Selected Poems
Ode to the Age of Mechanical Reproducibility
First there was the machine creating words.
Yet this time not a human machine. Here, no purple quill scratching
yellow parchment in the rain of red candles. Words strung together
in magazines stuffed under old radiators. No more ancient joy
of recital where wine flows from poet's lips to lover's face.
Here, machines storing up dead words for next year.
No more drinking halls where bards sing of those good kings
going down to dragons' dens for the peace of people's night.
But words painted on walls in large white rooms in foreign cities
explain what it feels like when one wants to turn over a rock
in a cool field and see what crawls from underneath. People
who pay with their souls to have a few of those old precious words
adorn pleas for their coffers to be replenished by the acquisition
of artificial food. Here, no more prophets with electric hair
crying their visions from mountain tops. But mornings try to bring
something, continue past the sky, and distribute their roses
over the dead land. For here, too many garlands of fatted words,
slippery mouths stealing whatever they can from each other,
hands spilling pain into the air. But voices, scattered, looking up,
very high up, on some days watching cold leaves fall to earth.
Coasting through the twilight some birds stop and laugh
at what's below. The night swells as emaciated angels
look for a place to spend the night.(Windhover Magazine 1995)
* * * * * * *
Liberty
I
Liberty and generosity, quiet ships on the new water.
Here is that other life. Tired bones regenerating
themselves. Conquering the crops. Here we are.
That red flame in the clean sky.
Liberty and genocide. Rose colored dust on hard skin.
Bathing in long moons, grandfather's stories of wild elks
by the blue rocks. Crane tails flowing from buffalo robes.
Here comes a ship, the smell of olive trees.
Far-away frogs singing near the water scatter
in the half light, ships full of voices, hairy faces
on the turquoise sea. The big ships and writing,
the forest burning. Look they say, look at all that land.
New lives. My family's memories resting under the water rushes.
The wind roars over the hunting grounds, blazes under black sun.
Old feet kicking new land.
II
Fighter planes above the city today.
In the brassy moonlight, people drink things, laugh,
and wonder. The stars watch and wait. Hope is lost
in the thick air, buried by hard windows, strangled
in the sad weeds. What's left? Voices floating
in the stolen moment, celebrating others' deaths
in the swollen night. The wet streets. The moon drops
its white nail on the window ledge. Sitting before
different pages with the same hands. Soon. All is lost.
What matters is to do, to do something. To do something
before violet light fills the air already filled with waiting
and waking and sleeping between the thick choices.(Windhover Magazine 1996)
* * * * * * *
City
Another life is being led
through the pattern of traffic.
Working woman with violet heart
sliced in two
looks for her lover
Come to me near the river he said.
But she can't.
Must work like papa
count tomatoes
cut pork.
Quiet hands sort onions
in the dirty moonlight.
She could be sitting now
turning soft pages
without a smell.
But she must express the store.
Her apron or her heel
listens to a blank
shopper's reasoning.
Waiting for awhile to skip upstairs
white wine and peaches
there's baby too.
Head tries to forget.
She dies again every evening
thinking about living
with her back
and tired bread waiting for day.
Open forms of evening
dark coming up
we admire her
honest as cotton.
Look at her colors.
They'll keep until she's ready
to bury them
as her child looks up
and squeezes mice
that peek from hollow shade.(Windhover Magazine 1996)
* * * * * * *
After the Storm
After the storm we were left with ourselves huddled
in some corner waiting to remember what to do next.
In the next room gray light astonished a wall,
and questioned the existence of its silent energy.
We walked on the ceiling for awhile, put bandages
on assorted fingers, and peeked outside
to assess the damage. The evening lay heavy on our eyelids.
The sky searched for a tone it had once known,
while the wind ripened into autumn ritual,
waiting for us to admire the porcelain of its breath.
Somewhere a child is running loose,
a bird is startled toward a field's edge: living bird phantom.
Then there is the darkness, finally,
we go on speaking to the night, get tired,
and speak of childhood: skinny mist rising
off of waterfalls, wandering animals sniffing for sure-footed food.
Something happens, absence makes itself known to us.
Some other thing dominates the world, breathes dimly, lives
for the flesh of dreamers, who squeeze their legs with hearts pounding,
huddled in some corner. There is knowledge in the eye,
but it is in the broken rains that we seek answers.
Energy reaches out so far that it denies ourselves, raising a dusty window,
digging for onions in the moonlight, sitting on a lean
bullet of silence. An orphan of simplicity knocks on the forest,
restores mystery and kindles youth, brings cold soup on a hot
summer's day, becomes beautiful and silent.
We have a broken wall, automobile fenders, mayonnaise jars,
and must be patient with the new shapes, the naked colors, the orbits of words.
The nails and boards of our arms become drugged
with the harsh stars, the pointless battle of planets, once clean faces,
and a garden full of weeds. A cricket passes an open door,
we disguise ourselves, and become part of the new world.(The Cellar Door 1984)
* * * * * * *
Somewhere
I
Ragged boys in the streets of a village
in Mozambique show us their dirty
thin wrists in the dying green light
of another day in the uneven brown streets.
They will sleep huddled
five or six together this evening
wrapped in potato sacks, stomachs screaming
white pain, bones in the numb air
rubbing against grey faces.
Scarred ankles cuddled together
in old newspapers trying to wrap out the Western cold.
Mama in the north somewhere, papa in the south.
"We spend day beg, no eat two day."
"I like come America go school be capitalist."
"Have warm TV bed food." "I cum wi u?"
Their dry lips rustle through the radio
and I turn my head.
II
Somewhere under Metropolis city
pale ankles in a silver train
going to shop for last night's dream.
Maybe an Oriental image
for the blue room
or an Arab one
for the white.
Oh those days when I can't buy.
But today can, can, can.
Pure fingernails scratch perfect skin.
Green eyes gaze through tunnel glass.
Today, today. Beautiful room, beautiful store.
Grey limousine. Smooth boxes.
Cold diamonds
from the hot earth of Africa.
Tonight, tonight. Indian food
on small tables. Slow images
of night
passing by
the restaurant window.
Oh city, oh honey,
oh more money
made
on the wasted lives
of those
peo
ple.(Windhover Magazine 1997)
* * * * * * *
Evening Eclogue
Can your quiet face and wise breathing be preserved here
as in an ancient statue? Why can't it be held forever
between hands, the soft brown hair dancing
in the window's light? You will turn and whisper
through wild wet teeth suffered dreams
and the wood smoke of memory. I don't know
what this means to others. This square room,
world of my life. Sleepy words grow out of you
like fragile branches on black trees. One by one
your words are like soft little bodies shining
out in the dark. They turn blue and speckle
the skinny moonlight. And we're here just like people
everywhere in the vineyards and stockyards and
backyards and graveyards. But here it is different.
Your skin is honey and your sleeping throat whispers
fat blueberries. The world sleeps and sometimes
groans. The cat's face glows and I sit up and wait
for a miracle to appear in the heavy darkness. The cat
hears the fog drifting by and your words sink away
into another world filled with silent mice
and girls in yellow dresses playing in an autumn field.
I don't know what this means, but I can't live
without your sleep. Writing poems in the
tightening dark, without commas, maybe
with a flashlight. This square white space,
space of my captivity. But here you will always be,
on these spots on a page, even while your sleep
freezes, your waking waits, and your voice stops.
Then new words are red ribbons spinning
like spiders in the black distance.(The Blue Notebooks 1992)
* * * * * * *
Envoi
Small animals crawl in and out
of your dream, sometimes slipping
through your fingers.You, someone with a distant name,
smile at me in the spring,
bearing a world of flowers
in your words.Later, you talk to your friends
in the street, wearing your blue
shoes, and fingering
a silver brace of pistols.You said you'd like to shoot
at the stars, watch them fall
to the bottom of the ocean,
and glow among the red coral.But there is already too much war,
you said, while violet rain
started to fall, clinging
to the space behind your ear.In the smooth moonlight, you think
about walking down a quiet street.
You think about the cool energy
in your feet. Then fly away
into the dark air.(Windhover Magazine 1997)