Via Negativa

November 28, 2017November 27, 2017 by Luisa A. Igloria

Frost warning

Every night I rehearse for some possibility
of shattering: for the temperature to drop,

for the crops to crackle over with ice;
for clustered leaves, womb-like and whorled,

to heave out their purpling, waterlogged
hearts. It isn’t just ruin: some things

just get heavier with time. Season after season
tunnels into the next, the way a drift follows

the veins in bedrock. Hear the matriarch
shift in her bed, slight as a sheet of dry

tobacco. Indoors, in the stilled hallway, a clock
measures the remaining hours before circling

back around to the beginning. I can think
of sounds to match these constant cinemas

of undoing: a string twanging in a doorway;
crickets; the ivory percussion of bones.

November 27, 2017November 27, 2017 by Dave Bonta

Up and to the office, where busy all the morning. Home a while to dinner and then to the office, where very late busy till quite weary, but contented well with my dispatch of business, and so home to supper and to bed.

office where
the morning quit
wit is a business

Erasure haiku derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Saturday 26 November 1664.

November 27, 2017November 26, 2017 by Luisa A. Igloria

Zoom

That game in which we make a steeple
of our fingers and open the doors to see

the people— What a marvel to think
part of the known world could telescope

into the space between one’s palms,
the colors of stained glass windows

prismed into specks smaller than grains
of sand. Look close and see everyone

we’ve ever known who’s passed away, walking
around in those museum halls: listening

to the guided tour, studying the dream-shapes
painted on the walls for clues to what they

might recall of the lives they had, before we
revised the ways in which we remember them.

In response to Via Negativa: Convolution.

November 26, 2017 by Dave Bonta

Diosito mío

Up and at my office all the morning, to prepare an account of the charge we have been put to extraordinary by the Dutch already; and I have brought it to appear 852,700l.; but God knows this is only a scare to the Parliament, to make them give the more money.
Thence to the Parliament House, and there did give it to Sir Philip Warwicke; the House being hot upon giving the King a supply of money, and I by coach to the ‘Change and took up Mr. Jenings along with me (my old acquaintance), he telling me the mean manner that Sir Samuel Morland lives near him, in a house he hath bought and laid out money upon, in all to the value of 1200l., but is believed to be a beggar; and so I ever thought he would be.
From the ‘Change with Mr. Deering and Luellin to the White Horse tavern in Lombard Street, and there dined with them, he giving me a dish of meat to discourse in order to my serving Deering, which I am already obliged to do, and shall do it, and would be glad he were a man trusty that I might venture something along with him.
Thence home, and by and by in the evening took my wife out by coach, leaving her at Unthanke’s while I to White Hall and to Westminster Hall, where I have not been to talk a great while, and there hear that Mrs. Lane and her husband live a sad life together, and he is gone to be a paymaster to a company to Portsmouth to serve at sea. She big with child. Thence I home, calling my wife, and at Sir W. Batten’s hear that the House have given the King 2,500,000l. to be paid for this warr, only for the Navy, in three years’ time; which is a joyfull thing to all the King’s party I see, but was much opposed by Mr. Vaughan and others, that it should be so much. So home and to supper and to bed.

an ordinary god
is only a scare

make one that is a beggar
giving a dish of rust in the evening

and the sea big with child
calling for so much bed

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Friday 25 November 1664.

November 26, 2017 by Luisa A. Igloria

Post Exchange

Gulity pleasures like lavender soap, good chocolate—
But also shampoo and potato chips in stacked cardboard
towers; squat jars of peanut butter. Whole blocks
of cheddar (no visible sell-by date) that we didn’t realize
until much later, were rations sent by the store owner’s
relatives from overseas. Percale sets divided up and sold
by the piece: pillow slips, flat sheet, fitted sheet. More
division: coffret sets of fragrance, toothpaste packs. Name
brands that rolled off our tongues like candy charms: Brachs,
Hershey’s Kisses; Lucky Strikes, Marlboro Reds; Breck, Hills
Bros., Kraft, Yardley. More rarely: Chanel No. 5, Elizabeth
Arden, English Leather; Johnny Walker, Courvoisier.
Behind bins of local coffee and ubiquitous dry goods, brisk
trade in facing and interfacing with colonial dreams.

November 25, 2017November 25, 2017 by Luisa A. Igloria

Inhabiting

Here’s our kingdom bordered by four walls, screen
doors, framed windows: open a random drawer to count

a wealth of mismatched spoons, tins half-filled with
tea, chipped porcelain. In every room, small machines

that need to be started and stopped, fed clothes or food,
water, dirt. Through the south-facing window, some mornings,

a gathering of crows in drab coats— Unlike them, we
do not fly away. We stay and press our forms into

the furniture; we pour the milk into the glass
and set the clocks. We say each other’s names.

November 25, 2017 by Dave Bonta

Convolution

Up and to the office, where all the morning busy answering of people. About noon out with Commissioner Pett, and he and I to a Coffee-house, to drink jocolatte, very good; and so by coach to Westminster, being the first day of the Parliament’s meeting. After the House had received the King’s speech, and what more he had to say, delivered in writing, the Chancellor being sicke, it rose, and I with Sir Philip Warwicke home and conferred our matters about the charge of the Navy, and have more to give him in the excessive charge of this year’s expense. I dined with him, and Mr. Povy with us and Sir Edmund Pooly, a fine gentleman, and Mr. Chichly, and fine discourse we had and fine talke, being proud to see myself accepted in such company and thought better than I am. After dinner Sir Philip and I to talk again, and then away home to the office, where sat late; beginning our sittings now in the afternoon, because of the Parliament; and they being rose, I to my office, where late till almost one o’clock, and then home to bed.

I drink to chance
and to excess
to see myself
home to her rose
of a clock

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 24 November 1664.

November 24, 2017 by Dave Bonta

Arms dealer

Up and to my office, where close all the morning about my Lord Treasurer’s accounts, and at noon home to dinner, and then to the office all the afternoon very busy till very late at night, and then to supper and to bed.
This evening Mr. Hollyard came to me and told me that he hath searched my boy, and he finds he hath a stone in his bladder, which grieves me to the heart, he being a good-natured and well-disposed boy, and more that it should be my misfortune to have him come to my house.
Sir G. Carteret was here this afternoon; and strange to see how we plot to make the charge of this warr to appear greater than it is, because of getting money.

I lose count of all
the late-night finds

a ladder to the heart
a good red tune

a plot to make war appear
greater than money

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 23 November 1664.

November 24, 2017November 24, 2017 by Luisa A. Igloria

Turning the wheel

Early morning: someone putting a kettle on the stove,
cracking an egg on the skillet’s rim; lid of the trash

can opening and falling back on itself to receive the cast-
off shell. Somewhere in the house, steam rising around

a body standing under the warm spray. Yesterday, we sat
around the table to eat and give thanks, slipping

sticks of cinnamon and woody stars of anise into the wine.
This time of year, past a certain hour, the world

darkens rapidly, enclosing each flame-like tongue lightly
tethered to the branch. Any day now, all of them will lie

in heaps, carpeting the ground. Russet and brass, lichen’s
bitter yellow: they are most achingly beautiful before they go.

Even the sleek white egret that stood still at the water’s edge
for hours unlocks its one folded leg; stretches, then flies away.

November 23, 2017 by Dave Bonta

Monument

At the office all the morning. Sir G. Carteret, upon a motion of Sir W. Batten’s, did promise, if we would write a letter to him, to shew it to the King on our behalf touching our desire of being Commissioners of the Prize office. I wrote a letter to my mind and, after eating a bit at home (Mr. Sheply dining and taking his leave of me), abroad and to Sir G. Carteret with the letter and thence to my Lord Treasurer’s; wherewith Sir Philip Warwicke long studying all we could to make the last year swell as high as we could. And it is much to see how he do study for the King, to do it to get all the money from the Parliament all he can: and I shall be serviceable to him therein, to help him to heads upon which to enlarge the report of the expense. He did observe to me how obedient this Parliament was for awhile, and the last sitting how they begun to differ, and to carp at the King’s officers; and what they will do now, he says, is to make agreement for the money, for there is no guess to be made of it. He told me he was prepared to convince the Parliament that the Subsidys are a most ridiculous tax (the four last not rising to 40,000l.), and unequall. He talks of a tax of Assessment of 70,000l. for five years; the people to be secured that it shall continue no longer than there is really a warr; and the charges thereof to be paid.
He told me, that one year of the late Dutch warr cost 1,623,000l. Thence to my Lord Chancellor’s, and there staid long with Sir W. Batten and Sir J. Minnes, to speak with my lord about our Prize Office business; but, being sicke and full of visitants, we could not speak with him, and so away home.
Where Sir Richard Ford did meet us with letters from Holland this day, that it is likely the Dutch fleete will not come out this year; they have not victuals to keep them out, and it is likely they will be frozen before they can get back.
Captain Cocke is made Steward for sick and wounded seamen.
So home to supper, where troubled to hear my poor boy Tom has a fit of the stone, or some other pain like it. I must consult Mr. Holliard for him.
So at one in the morning home to bed.

touching the head of the king
for this
they wounded a stone

Erasure haiku derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Tuesday 22 November 1664.