Poems from the home page, 2008



  PERFECTLY LEGAL

  It's the time of day when most drivers
  have turned on their headlights,
            but not all. 
  I'm headed south, Interstate-85, a few miles 
  past the Virginia/Carolina border
  (perhaps you know that stretch of road,
  but no matter). Trees move past 
  on both sides at highway speed,
  fading slowly through ever-darker 
            shades of green.
 
  By chance I glance up, notice a layer 
  of minutes-before-sunset clouds
  at the center of the sky, lit 
  from below, whiteness rippled by just 
  a hint of rust, racing, (the same speed 
  as my car, imagine that!) above 
  the landscape I am passing through,
  as if pulling my vehicle along
  in a vortex of their creation.
 
  And for a while I become an intoxication
  (relying even more than usual 
  on my cruise control) eyes 
  pulled skyward except for moments 
  when I must glance 
  at the almost-empty road ahead, 
  considering, with some relief-- 
  though still, it seems, short of full sobriety--
  that no state in this nation 
  will ever craft legislation 
  criminalizing "distracted driving"
  of this variety.
   

  SIXTY-TWO WORDS . . . 

  . . . for sixty-two years. That's ten lines 
  of six words each, plus two 
  in my title. Not very many 
  but I decide: Today it's sufficient, 
  because I have reached an age 
  when I may count how many 
  of the words we've uttered or
  heard turn out to be broken,  
  find myself more content to sit   
  and ponder all that remains unspoken.

  (September 13, 2008 was Steve's 62nd birthday)


   


  PIECES  

  I decide to start collecting them 
  with today's broken plastic arm 
  that once pulled a chain, 
  lifting the flapper, allowing water 
  to flow into my toilet's bowl.   

  I'll include the old handle too 
  since the replacement piece 
  comes with another handle 
  attached to a new brass arm. ("Good, 
  sturdier than plastic," I tell myself.)   

  I can put the two old useless parts 
  into a box somewhere, then, 
  when whatever is going to stop working 
  next around the house stops working 
  I'll store its broken pieces 
  in the same place.   

  Eventually I'll have enough junk 
  to reconnect in the form of a sculpture. 
  I'll include some new parts 
  for toilets and other household amenities too, 
  as well as a few items which 
  have continued to work as intended 
  year after year, thus earning 
  a dignified retirement.   

  And when I have succeeded 
  in cementing all of this together 
  (the mostly old and broken, the few 
  new, along with some still- 
  functional-but-ready-to-rest) 
  in a manner you would never 
          have expected—  
  aesthetically pleasing from as many 
  angles as can be arranged— 
  let me suggest that I will have created 
  an appropriate metaphor 
          for my life.   

  Perhaps, I'm thinking, for your life, too.


   

     

Picture
  MISSISSIPPI

  In the Swamp
  the tupelo and cypress trees grow--
  some to be hundreds of years old--
  despite water deep enough
  to drown other species,
 
  which reminds me of what we, too
  must do to become poets.  
                             Photo by Marianne Hill
        


  HORIZONS 

  The indigenous forest dweller
  who has lived an entire life among the trees,
  never seen a television set, backyard barbecue,
              or SUV
  will have no word in his language for"horizon."
  Take one of these by the hand, 
  lead him out onto the ledge
  of a mountain to gaze 
  over the top of the jungle,
  and he will be unable to understand,
  retreat, frightened, to the world 
  he has always known. 

  You, who live today in a forest 
  of televisions, backyard barbecues,
             and SUVs,
  who have never developed a vocabulary
  to converse about your own humanity,
  take my hand, walk with me out 
  onto the ledge of this poem,
  where we can gaze at a horizon, 
  that stretches beyond your imagination. 

  I do not know if you will believe it, 
  but there is no need to be frightened 
  except, perhaps, of the urge
  you may be feeling to retreat, 
  back into the darkness of the jungle. 
       
  

  FOR A SONG  

  It feels like a sexual climax. 
  Well, at least in one respect: 
  No matter how often 
  it has happened before, 
  this time I am thrilled 
  all over again.   

  You do not invent any chords 
  for the mandolin or guitar. 
  Twelve tones remain the total 
  in our musical scale. And not 
  a single new word has entered 
  the English language this evening. 
  Yet as you weave these elements 
  together in a way I have never 
  experienced before, that feeling 
  comes over me: an at-peace- 
  with-my-humanity, connected, 
  wondering-how-you-managed- 
  to-do-it-to-me-again and 
  can-I-write-a-poem-to-express- 
  the-way-I'm-feeling kind of feeling 
  that happens when a song 
  seems exactly right.   

  And, after the music, 
  as our applause fades 
  a question comes to mind, the same 
  that silently I ask each lover, 
  in the moments when my climax 
  has receded but the heart continues 
  to race: Just how did you manage 
  to do that to me again?  

       


  WITHOUT STRINGS 

  It isn’t like the other times, when I’m standing naked
  in front of an auditorium, on stage, holding
  a flute or some other instrument I have never learned
  how to play, expected to perform a virtuostic concerto.

  In this one I am fully clothed. And, although
  the musical instrument is unusual, one neither you
  nor I have seen before, somehow I proceed
  with confidence, know that I will play it well, thrill
  the audience with new and unusual sounds.

  Yet when I turn to take it from its case, I discover
  that all of the strings have been removed, ask
  the audience to pretend with me, hold it
  across my body, strum the air with one hand,
  fingering non-existent chords with the other, hum
  a melody that ought to be sounding. People grow restless,
  start to boo, tell the MC to shoo me off the stage. 

  And so I awake in disgrace, later realize that this dream
  is simply a metaphor for the present moment, as the poet
  stands before you with nothing to strum but his words,
  each of which has had its strings removed, can never produce
  more than the naked hum of music which is bursting
  from each of our souls, aching to be shared with the world. 

  Life is not a dream, despite what it says
  in the song. And this is good, I decide, because
  you will probably not boo me off the stage,
  show a bit of sympathy for this poet--
  and his verse as well—offering, when we conclude,
  at least a smattering of polite applause.
     


  GREEN RIBBONS

  At an open reading human beings 
  establish a certain connection 
  with one another, the kind
  that only poetry can provide: 
  words spoken, 
            heard, 
                      felt.
  At least, that’s what we strive for,
  though often—I have to admit--
  in the end it is hard to tell how well
  we have actually succeeded.

  I come to this one with a box 
  of green ribbons, part of a new campaign 
  for survivors of Hurricane Katrina 
  still scattered across the country 
  because even after so many months 
  there are no homes for them to return to, 
              no jobs,
                          no schools,
  and no one in an official capacity 
  who even seems to notice anymore.

  So when I get up on stage, 
  before sharing my few minutes 
  of poetry, I explain how I will pass 
  the box around, ask people to take a ribbon, 
  along with one of the fliers explaining 
  why we are engaged in this campaign. 
  “Put a dollar in; more if you can.
  The fund directly benefits survivors 
  in New York City who are in need.” 

  And when the reading is over 
  I find more dollars waiting for me 
  than there were people in the room, 
  am reminded of words spoken, 
            heard, 
                      felt, 
  decide that at this reading, at least, 
  I have no need to wonder 
  whether the human beings present 
  established a certain connection 
  with one another, the kind
  that only poetry can provide.