in a house without power
the sound of the wind
appliances have stopped humming
chargers no longer glow
the masks on my walls stare
steadfastly into the darkness
i offer myself again
on the altar of sleep
Outage
Ode to Old Shoes
the feet seek freedom
busting the broadest toe box
splaying out for balance
in an almost gape
at the gravity of it all
and the earth’s endlessness
such a repertoire
of grounds and surfaces
for the feet to savor without ingesting
to rely upon without clinging
a lesson from the dust
of the ancestors
who would’ve gone to rest
in their best shoes
the straight and narrow ones
that pinched all through church
not the ones they worked
and walked in
soft as spring rain
tough as old chewing gum
settling at the dump
into holes just their size
In the Sticks
everything forks and branches
you can’t get there from here
unless you go sideways first
like a knight in chess
or a long-tailed weasel
hunting in the stiltgrass
you must run out
of luck or lumber
get saved by a discount preacher
behind the barbecue shack
lose an argument
with the moss
wonder what horrors
lie hidden beneath your feet
wrapped in duct tape
sealed in mason jars
but you learn the new
bump and grind
of mountaintop draglines
or fracking rigs
the way a chainsaw mutters
between screams
how the creek can rise
from a lullaby to a roar
and wash away all
our post-industrial middens
how there’s a rambling rose
that blooms every june
in the small of the back
of beyond
Goldenrod Time
the meadow at dawn
gives birth to ghosts:
slow dancers of fog
beneath a crescent moon
that’s just been deserted
by its entourage of stars
the goldenrod’s dark gold
mellows to yellow
a whole 30-acre bowl of it
between wooded ridges
where the sun comes
as a parishioner
among the monarchs
and the green darners
and later the lopper
with its steel grin
as i clearcut black locusts
infiltrating the goldenrod
enjoying their shade
even as i destroy it
there’s a cool breeze
from the heart of the sky
now that night and day
are nearly equal
happiness appears in the form
of small clouds
suspended just
out of reach
Walking Blues
i lug my silence into a blue forest
its lost cloud
loud with jays jeering
at my blue hat
what makes it so high
and lonesome on the map
baptised from below
in the water table
enabling the spirit to speak
in broken oak—
no hoax this glossolalia
a cross-worded puzzle
muzzling all green thoughts
leaf by leaf
grief needs no bait to bite
no hook to hold
old as the reflection
in a phone’s black glass
amassing unknown calls
vibrating on silent
On Pilgrimage
a morning-fresh aroma
from the compost
steaming in the cool air
i descend the mountain
just so i can climb it
yet again
through fog
as soft as the moss
acorns clattering down
the sun’s already out
in the valley for
the annual farm show
and above the gap
the first broad-winged
hawks of the day
spiral high around
a column of rising heat
then hurtle south
while a long rumbling
line of tractors
snakes through the fields
they used to say
rogation was good
for the crops
even bullshit walks
on six legs
bit by bit into the earth
***
Another day, another poem. Thanks to my brother Mark for the bird info and the Sinking Valley Facebook page for the farm show info. Rogation was/is a Catholic ritual with parallels in folk religions around the world, a form of annual pilgrimage in which a priest leads a procession of local residents in a circuit of the fields.
Future Tense
a nameless fear approaches
the crickets fall silent
i hear thin things
like teeth chattering
a heart thudding against
its slaughterhouse pen
my caught breath
turns tenuous as a frayed rope
i hear myself saying go on
you don’t exist yet
oh future
voracious as a vacuum
my own appetites have changed
i can count my ribs
what else would you have
me consume
Ravished
missing heads and shrivelled petals
orotund with seed
corn-fed on extra syllables
trapped between the teeth
nearly reptilian our rictus
of gratitude for another sun
let us trust the rust within us
to paint our noble ruins red
as knotweed blossoms into lace
and devil’s-tail brandishes blue fruit
immune to anything that ravishes
without or within
they spread like miracules
their missionary impositions
as we lower our last dreams
into the earth
we who were never beautiful
but were sensitive to beauty
our lanterns in the dark
so sleek and next-generation
are monitoring our every flicker
for signs of life
Carpe Noctem
full moonlight at half strength
due to rain
a slow and seemingly deliberate
tapping on the roof
one of the last warm
end-of-summer nights
katydids singing this is it
this is it this is it
this night with its singular pelage
will never come again
let sleep go on without you
like a zombie apocalypse
flying squirrels open
the dark sails of their bodies
a spring peeper calls three times
in defiance of the season
i take the indescribable
petrichor into my lungs
Oaks as Teachers
give me shade tolerance
so i can worship the sun
at a cellular level
teach me the dance
in abundance
the sects of insects
how to work like
an artist’s model
with wind or fire
how to mine in place
and turn the soil
into an accomplice
how to communicate
with an alien life form
in speech acts of pure energy
how to grow wound wood
walling off all the hollow
broken places
