Is the little bird torn apart
by a paw? Does the dream
of flying above the white
sheet of a sea haunt it,
as it does me? In the hill
town where I was raised
though not born, once
a week, in a wooden school-
room, a nun taught us
about music and the smell
of lavender flowers. Decant
is a word that applies to sound
as it does to memory and scent.
When the bells peal at dusk
and in early morning, don’t you
see the shapes with which
they petal our heads? Tenderness
is the day-old bread we break
with our hands and dip in milk
to feed to the smallest ones,
those whose hearts have not yet
swallowed sadness whole.
Wild
Only the cloud rat knows
how to scale the tree
of heaven, whose roots
are hidden in fog
from mortal view.
And only the rough-
skinned tubers in the field
might possibly know the volume
and density of time, or how
the worms have mastered its
parceling-out. What does it matter
if it is tortoise or serpent
that grinds the wobbly
axis of the world? The sky
is portent and mystery,
the sea’s architecture
encoded in salt; the wood
is wild or so I think, only
because I have not learned
to read the wood in me.
In response to Via Negativa: Statement of ecopoetics and Via Negativa: Observer's Credo.
In the grey sky, a blue wound:
as if what flesh once desired
found embodiment in this opening.
Sudden as epiphany, though not
earth-shattering— A square of paper
come to light again after many months
hidden in a drawer, inked lines
of handwriting. Despite such careful
unfolding, all that language
cannot dress beyond compression:
shimmer of what called our names
even after the curtain was drawn.
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.
Die Winterreise
Franz Schubert, “Winter Journey”
“Only now in the quiet do you feel the sharp sting
of the worm that lives within you…” ~ Wilhelm Muller
The tears you shed are hot enough
to melt the winter’s ice; the road
you’ve glimpsed through windows,
scything through the countryside,
leads farther away than thought.
What can you bring to nestle
in your two hands to last
this journey— blossom from
the once verdant linden tree?
No, leaf from flame tree, leaf
of palm that burned in the shade
of the equator and cooled
to the shape of a braided fan.
For what does the lover really know
of unrequitement? Tell this
if you can to the butterflies
that ferry their flimsy envelopes
of gold, season after season,
from coast to coast. Tell this
to the cliff swallows that wing
their way back to build mud nests
in the walls of the ruined church.
And tell this to the ones
whose forebears jumped ship
centuries ago where the waters
looked almost emerald and warm—
where they came ashore to forge their own
welcome in an inhospitable land.
Faithful
You turned my wailing into dancing;
you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy…
~ Psalm 30
And you slicked the roofs with a shimmer of rain,
and the trunks of trees with the green of lichen.
Even the reeds that bent from the weight
of passing winds lent their sheen to the earth.
Who was I to send up my voice through the hollow,
who was I to run the flag of my sorrows up the pole?
Yesterday brought news of friends’ deaths.
And yesterday couriers left parcels at the door.
Every morning the small brown birds forage in the yard:
their industry steady, with no real expectation of return.
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.
Milonga sentimental
Old heart, tired heart
counting this cold morning
the beads that gather on the grass—
Sometimes it’s hard
to keep track of how many
promises you made, fueled by hope
of their full return: each time
felt real, was real— O how you
wanted to empty your draw-
string purse of all
your savings, and spend them
on the greatest love of all.
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.
[poem removed by author]
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.
Stealer
Oton Death Mask
Luisa A. Igloria December 20, 2014
(Oton, Iloilo; 1300-1400 A.D.)
They’ve melted and cut
a ribbon of gold
into squares they’ll beat
with mallets to the thinness
of skin— They’ll trim
around the outlines
then lift with pincers to lay
upon the face of the beloved,
pressing upon the mouth
that kissed and doubtless
was kissed warmly in return,
the bridge of the nose
that flared quietly
for the last time
then shut close
in the early dark;
and because the dark
is real now, the two
eyepieces are a blessing—
one over each shaded socket,
medallions hammered to borrow
the sun’s old fire.
*
Melted gold,
thinness of skin,
beloved kissed
quietly then shut
to borrow fire.
[poem removed by author]
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.
Landmarks
Girl with the single braid falling down her back,
boy with the limp or a stone in his shoe—
Old man dressed in his only white suit
walking up the road with his cane—
In those days one could buy
bread at dawn from the corner store,
little yeasty fistfuls to carry
like hot stones in each hand, careful
to avoid the dogs that snarled
and pulled at their chains
in unkempt yards— And on Mount
Santo Tomas, the twin cupped discs
of radars that marked the edge of a world
beyond which it did not seem possible
to venture: only the hawks could view
the sea from that height, or the sun
as it slipped from our grasp,
disappearing the end of each day.
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.