on the ugh still roiling
has found a crack
somewhere near a shoulder
to gleam from
defy the mess
still whirling inside
fire, light
is willing to work slowly
take back its losses
spark thought again
insist the others
clean up the mess they've made
but while it waits and demands
to dance up joy
even in taking back so little
even in beginning to bring back
balance
the leaps between brain cells
fire!  light!

341.365 - on getting suddenly sick

howling down the night
a roil of water, earth, and air
surrounded me and invaded
until I was the perfect
bad cold incarnate
then extricated itself
observed me from a foot away
smiled its satisfaction
and howled away to find
another person to involute
with these dread symptoms

340.365 - observations in wonder

we invent being five years old
maybe any age, but right now
I am hearing five year olds
making up the world they will play in
at least for the next few minutes
choosing characters
assigning attributes, strengths, flaws
choosing laws and goals
the adult of me wonders if the game
will be as much fun as the creation
but also admires the completeness
while leaving chance room to wiggle
the adult of me also recognizes
that they do the same in learning what's real
maybe they even do it as a group
I never knew that group
at five, if I remember right
I played in the woods as often as I could
but part of that was telling myself stories
trying to see the grownup world from different heights
sneaking to the edge and watching folks
trying to figure out streetcars, for instance
or how women's clothes worked
oh yes, little boys notice and notice and notice
but nobody never explains nuthin interesting
or that was my experience
growing up alien in a foreign land
so we invent and make up and concoct
and if our guesses work, settle for that
no wonder science teachers have such a job to do
and then we're thrown out in the real world on our own
with nuthin guiding us but lies grownups have told
that we can plainly see don't hold
maybe we do what five-year-olds do once again
invent, make up, concoct, try out
until we find what works and doesn't
no wonder we need law courts
but still what wonderfully inventive
explorers five-year-olds are!

339.365 - lion talk

          If a lion could speak, we could not understand him.
               Ludwig Wittgenstein

imagine it, if you please
one morning the lion chooses to speak
and whatever human attends faints
whatever the lion said, it wouldn't be
"Good morning, how are you?"
and wouldn't be gossip about Troy Larrabee
or dispatches from one of our many wars
it would be something important to the lion
his sense of honor or dignity
or maybe just a protest of his treatment
and we, based on our behavior so far
would dutifully record it, study it
pass it around, argue about its meaning
and whether he was being facetious
the lion would die, of boredom or of years
before we reached a general agreement
of what he meant and sent
the proper official to answer him

338.365 - a proposition questioned

peace, a poet invokes
the peace of the writing desk
the peace of writing
and I sit up to wonder
is this peace I feel?
I am the one who wonders about guns
who happily owns one and shoots it
cleans it, wipes it
while friends around me clamor
that guns should be taken away
from our freedoms
guns are too dangerous
especially in the hands of
whomever did the last killings
they think they know just how
to keep "those people"
from ever killing again
and well they might
if no one had any guns
then no one could stand
and kill people around him
not with guns
and maybe indeed
if you took guns away from me and mine
no one would ever think to pick up a rock
and brain a brother or a father
no one would ever pick up a kitchen knife
and drive it into a mate or friend
no one would ever imagine again
a garotte, a sickle, or a scythe
but I waste my arguments upon myself
and need to get back to the inquiry
is peace a product of writing
I think not

337.365 - dawn thoughts

how does the dawn happen? a poet asks
seriously, as well as I can tell
I think, but we have explained all that
meaning physicists have, and
pretending for a moment that
all those years of studying physics
gives me some claim on them today
I think of sun and earth, rotation
and geometry, refraction, color
but the poet answers himself and
it is none of these, something almost
medieval instead, and I stare
trying to imagine some universe
in which orange dances on tiptoes
just out of sight, waiting for the call
from some director hired for this dawn
gold popping up next, then red
and so on, and am amazed that anyone
still thinks like that in this late year
then frown and wonder if it is a metaphor
and if so, for what, ignorance, I guess
but no, ignorance surrounds us like a fog
and never dawns, as well as I can tell
so I am left with a poet and a dawn and
a serious lack of science and think,
it isn't dawn he means, it's sunset
and what follows isn't night but
the sadder darkness of the mind

336.365 - deep dive

it is, perhaps, the big thoughts
the deep ones
the ones that graze the ocean floors
of conscience
of epistemology
that I fail to have
being too busy with the particulars
the girl who died in the gutter
stabbed sixteen times
whose killer was elegantly chauffeured away
or the boy shot thirty times by cops
who confused the cell phone that he held
for a gun, or so they said
the man who walked out to buy cigarettes
and never returned to help raise his daughter
a whole society built on white supremacy
whose beneficiaries deny any exists
I never get around to Wittgenstein
or Heidegger and know enough of Kant
I think, to ever learn more
I write instead of a rooster perched on a rooftree
a boy in an attic wrapping a hangman's noose
a woman sharpening a letter opener
and let the stories wrap themselves
around ambiguities
or partial knowledges
and miss whatever pleasures accrete
to diving so deep one needs a pressure suit

335.365 - prophecy

read poems
he said
read endlessly
each poem leaves
a claw mark
in your imagination
and after long whiles
you'll turn and see
letters
hieroglyphs
glyphs without the hiero
arranged in order
so they spell out
your most twisted dreams
memories unresolved
and stories you didn't know
you had been brewing
and poems
or something like them
will pour off those walls
through your fingers
sometimes unwilling
and people will call
those results
your greatest works
or nonsense