Via Negativa

November 19, 2023 by Dave Bonta

Killer

(Office day). After we had done a little at the office this morning, I went with the Treasurer in his coach to White Hall, and in our way, in discourse, do find him a very good-natured man; and, talking of those men who now stand condemned for murdering the King, he says that he believes that, if the law would give leave, the King is a man of so great compassion that he would wholly acquit them.
Going to my Lord’s I met with Mr. Shepley, and so he and I to the Sun, and I did give him a morning draft of Muscadine. And so to see my Lord’s picture at De Cretz, and he says it is very like him, and I say so too. After that to Westminster Hall, and there hearing that Sir W. Batten was at the Leg in the Palace, I went thither, and there dined with him and some of the Trinity House men who had obtained something to-day at the House of Lords concerning the Ballast Office.
After dinner I went by water to London to the Globe in Cornhill, and there did choose two pictures to hang up in my house, which my wife did not like when I came home, and so I sent the picture of Paris back again. To the office, where we sat all the afternoon till night. So home, and there came Mr. Beauchamp to me with the gilt tankard, and I did pay him for it 20l.. So to my musique and sat up late at it, and so to bed, leaving my wife to sit up till 2 o’clock that she may call the wench up to wash.

a morning for murder
sun in the corn

set to hang
like a gilt clock

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Monday 19 November 1660.

November 18, 2023November 18, 2023 by Luisa A. Igloria

Close Reading

river in November light between bare woods and mountain

We were winding down the year—
Evening's gold bandage at the edge

of the sky, followed by snowfall.  
I can't remember how many gifts

of narcissus I unboxed and tended;
their papery musk and ensuing silence.

I have not quite learned how to see
such things simply for what they are 

and not as metaphor or omen. It is 
this habit of seeking text beneath 

circumstance, a footnote for every
lapse in conversation. The heart

is afraid of how much it can't hear;
the mind, of what it can't bear to change.

November 18, 2023January 11, 2025 by Dave Bonta

Fundamental

(Lord’s day). In the morning to our own church, Where Mr. Powel (a crook legged man that went formerly with me to Paul’s School), preached a good sermon.
In the afternoon to our own church and my wife with me (the first time that she and my Lady Batten came to sit in our new pew), and after sermon my Lady took us home and there we supped with her and Sir W. Batten, and Pen, and were much made of. The first time that ever my wife was there. So home and to bed.

an ache came to sit
in our new pew

after too
much time

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Sunday 18 November 1660.

November 17, 2023November 17, 2023 by Dave Bonta

Off Trails

struck long ago by lightning
charred heart open to the sky

what doesn’t kill you
leaves you damaged

climbing a mountain to learn
what you already know

like telling the pines apart
by how they whisper

or marveling at birch twigs
etched in sunlight

on the shadow
of the neighboring mountain

and underfoot the moss cracked
like mud in a honeycomb pattern

a kind of ur-text
about cells and absence

the way a life was laid down
ring by ring in a log

or how after the rungs rot away
and the tree topples over

it’s not a ladder anymore
the bark’s long gone

there are just these troupes of rusty nails
awaiting further orders

the sky so clear your binoculars
pick out distant windblown leaves

or follow a hawk
following the ridge for miles

with the leaves down a white
clapboard church appears

with a steeple to staple it in place
between the river and the railroad

where shipping containers roll past
night and day

from this height like pale capsules
full of bad medicine

this is the trouble with all
tracks and paths

it’s time to stop following
and set your feet free

off-trail
on a careful descent

stepping from rock to rock
stopping for twisted oaks

and tall straight pines no 19th-century
logger is coming back for

though a thousand feet downslope
and you’re in pole timber

the whited sepulcher of a tip-up mound
marks the shift from ironstone to shale

through long shadows made feathery
by young white pines

footfalls mingle contrapuntally
with woodpecker taps

on a twisty back road
the tarmac cracks in honeycomb patterns

and the low sun is attentive
to every detail of mummified roadkill

its five-fingered paw
still stretched out

just past a sign that reads
UNTIL WE MEET AGAIN

MAY GOD HOLD YOU
IN THE PALM OF HIS HAND

on bare wood
in letters of faded blue

November 17, 2023 by Dave Bonta

Natural law

In the morning to Whitehall, where I inquired at the Privy Seal Office for a form for a nobleman to make one his Chaplain. But I understanding that there is not any, I did draw up one, and so to my Lord’s, and there I did give him it to sign for Mr. Turner to be his first Chaplain. I did likewise get my Lord to sign my last sea accounts, so that I am even to this day when I have received the balance of Mr. Creed.
I dined with my Lady and my Lady Pickering, where her son John dined with us, who do continue a fool as he ever was since I knew him. His mother would fain marry him to get a portion for his sister Betty but he will not hear of it.
Hither came Major Hart this noon, who tells me that the Regiment is now disbanded, and that there is some money coming to me for it. I took him to my Lord to Mr. Crew’s, and from thence with Mr. Shepley and Mr. Moore to the Devil Tavern, and there we drank. So home and wrote letters by the post. Then to my lyra viall, and to bed.

in the morning a red sea
for the Lord to turn plain

even to receive
the lash of noon

that no-one
coming from the devil

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Saturday 17 November 1660.

November 16, 2023 by Dave Bonta

Mountainous

Up early to my father’s, where by appointment Mr. Moore came to me, and he and I to the Temple, and thence to Westminster Hall to speak with Mr. Wm. Montagu about his looking upon the title of those lands which I do take as security for 3000l. of my Lord’s money.
That being done Mr. Moore and I parted, and in the Hall I met with Mr. Fontleroy (my old acquaintance, whom I had not seen a long time), and he and I to the Swan, and in discourse he seems to be wise and say little, though I know things are changed against his mind.
Thence home by water, where my father, Mr. Snow, and Mr. Moore did dine with me. After dinner Mr. Snow and I went up together to discourse about the putting out of 80l. to a man who lacks the money and would give me 15l. per annum for 8 years for it, which I did not think profit enough, and so he seemed to be disappointed by my refusal of it, but I would not now part with my money easily.
He seems to do it as a great favour to me to offer to come in upon a way of getting of money, which they call Bottomry, which I do not yet understand, but do believe there may be something in it of great profit.
After we were parted I went to the office, and there we sat all the afternoon, and at night we went to a barrel of oysters at Sir W. Batten’s, and so home, and I to the setting of my papers in order, which did keep me up late. So to bed.

the peak is an old acquaintance
who seems to be wise

and say little
against the snow

to a man who lacks
the ears for it

seems to offer a way
to not understand

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Friday 16 November 1660.

November 15, 2023November 15, 2023 by Luisa A. Igloria

Elegy with Partial Inventory

My mother's house has been dismantled
into parts that do not resemble a house—

There was a waist-high porcelain jar 
painted over with dragons and clouds;

it was part of a pair. There was cabinet with a glass
door which held a catalog of her best dresses.

Only pleats of dust hang there now with the mauve
of memory, the brittleness of bone. 

Once she wielded a gaze sharp as the silver
blades of her sewing scissors.

Once she was tender and trellised like a woven
blanket worked in daisy chains.

She was the last door closing quietly when they folded her arms 
over her chest, the silver-blue stones that led to the gate.

November 15, 2023 by Dave Bonta

Transmigration

To Westminster, and it being very cold upon the water I went all alone to the Sun and drank a draft of mulled white wine, and so to Mr. de Cretz, whither I sent for J. Spicer (to appoint him to expect me this afternoon at the office, with the other 1000l. from Whitehall), and here we staid and did see him give some finishing touches to my Lord’s picture, so at last it is complete to my mind, and I leave mine with him to copy out another for himself, and took the original by a porter with me to my Lord’s, where I found my Lord within, and staid hearing him and Mr. Child playing upon my Lord’s new organ, the first time I ever heard it.
My Lord did this day show me the King’s picture, which was done in Flanders, that the King did promise my Lord before he ever saw him, and that we did expect to have had at sea before the King came to us; but it came but to-day, and indeed it is the most pleasant and the most like him that ever I saw picture in my life.
As dinner was coming on table, my wife came to my Lord’s, and I got her carried in to my Lady, who took physic to-day, and was just now hiring of a French maid that was with her, and they could not understand one another till my wife came to interpret. Here I did leave my wife to dine with my Lord, the first time he ever did take notice of her as my wife, and did seem to have a just esteem for her. And did myself walk homewards (hearing that Sir W. Pen was gone before in a coach) to overtake him and with much ado at last did in Fleet Street, and there I went in to him, and there was Sir Arnold Brames, and we all three to Sir W. Batten’s to dinner, he having a couple of Servants married to-day; and so there was a great number of merchants, and others of good quality on purpose after dinner to make an offering, which, when dinner was done, we did, and I did give ten shillings and no more, though I believe most of the rest did give more, and did believe that I did so too.
From thence to Whitehall again by water to Mr. Fox and by two porters carried away the other 1000l.. He was not within himself, but I had it of his kinsman, and did give him 4l.. and other servants something.
But whereas I did intend to have given Mr. Fox himself a piece of plate of 50l. I was demanded 100l., for the fee of the office at 6d. a pound, at which I was surprised, but, however, I did leave it there till I speak with my Lord.
So I carried it to the Exchequer, where at Will’s I found Mr. Spicer, and so lodged it at his office with the rest.
From thence after a pot of ale at Will’s I took boat in the dark and went for all that to the old Swan, and so to Sir Wm. Batten’s, and leaving some of the gallants at cards I went home.
Where I found my wife much satisfied with my Lord’s discourse and respect to her, and so after prayers to bed.

all alone the sun
playing on the sea

like my life carried into
another self

I make an offering
too dark for prayers

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 15 November 1660.

November 14, 2023November 14, 2023 by Luisa A. Igloria

Elegy with an Hour Lost Inside It

One form of time is an invention that wants to lead
the darkness on a halter, that wants to slow
its steps as it approaches the door of the stable.

Or it is a sail that the men on the beach fold
into a triangle or a square, squinting at
the last scattering of light on water.

The smell of grass clings to our hands.
A dark plume traces ink stains across the sky.
We can still hear wings even as light falls. 

I too don't want to carry such sadness 
much longer. I want it to fall into 
the deepest part of the sea.

November 14, 2023 by Dave Bonta

Where the words come from

(Office day). But this day was the first that we do begin to sit in the afternoon, and not in the forenoon, and therefore I went into Cheapside to Mr. Beauchamp’s, the goldsmith, to look out a piece of plate to give Mr. Fox from my Lord, for his favour about the 4,000l., and did choose a gilt tankard. So to Paul’s Churchyard and bought “Cornelianum. dolium.” So home to dinner, and after that to the office till late at night, and so Sir W. Pen, the Comptroller, and I to the Dolphin, where we found Sir W. Batten, who is seldom a night from hence, and there we did drink a great quantity of sack and did tell many merry stories, and in good humours we were all. So home and to bed.

day on a plate
to give my pen

night in a sack
and many stories

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 14 November 1660.