That moment before dark: deep blue, etched
lines in city brick; a rain-filled plastic tub
alive with circling wings, then still—
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.
Called
What I want is for you to read my lips, my eyes.
Curve of spine, spot on the small of the back
that has ached for days. Arch of instep, flex
of the foot; toes that lead the way, that always
lead the way as though they knew where on this earth
they were going. Hither, say the fingers curling
into the shapes of smoke. Hither,
I repeat. Hither, hither.
In response to small stone (179).
Before Genesis
Just like mitochondria & cell nuclei, genitalia were once free-living organisms. They resembled hydrozoans: the penis a polyp & the vulva & vagina a medusa. They were, in other words, the same organism at different stages. Though it needed an anchorage, joined to its brother polyps by hollow roots, the primitive penis strained for more, combing the currents with a hungry cluster of tentacles. Eventually, a bud would sprout from its side, break free & open like an umbrella in all that water. So while the penis lived from hand to mouth, the vagina, arrayed in glory, neither toiled nor spun, & the music of its transparent bell spread through the oceans & inspired the coral to new architectural heights. And the god of evolution, swaying in the garden, saw that it was good.
Elegy, even after 22 years
My father, we did not know then it would be the last day of your life. But you struggled into your slippers and your bathrobe the warm, dusky-gold of corn; and you came and stood in the doorway, holding on to the wooden frame for ballast. How long did you stand there, more wispy than a plume of smoke, simply gazing over the rest of us huddled on two beds? We’d pushed them together, exhausted from going days without sleep through the aftershocks that rocked the city. The upright piano had moved to the far end of the living room. The china cabinet sounded crystal chimes as if from afar, but nearer than the drone of rescue helicopters fracturing the dark. No one dared to light candles for fear of setting the house on fire. No one dared to unfasten their shoes. I’ve written this over and over, composing and revising, revising and composing, trying to return to that elusive fold of time, those last few hours before your body stiffened and your eyes turned silver-grey, the color of a clear but frozen lake. Even as nurses tried to revive you where you lay on a pallet in the hospital wing, your spirit had started its journey. Out of that valley it rose, rising above earthquake ruins, rising higher than the limestone rocks; rising, still, as seasons changed and pools of sleeping fish warmed back to life.
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.
Words on the Street
A little slow on the draw.
If not with me
“Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither…” ~ Job 1:21 (KJV)
Would you go? Would you go in my place? e-mailed a friend, having paid in advance months ago for a twelve-day trip she would not be able to take. Down the Rhine, from Bamberg, Wurzburg, Freudenberg, down to Koblenz and Cologne, finishing with three days in Amsterdam. I would have, but for various reasons couldn’t, can’t. So I said no. Oh don’t get me wrong— who wouldn’t leap at the chance? Everything paid for: all-inclusive of meals, wine and beverages— anytime, anywhere; the land excursions, the entrance fees to museums and castles, barring other side trips outside the itinerary once the ship docks at ports of call; cashless on the boat, no tipping allowed, gratuities pre-calculated into the cost. Do not inquire too closely into my reasons. O magnum mysterium. Only know that I find it difficult to revel in joy alone. Will you reconsider? she asked. There will be 3 balls: the welcome, the Captain’s farewell, the Christmas dinner ball; live music, open seating, a personal valet on the liner through the entire trip. Truly, I thanked her; and promised, perhaps someday.
In response to the cassandra pages: two world premieres.
Old Norse Family Values
Son of sour milk
tried to trick fate
by going under a lifted strip of sod,
making a coin with two heads
held together with rivets,
even staging his own death.
The sons & daughter of Sour
soon soured on each other,
& the blood-brother’s blood, which had dried
on the point of an ensorcelled spear,
blended with the blood of the killer
who had earlier refused such a mingling,
refused to swear brotherhood.
They outlawed the killer’s killer
(also his brother-in-law).
He went back under the sod to hide,
& in his dreams, two women
took turns filling his drinking horn,
one with mead, the other with gore,
& all streams flowed down
into the same broad fjord.
See Rachel’s photographic response: “Blood and milk.”
Inflorescence
“Where is the way where light dwelleth? and as for darkness, where is the place thereof,
That thou shouldest take it to the bound thereof, and that thou shouldest know the paths to the house thereof?”
~ Job 38: 19-20
We sit and hug our knees, watching as children come to the center of the square, where volunteers have set up fires and big iron cauldrons. Some have brought buckets, and some have brought styrofoam bowls; and some have brought tin plates or the plastic cover of a margarine tub. Their faces are smeared with soot, with tears, with snot. They haven’t eaten for days. They haven’t washed. Soon there isn’t enough for their hunger. We wonder, will there ever be enough again? The long-handled ladles scrape the last burnt layers from the bottom of the pot. A few grains of brown rice, onions, lentils in the mouth. Behind them, the setting sun casts shadows in hives of stucco and plaster. Hollow stairwells, honeycombs of walls where bedrooms and kitchens used to be. Should I mouth the old prayers, should I repeat a phrase of comfort to my neighbor huddled beside me, it isn’t from claiming to know, Lord, what these designs can mean. I am smaller than a cipher on a flimsy page. In the darkness, every heart still beating buries itself like a mine waiting to explode, the way the dark amber flesh of a date swells and breaks open, no longer able to contain either its ripeness or the sugars that have hardened to stone.
In response to small stone (177).
Lost, found, whatever
A shark is a compass
that always points toward blood.
This may not seem of great utility
if you’re lost at sea.
But cut yourself & wait —
you’ll be found soon enough.
These lines came to me in a dream, which goes to show that remembering your dreams doesn’t automatically make you a poetic genius. Yeah, I’m in touch with my subconscious… and my subconscious is an idiot.
November
And what is to be visceral, if not to lead with the deeper mind of the body’s insides? The gut is often wiser than the radio which sits in its alcove in the attic (keenly wired to the world and its signals but only for as long as its battery acids have been replenished). So cold today… Seen from the high oriel window that juts out of brick: a skein of dark glyphs over gray-draped fields, the quarrelsome racket of crows. I’ve learned not to believe everything that purports to bring forward an accounting. In our ledger of days, the hills might be pages crammed with previous scripts— And yet, even the lopped-up limbs of dead trees twitch back to life in the fire.
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.