Wednesday, June 30, 2010

when the dark starts

in staccato chirp, whir of
hunting bats calling
to the strange insects
not name by name
they feel for a presence in the air
while
moths puff like syllables of incantations
feathered toward any light at all

with a blur junebugs suddenly appear
like portly magicians
then bumble close upon the window screen
like so many failed houdinis
they bounce along interstices

(oh the space between us
is so hard to understand
sometimes)

one by one each plant
calls down the water from the air
linden ash fern and grass
and
what are the things
that we cannot name
and can we tell the tone of our call returned?

Sunday, June 27, 2010

on the way to lakeville to drop off my oldest daughter for a stay with her cousin

we both decide this ride
will be better with the windows down
stuart on the radio

oh
if i could make sense of it all...

we both smile as he hits
the high note

driving south
the warm wind pours in
backlit in her hair like wild honey
her eyes slide slowly closed
while the miles go

oh
if i could make sense of it all
i wish that i could sing

while the miles go
hitting all of our high notes
my little girl
i am swearing to myself
whatever will come
i will not stop seeing how beautiful you are

and oh
if i could make sense of it all
i wish that i could sing
i'd stay in a melody
i would float along in everlasting song

Saturday, June 19, 2010

light rail

grey, stringy, and damp
hair, shirt a faded
bruise color
she boards the light
rail car

the smell of the earth
the rise in your throat like
smooth white wands where a stump stood
once (and before
a tree?)

her eyes shut plywood
over dark windows

i don't know her at all
could be everyone she knows
falls in love with her

but when her head drooping
drowsy jerks
i close my eyes too

the worst things
i have ever seen:
light of a gun glinting from a man's
arm straight as a rail
cedar and 26th

light rail
gliding silent
on electric wings
gathering a crossing car
into its deathly arms
hiawatha and 35th

the look of someone
opening their eyes
knowing the fact they are
alive
gives nothing
to no one silently
gliding on electric wings we slow

gather up our crossing lives
38th street station
light rain glistens grey
strings of damp rail sky
the color of bruise i didn't
know i didn't know i
did not know.

Monday, June 14, 2010

Hymn

My attempt to play a lovely old hymn I was reminded of today.

Friday, June 11, 2010

the romantic turn of mind

1
what are you,
me, that guy
over there with the paper bag
under his arm walking in the twilight
in the park

or the biking man panting into his phone
ok i'll see you in a little bit
he snaps it closed

2
on the hill
by the creek looking down
upon a single wordsworth tree

the romantic turn of mind
and the significance
it will assign

why do the bugs
always get
so bad out here?

3
if we can't be silent
Jesus like
we speak like Pilate
half in interrogatives

these questions
like stones
like scrollwork on these pale stones

4
in new york london paris prague
scrollwork upon this high facade

the words that came will come again
scrollwork upon this stone facade
half-ruined
how ancient structures speak of death
how these old buildings long for death
don't look up there

all of us pressed against the crushed stone
streets
our lives
the teeming of their beauty
in their passing by
hosanna

in the highest
palm branch clouds

sing loud

Thursday, June 10, 2010

underground

what about the things
we never knew?

what about
the ending and

what about when things
that grow
have no place to go? is this like
the slab of the sidewalk
shifted

growing
a new end

the tree quietly reaching across
ten feet and 20 odd years

trips you

Sunday, June 06, 2010

Vaguely after Hank Williams

I'm sure I stole this tune from a few songs, but I can't think exactly what they are.

Friday, June 04, 2010

mother's wings

have you seen how
the hawk
upon the wind rides godlike
as death sharp-
eyed wings dried red

and the little nesting bird
rising up from chick beaks
and sticks

how she will harry about his back

the flurry of wings
her sharp arcing lines

the grace of her desperation

love
all the flurry of her wings

the slow circling
of his rising retreat

Thursday, June 03, 2010

with the wind

you are
a biking god

until you must turn
back

is it that the gods
have no home?