Month: January 2023

Posted on by Dave Bonta

After work

In the morning I went to Mr. Downing’s bedside and gave him an account what I had done as to his guests, and I went thence to my Lord Widdrington who I met in the street, going to seal the patents for the judges to-day, and so could not come to dinner. I called upon Mr. Calthrop about the money due to my Lord. Here I met with Mr. Woodfine and drank with him at the Sun in Chancery Lane and so to Westminster Hall, where at the lobby I spoke with the rest of my guests and so to my office. At noon went by water with Mr. Maylard and Hales to the Swan in Fish Street at our Goal Feast, where we were very merry at our Jole of Ling, and from thence after a great and good dinner Mr. Falconberge would go drink a cup of ale at a place where I had like to have shot at a scholar that lay over the house of office.
Thence calling on Mr. Stephens and Wootton (with whom I drank) about business of my Lord’s I went to the Coffee Club where there was nothing done but choosing of a Committee for orders. Thence to Westminster Hall where Mrs. Lane and the rest of the maids had their white scarfs, all having been at the burial of a young bookseller in the Hall. Thence to Mr. Sheply’s and took him to my house and drank with him in order to his going to-morrow. So parted and I sat up late making up my accounts before he go.
This day three citizens of London went to meet Monk from the Common Council.

going to sea with the sun
west of my office

I drink like a scholar
at the burial of a book


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Friday 20 January 1659/60, a revision of this erasure.

Posted on by Luisa A. Igloria

Umami

Since the '80s, the discovery of this  
            fifth basic taste has gained more

popularity. It comes from naturally occurring 
            glutamates in fish, kombu, mushrooms,

dashi, soybean paste. Scientists say it's no wonder 
           our taste buds snap awake: they're connected  

to our earliest memories of pleasure. It's in cheese, 
           fermented foods, and in breast milk which is high 

in amino acids. Think of babies, faces cupped against
           their mothers' breasts, heads tipped back after

they've had their fill. Then, there's texture: 
           the pleasing melange of sensations spreading 

through the roof and the back of the tongue,  
          a fuzzy warmth down the throat. Mostly, I prefer  

savory over sweet, salty over sour and bitter— 
         One perfect oyster globe, the reward of buttery 

yellow uni gonads lifted to the mouth with chopsticks 
        after tapping carefully around the spiny shell.
Posted on by Dave Bonta

Sacerdotal

the maple with a double helix
of poison ivy succubi

its branches that are not its branches
just as naked now

the beech with a hidden hollow
hoarding meltwater

skinny stalks in the meadow
fern tangles reduced to ribs

winter makes it easy to see
and miss the missing

*

but trees can shine
in an icy blue depth of sky

and church bells from town
remind me it’s sunday

so i walk among ridgetop oaks
as if through a cathedral

who can resist a bit
of sabbath-day LARPing

to my usual seat
on a stack of flat rocks

cue a coyote trotting in
from the other direction

who stops 50 feet away
and gazes past me

flag of breath curling up
into the sunlight

and takes a few more steps
as i reach for my phone

a flash of sun from
the reflective case

and coyote is disappearing down-ridge
tail streaming behind

a lapse in faith
i instantly regret

my consumer’s impulse to capture
to have and to hold

whatever sacrament may exist
apart from the encounter itself

i think of those who will never
see a carnivore in the wild

or walk in a true forest
or visit the ocean

too poor or too much
in the middle of things

either way a poverty
that should appall us

*

i finish my tea
begin to feel a kind of warmth

a split in the heartwood
of an old black cherry tree

opens with a ratchety cry
wound like a sideways mouth

taking all
the wind’s calls

no room for piety in this hymnal
the earth has teeth

Posted on by Dave Bonta

Interior

Sam Pepys and me

This morning I was sent for to Mr. Downing, and at his bed side he told me, that he had a kindness for me, and that he thought that he had done me one; and that was, that he had got me to be one of the Clerks of the Council; at which I was a little stumbled, and could not tell what to do, whether to thank him or no; but by and by I did; but not very heartily, for I feared that his doing of it was but only to ease himself of the salary which he gives me.
After that Mr. Sheply staying below all this time for me we went thence and met Mr. Pierce, so at the Harp and Ball drank our morning draft and so to Whitehall where I met with Sir Ant. Cooper and did give him some answer from my Lord and he did give us leave to keep the lodgings still. And so we did determine thereupon that Mr. Sheply might now go into the country and would do so to-morrow.
Back I went by Mr. Downing’s order and staid there till twelve o’clock in expectation of one to come to read some writings, but he came not, so I staid all alone reading the answer of the Dutch Ambassador to our State, in answer to the reasons of my Lord’s coming home, which he gave for his coming, and did labour herein to contradict my Lord’s arguments for his coming home. Thence to my office and so with Mr. Sheply and Moore, to dine upon a turkey with Mrs. Jem, and after that Mr. Moore and I went to the French Ordinary, where Mr. Downing this day feasted Sir Arth. Haselrigge, and a great many more of the Parliament, and did stay to put him in mind of me. Here he gave me a note to go and invite some other members to dinner tomorrow. So I went to White Hall, and did stay at Marsh’s, with Simons, Luellin, and all the rest of the Clerks of the Council, who I hear are all turned out, only the two Leighs, and they do all tell me that my name was mentioned the last night, but that nothing was done in it.
Hence I went and did leave some of my notes at the lodgings of the members and so home. To bed.

in the heart of the country
we expect no ambassador

coming here
is coming home
to ore and the ordinary feast

I am put in mind of a marsh
with all the night in it


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 19 January 1659/60, a revision of this erasure from 2015.

Posted on by Dave Bonta

Autocrat

To my office and from thence to Will’s, and there Mr. Sheply brought me letters from the carrier and so I went home. After that to Wilkinson’s, where we had a dinner for Mr. Talbot, Adams, Pinkny and his son, but his son did not come. Here we were very merry, and while I was here Mr. Fuller came thither and staid a little, while. After that we all went to my Lord’s, whither came afterwards Mr. Harrison, and by chance seeing Mr. Butler coming by I called him in and so we sat drinking a bottle of wine till night. At which time Mistress Ann came with the key of my Lord’s study for some things, and so we all broke up and after I had gone to my house and interpreted my Lord’s letter by his character I came to her again and went with her to her lodging and from thence to Mr. Crew’s, where I advised with him what to do about my Lord’s lodgings and what answer to give to Sir Ant. Cooper and so I came home and to bed.
All the world is at a loss to think what Monk will do: the City saying that he will be for them, and the Parliament saying he will be for them.

at dinner I am king
a bottle of mist

the key
to an ant city

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 18 January 1659/60.

Posted on by Luisa A. Igloria

Repetition Pantoum

Repetition lays grooves in the tracks of her speech—
each pass makes the same sounds, tells the same stories.
The common room is her kingdom, the bedroom her cell.
Trembling, she calls for rescue from unseen persecutors.

Each pass produces the same sounds, the same stories.
Sometimes she cries for her sister or her lover, both long dead.
Trembling, she calls for help—who's coming for her?
Like a leaf, she slides under the covers.

She cries out for her sister or her lover, both long dead.
She doesn't believe that they couldn't hear her.
She is thin as a leaf slipping under the covers.
Are the sheets cool as satin, is it her wedding night?

She doesn't believe that the dead can't hear her.
Don't they live in the air, in dappled shadow, in water?
Who lay with her on satin sheets, who wed her?
Fish in the shallows, moths in the net of a lamp.

Don't the dead live in the air, in dappled shadow, in water?
The common room is her kingdom, the bedroom a holding cell.
Fish in the shallows, moths that line the net of a lamp—
Tracks that repeat in the mind and the groves of her speech.
Posted on by Dave Bonta

Ungodly

Sam Pepys and me

Early I went to Mr. Crew’s, and having given Mr. Edward money to give the servants, I took him into the coach that waited for us and carried him to my house, where the coach waited for me while I and the child went to Westminster Hall, and bought him some pictures. In the Hall I met Mr. Woodfine, and took him to Will’s and drank with him. Thence the child and I to the coach, where my wife was ready, and so we went towards Twickenham. In our way, at Kensington we understood how that my Lord Chesterfield had killed another gentleman about half an hour before, and was fled. We went forward and came about one of the clock to Mr. Fuller’s, but he was out of town, so we had a dinner there, and I gave the child 40s. to give to the two ushers.
After that we parted and went homewards, it being market day at Brainford. I set my wife down and went with the coach to Mr. Crew’s, thinking to have spoke with Mr. Moore and Mrs. Jane, he having told me the reason of his melancholy was some unkindness from her after so great expressions of love, and how he had spoke to her friends and had their consent, and that he would desire me to take an occasion of speaking with her, but by no means not to heighten her discontent or distaste whatever it be, but to make it up if I can.
But he being out of doors, I went away and went to see Mrs. Jem, who was now very well again, and after a game or two at cards, I left her. So I went to the Coffee Club, and heard very good discourse; it was in answer to Mr. Harrington’s answer, who said that the state of the Roman government was not a settled government, and so it was no wonder that the balance of propriety was in one hand, and the command in another, it being therefore always in a posture of war; but it was carried by ballot, that it was a steady government, though it is true by the voices it had been carried before that it was an unsteady government; so to-morrow it is to be proved by the opponents that the balance lay in one hand, and the government in another.
Thence I went to Westminster, and met Shaw and Washington, who told me how this day Sydenham was voted out of the House for sitting any more this Parliament, and that Salloway was voted out likewise and sent to the Tower, during the pleasure of the House.
Home and wrote by the Post, and carried to Whitehall, and coming back turned in at Harper’s, where Jack Price was, and I drank with him and he told me, among other, things, how much the Protector is altered, though he would seem to bear out his trouble very well, yet he is scarce able to talk sense with a man; and how he will say that “Who should a man trust, if he may not trust to a brother and an uncle;” and “how much those men have to answer before God Almighty, for their playing the knave with him as they did.” He told me also, that there was; 100,000l. offered, and would have been taken for his restitution, had not the Parliament come in as they did again; and that he do believe that the Protector will live to give a testimony of his valour and revenge yet before he dies, and that the Protector will say so himself sometimes.
Thence I went home, it being late and my wife in bed.

where the wood stood
a field full of rain
speaking without voices

I sit like a harp
before God Almighty
playing for time

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Tuesday 17 January 1659/60.

Posted on by Luisa A. Igloria

Polaris

Easy to find the brightest
         star in the evening sky—
at the end of the Little

Dipper's handle, or pointing
        in a straight line from the two 
stars on one side of the Big Dipper. 

Early navigators knew this: at the ship's
       prow, their bodies straining forward  
and upward, trying to push the compass

needle north. There are various star-
       gazing apps in our time, and so much 
more light, we call it pollution: these

modern predicaments of excess
       which give us a sense of certainty
—sometimes. At his preschool, 

my grandson says the teacher led
        the class in a guided meditation
and he learned that light gives love.

He sat on the carpet by the window,
         the geometry of dust-speckled rays 
falling on his face and shoulders.

I wasn't there, but I know his mother's 
         heart sped quick as a line toward 
this brightness,  the way starry

bodies circle around the celestial pole.
         Particle or wave, diffracting or expanding
—could we patch a coat with it, unroll it like

a map or billowing sail; gather it in a crystal
         sphere? What we see of light depends
on what we ask of it, and in what ways.
Posted on by Dave Bonta

Travel writer

In the morning I went up to Mr. Crew’s, and at his bedside he gave me direction to go to-morrow with Mr. Edward to Twickenham, and likewise did talk to me concerning things of state; and expressed his mind how just it was that the secluded members should come to sit again. I went from thence, and in my way went into an alehouse and drank my morning draft with Matthew Andrews and two or three more of his friends, coachmen. And of one of them I did hire a coach to carry us to-morrow to Twickenham.
From thence to my office, where nothing to do; but Mr. Downing he came and found me all alone; and did mention to me his going back into Holland, and did ask me whether I would go or no, but gave me little encouragement, but bid me consider of it; and asked me whether I did not think that Mr. Hawly could perform the work of my office alone or no. I confess I was at a great loss, all the day after, to bethink myself how to carry this business.
At noon, Harry Ethall came to me and went along with Mr. Maylard by coach as far as Salsbury Court, and there we set him down, and we went to the Clerks, where we came a little too late, but in a closet we had a very good dinner by Mr. Pinkny’s courtesy, and after dinner we had pretty good singing, and one, Hazard, sung alone after the old fashion, which was very much cried up, but I did not like it.
Thence we went to the Green Dragon, on Lambeth Hill, both the Mr. Pinkney’s, Smith, Harrison, Morrice, that sang the bass, Sheply and I, and there we sang of all sorts of things, and I ventured with good success upon things at first sight, and after that I played on my flageolet, and staid there till nine o’clock, very merry and drawn on with one song after another till it came to be so late.
After that Sheply, Harrison and myself, we went towards Westminster on foot, and at the Golden Lion, near Charing Cross, we went in and drank a pint of wine, and so parted, and thence home, where I found my wife and maid a-washing.
I staid up till the bell-man came by with his bell just under my window as I was writing of this very line, and cried, “Past one of the clock, and a cold, frosty, windy morning.” I then went to bed, and left my wife and the maid a-washing still.

secluded in a rank rage of ink

alone like the green hill I venture up on foot

wind writing this very line


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Monday 16 January 1659/60.