Mill town

Sam Pepys and me

(Lord’s day). My wife and I to church, and then home with Sir W. Batten and my Lady to dinner, where very merry, and then to church again, where Mr. Mills made a good sermon. Home again, and after a walk in the garden Sir W. Batten’s two daughters came and sat with us a while, and I then up to my chamber to read.

my church and I
at church again

where mills made
the garden mean


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Sunday 24 March 1660/61.

Sea changeling

Sam Pepys and me

All the morning at home putting papers in order, dined at home, and then out to the Red Bull (where I had not been since plays come up again), but coming too soon I went out again and walked all up and down the Charterhouse yard and Aldersgate street. At last came back again and went in, where I was led by a seaman that knew me, but is here as a servant, up to the tireing-room, where strange the confusion and disorder that there is among them in fitting themselves, especially here, where the clothes are very poor, and the actors but common fellows. At last into the Pitt, where I think there was not above ten more than myself, and not one hundred in the whole house. And the play, which is called “All’s lost by Lust,” poorly done; and with so much disorder, among others, that in the musique-room the boy that was to sing a song, not singing it right, his master fell about his ears and beat him so, that it put the whole house in an uprore.
Thence homewards, and at the Mitre met my uncle Wight, and with him Lieut.-Col. Baron, who told us how Crofton, the great Presbyterian minister that had lately preached so highly against Bishops, is clapped up this day into the Tower. Which do please some, and displease others exceedingly.
Home and to bed.

the sea is here
fitting into my house

and is lost among us
not singing right

as ears roar who told us
how to ache


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Saturday 23 March 1660/61.

Self-reliance

Sam Pepys and me

This morning I rose early, and my Lady Batten knocked at her door that comes into one of my chambers, and called me to know whether I and my wife were ready to go. So my wife got her ready, and about eight o’clock I got a horseback, and my Lady and her two daughters, and Sir W. Pen into coach, and so over London Bridge, and thence to Dartford. The day very pleasant, though the way bad. Here we met with Sir W. Batten, and some company along with him, who had assisted him in his election at Rochester; and so we dined and were very merry. At 5 o’clock we set out again in a coach home, and were very merry all the way. At Deptford we met with Mr. Newborne, and some other friends and their wives in a coach to meet us, and so they went home with us, and at Sir W. Batten’s we supped, and thence to bed, my head akeing mightily through the wine that I drank to-day.

I am my horse
for a bad way

newborn
through wine


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Frtiday 22 March 1660/61.

Sheltering the Dream House

river in November light between bare woods and mountain
We listen in the deep of night as the wind
picks up, and loose asphalt shingles bang 
against each other. Sometimes, in the daytime, 
they clatter under the feet of touching-down-
crows. Twigs drop from the trees; a sifting 
of dry needles gathers in the roof valley. 

We don't know how long this roof stayed 
over the heads of everyone who's ever 
lived in this house, before we came along. 
We don't know if it's ever been changed 
since it was built in the '40s, or how 
many times it might have been repaired.

When finally we call around for an inspection, 
the roofer that comes gives his verdict: it's old,
high time it's replaced. Bracing for the quote
(we know this isn't a warm or witty saying), we 
wonder how we can afford it. The roofer says
he will work with us and try to meet us 

where we are—on his tablet, he shows 
pictures of his handiwork, so many befores 
and afters. I take pride in my work, he says; 
I work with my men on every job. I don't sit 
around in some office. He points out 
the clean lines, the neat joins, 

nothing that overlaps or juts out where
it shouldn't: I am an artist. And I won't
begrudge him that, knowing how function is
more than the tuck and trim of parts, more than
the aggregate of gravel, sand, and bitumen  
shading this space where we might safely dream.

Living the life

river in November light between bare woods and mountain
of the mind, or any other kind of life,
requires living in a body. But the body's
problems are manifold; repeating and

repeatable, even as they're unknowable. 
Hannah Arendt wrote The Life of the Mind
to query how thinking connects the active

life and the contemplative mind. She asked, 
"What are we doing when we do nothing 
but think?" As we discover, the world

of appearances from which we draw
evidence of our science and art, reveals
as well as conceals. The moment the mind

lights on a string of inverted clouds, science
comes up with a name for it. But no one has yet
definitively answered what it all means: we are 

trial and error. This is what we call the ineffable—never
 arriving at zero, or upon arrival, finding out the restless
mind is off again to dance with the next illusion.

Amnion

river in November light between bare woods and mountain
If I am 
severed then 
so be it.
A cord 
yanked from
its stump.
Limbs shorn
in the brief
interval 
between 
winter and 
spring.
I'll tunnel 
through the rest
of my remembered
self, trade
this taste of mud
and salt. 
I'll bathe 
in the water 
of my own 
postponed
rebirthing.

Trapped inside

Sam Pepys and me

Up very early, and to work and study in my chamber, and then to Whitehall to my Lord, and there did stay with him a good while discoursing upon his accounts. Here I staid with Mr. Creed all the morning, and at noon dined with my Lord, who was very merry, and after dinner we sang and fiddled a great while. Then I by water (Mr. Shepley, Pinkney, and others going part of the way) home, and then hard at work setting my papers in order, and writing letters till night, and so to bed.
This day I saw the Florence Ambassador go to his audience, the weather very foul, and yet he and his company very gallant. After I was a-bed Sir W. Pen sent to desire me to go with him to-morrow morning to meet Sir W. Batten coming from Rochester.

early to work
in the pink part
of a hard day

the weather is any
desire to go
in a chest


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 21 March 1660/61.

Almost April

river in November light between bare woods and mountain
How do you pretend you're no longer
connected to someone whose blood
is your blood, whose eyes you see

when you look into the mirror, whose
forehead is the same smooth brown
instead of a billboard across which

warnings to stay away have been spray-
painted? I don't think I could, even if I 
tried. I'm not even sure I know how. But

I grow unsteady, moving into these new 
thickets of later life. I weep into the soup, 
brighten at the sound of bells, at the effusions

of spring. Every morning I swing my legs
out of a dream and back into the world.

Pilgrimage

Sam Pepys and me

At the office all the morning, dined at home and Mr. Creed and Mr. Shepley with me, and after dinner we did a good deal of business in my study about my Lord’s accounts to be made up and presented to our office. That done to White Hall to Mr. Coventry, where I did some business with him, and so with Sir W. Pen (who I found with Mr. Coventry teaching of him upon the map to understand Jamaica). By water in the dark home, and so to my Lady Batten’s where my wife was, and there we sat and eat and drank till very late, and so home to bed.
The great talk of the town is the strange election that the City of London made yesterday for Parliament-men; viz. Fowke, Love, Jones, and Thompson, men that are so far from being episcopall that they are thought to be Anabaptists; and chosen with a great deal of zeal, in spite of the other party that thought themselves very strong, calling out in the Hall, “No Bishops! no Lord Bishops!” It do make people to fear it may come to worse, by being an example to the country to do the same. And indeed the Bishops are so high, that very few do love them.

off the map
under the dark bed

far from all other selves
to try to love


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 20 March 1660/61.

Pruning

river in November light between bare woods and mountain
Newly shorn limbs in afternoon sun, pale
pith enclosed in jackets of bark— Yearly

in spring, the tree suffers this offering. 
Really, it's us who bring the bladed teeth  

of pruning saws to bear on an idea of
proliferation. Stores of energy lie in its roots, 

crown, trunk. The principle is the generation 
of more vigorous increase by reducing 

the number of growing points. All shearing 
results in a wound whose closure and healing 

depend on time and the body's immediate 
properties. In summer, after the buds 

unfurl their whole bodies, ripeness
is a beautiful fruit the color of bruise.