Purveyors of fine poetry since 2003.
so what if the labile moon
becomes your emblem
the half-shell upon which
your camino is served up
sew it into the lining of a coat
for use in emergencies
a subway token for the underworld
or an owl’s limitless eye
stirring up the birds
in your bedroom tree
its screen will sell you nothing
in glowing detail
it claims one egg
from every clutch
it brings out your darkest shadow
once a month
Rain falls through most of the day, as if washing what's left of the year. The wrapping paper has been crumpled or stowed away for future use; the packing peanuts, tossed into the trash. Now the rooms are quiet and the extra blankets are folded away. Every year, we gather and repeat similar rituals. We fill each other's glasses and talk about everything we still want to do. One of us is turning sixty. One of us has just gotten better numbers back from the last blood draw. One of us hopes her cough abates tomorrow. One of us makes a secret wish that, if granted, would make it possible for her to die happy.
In the morning to Alderman Backwell’s again, where I found the candlesticks done, and went along with him in his coach to my Lord’s and left the candlesticks with Mr. Shepley. I staid in the garden talking much with my Lord, who do show me much of his love and do communicate his mind in most things to me, which is my great content.
Home and with my wife to Sir W. Batten’s to dinner, where much and good company. My wife not very well went home, I staid late there seeing them play at cards, and so home to bed.
This afternoon there came in a strange lord to Sir William Batten’s by a mistake and enters discourse with him, so that we could not be rid of him till Sir Arn. Breames and Mr. Bens and Sir W. Pen fell a-drinking to him till he was drunk, and so sent him away. About the middle of the night I was very ill — I think with eating and drinking too much — and so I was forced to call the maid, who pleased my wife and I in her running up and down so innocently in her smock, and vomited in the bason, and so to sleep, and in the morning was pretty well, only got cold, and so have pain in pissing as I used to have.
sticks in the garden
love in the cards
we drink to unthink
all innocent in sleep
and in the morning
we only have piss
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 27 December 1660.
You try your best to make language fit the purpose of your usage; smooth the edges or square the lines, if only to communicate. But sometimes language falters. One purpose of using words: to smooth what's tangled, bring what's shadowy to light. But more than sometimes, language falters. Or in your clumsiness, speech stumbles. You want to see what's tangled in shadow. Questions are a place, perhaps, to start. But in your clumsiness, speech stumbles. Also, those who might have the answers to such questions are long gone from this place. In that case, words try to remember words once used by those who might have answers. Intention or chance; slow burn or lightning strike— In either case, you try to remember the words: their purpose, their usage, their rough and smooth. Intention or chance, slow burn or lightning strike— You're only trying to make the language fit.
where a buck rubbed
the felt from his crown
fog drifts through the trees
without getting snagged
the day after Christmas
it’s not accurate to say the ground is bare
it hosts a 10-million-piece puzzle
of the fallen in brown and gray
a hickory nut still in its hull
is riding out the rain
like my last lost idea
nestled among roots
a red flourish of surveyor’s paint
flakes from a dead oak
while a power pole marked up by bears
is turning green
who knows what markings
might outlive us
stay too long in one place
and all the faces change
the once-vernal pools
now hold water year-round
which means we’re witnessing
the birth of a bog
it fattens on raindrops
each one a bull’s eye
the water seems murky
but it’s only the fog’s reflection
down below this cloud ceiling
a train blows its horn three times
instead of the usual six
i keep listening for the rest
my fingers grow cold
daylight begins to fade
shadows flit through the woods
heading for their roosts
at a crossroads of trails
traffic is light
just the clouds and me and then
just the clouds
In the morning to Alderman Backwell’s for the candlesticks for Mr. Coventry, but they being not done I went away, and so by coach to Mr. Crew’s, and there took some money of Mr. Moore’s for my Lord, and so to my Lord’s, where I found Sir Thomas Bond (whom I never saw before) with a message from the Queen about vessells for the carrying over of her goods, and so with him to Mr. Coventry, and thence to the office (being soundly washed going through the bridge) to Sir Wm. Batten and Pen (the last of whom took physic to-day), and so I went up to his chamber, and there having made an end of the business I returned to White Hall by water, and dined with my Lady Sandwich, who at table did tell me how much fault was laid upon Dr. Frazer and the rest of the Doctors, for the death of the Princess!
My Lord did dine this day with Sir Henry Wright, in order to his going to sea with the Queen.
Thence to my father Bowyer’s where I met my wife, and with her home by water.
can sticks be one
with the oven
ash going white
as the doctor Death
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 26 December 1660.
I smooth a space for rest, I pour a tonic for my head. Carnations droop as if in sympathy in the glass. My dreams are nothing but a blank. Or they are about wars in other nations. I smooth a space for rest, I pour myself into position for prayer. I crave only water as libation. Flowers droop as if in sympathy in the glass. After the solstice, the dark lifts imperceptibly, by degrees. Birds return. I smooth a tentative space for rest, pour myself again into some work. I wake a little later in the day; at night sometimes I droop too quickly in the glass. Who knows when we will have any ease again? I smooth a space for rest. Flowers droop as if in sympathy in the glass.
(Christmas day). In the morning very much pleased to see my house once more clear of workmen and to be clean, and indeed it is so, far better than it was that I do not repent of my trouble that I have been at.
In the morning to church, where Mr. Mills made a very good sermon. After that home to dinner, where my wife and I and my brother Tom (who this morning came to see my wife’s new mantle put on, which do please me very well), to a good shoulder of mutton and a chicken. After dinner to church again, my wife and I, where we had a dull sermon of a stranger, which made me sleep, and so home, and I, before and after supper, to my lute and Fuller’s History, at which I staid all alone in my chamber till 12 at night, and so to bed.
Christmas ease
far better than the mill
where I shoulder
a dull sleep
after history
all alone in amber
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Tuesday 25 December 1660.
I wanted to tell you of its deep exhaustion, this self when it's at the level of no adornment, without calculation, without pretense. It's been trained so well and long to hide the signs of its true nature even from itself— In school, the nuns gave girls lessons in deportment that included walking up and down the stairs only on the balls of their feet; not to speak out of turn, and without changing the inflection of voice. Sacrifice, the greatest mother-virtue that always puts the needs of others before your own. But I wake sometimes in the middle of the night to wonder who will care for me when I can no longer; who will smooth out a space for rest.
In the morning to the office and Commissioner Pett (who seldom comes there) told me that he had lately presented a piece of plate (being a couple of flaggons) to Mr. Coventry, but he did not receive them, which also put me upon doing the same too; and so after dinner I went and chose a payre of candlesticks to be made ready for me at Alderman Backwell’s. To the office again in the afternoon till night, and so home, and with the painters till 10 at night, making an end of my house and the arch before my door, and so this night I was rid of them and all other work, and my house was made ready against to-morrow being Christmas day. This day the Princess Royal died at Whitehall.
I miss being a couple
a pair of candles
made to paint the night
a Christmas white
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Monday 24 December 1660.