Yes, it’s true. I want
to take every last barren tree in the field,
peel back the bark,
and make a fire big enough
to melt the fallen snow
that currently covers you
many times over.
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Outside Opinions
Outside Opinions
no one ever said a love like this could be easily - parceled out
along little lines across a flat surface
supposedly meant to capture it,
and yet we keep trying to anyway.
they tried to warn the man who did ecstatic cartwheels
along the way to and from church every Sunday
that he was on the edge of being deemed crazy,
but he didn’t listen, didn’t care
about the grumblings of petty people, too caught up
in words, and the prisons they built with those words,
to actually live the way that love lives,
taking hold of the moon at midnight
and then slipping between the trees,
shaking them down to their very roots
until even the soil breaks loose, bringing forth
the many worms in all their wriggling glory.
no one ever said a love like this could be easily - parceled out
along little lines across a flat surface
supposedly meant to capture it,
and yet we keep trying to anyway.
they tried to warn the man who did ecstatic cartwheels
along the way to and from church every Sunday
that he was on the edge of being deemed crazy,
but he didn’t listen, didn’t care
about the grumblings of petty people, too caught up
in words, and the prisons they built with those words,
to actually live the way that love lives,
taking hold of the moon at midnight
and then slipping between the trees,
shaking them down to their very roots
until even the soil breaks loose, bringing forth
the many worms in all their wriggling glory.
Friday, August 19, 2011
Un-finished
Un-finished
Half way through making a set of plates,
you dropped one,
watched it shatter across
the cold, pale gray floor
of love, she was already quite uncertain
you could mold all those words you said
into a solid cup for the both of you to drink out of.
That you had been fighting for weeks
about how to best create peace
in the world
never once
crossed her mind,
nor yours,
and yet she could not help
but feel the sudden weight of it all:
that days and weeks
had become months
and even years
how you had once imagined
a world that reflected
nothing back at you
except her,
Once, long ago, she had imagined you rural:
your hands in the soil,
turning last year’s leaves into clay
now, it takes everything in her power
to unfold her arms,
let the fire you had built for so long
finally go out.
Half way through making a set of plates,
you dropped one,
watched it shatter across
the cold, pale gray floor
of love, she was already quite uncertain
you could mold all those words you said
into a solid cup for the both of you to drink out of.
That you had been fighting for weeks
about how to best create peace
in the world
never once
crossed her mind,
nor yours,
and yet she could not help
but feel the sudden weight of it all:
that days and weeks
had become months
and even years
how you had once imagined
a world that reflected
nothing back at you
except her,
Once, long ago, she had imagined you rural:
your hands in the soil,
turning last year’s leaves into clay
now, it takes everything in her power
to unfold her arms,
let the fire you had built for so long
finally go out.
Saturday, May 14, 2011
Like Corot - A Poem
Like Corot
There was a truth, I believe,
in the lies we told each other.
What else could explain the way
winter was delayed that year?
Stepping over a muddy log, I stopped,
saw, as you bent back a barren limb
until it broke, your eyes terribly full
of the body – I – what you – wanted.
There is a girl in the sketchbooks of Corot
that looks like that, as you did
Just then, her hands wrapped tightly
around her young and naked frame,
her eyes turned away from the world –
as if when he drew her, Corot knew
the near future, for them, and for us,
how I would make the mistake
of thinking she was you- instead of me –
how the wind would bring winter
not long after we said “I love you”
under the leafless trees.
There was a truth, I believe,
in the lies we told each other.
What else could explain the way
winter was delayed that year?
Stepping over a muddy log, I stopped,
saw, as you bent back a barren limb
until it broke, your eyes terribly full
of the body – I – what you – wanted.
There is a girl in the sketchbooks of Corot
that looks like that, as you did
Just then, her hands wrapped tightly
around her young and naked frame,
her eyes turned away from the world –
as if when he drew her, Corot knew
the near future, for them, and for us,
how I would make the mistake
of thinking she was you- instead of me –
how the wind would bring winter
not long after we said “I love you”
under the leafless trees.
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
How Long Must I Wait - A poem
How Long Must I Wait
“Delusions are inexhaustible; I vow to end them.”
From the Four Great Bodhisattva Vow
You would think we’d grow tired of it:
this need to murder
in the desert
and then lament
those who have died.
Yet, when faced with
the twisted sinews
of the mind, frayed
and torn by so many years of –
is it neglect? misuse?
the wrong path taken again and again?
whatever it is,
I run straight to the temple
looking for answers,
to the question
of my suffering
as if that were the issue,
the thing that is
at stake,
How long must I wait?
Even the question
being asked,
keeps taking me further
from the truth.
“Delusions are inexhaustible; I vow to end them.”
From the Four Great Bodhisattva Vow
You would think we’d grow tired of it:
this need to murder
in the desert
and then lament
those who have died.
Yet, when faced with
the twisted sinews
of the mind, frayed
and torn by so many years of –
is it neglect? misuse?
the wrong path taken again and again?
whatever it is,
I run straight to the temple
looking for answers,
to the question
of my suffering
as if that were the issue,
the thing that is
at stake,
How long must I wait?
Even the question
being asked,
keeps taking me further
from the truth.
How Long Must I Wait - A poem
How Long Must I Wait
“Delusions are inexhaustible; I vow to end them.”
From the Four Great Bodhisattva Vow
You would think we’d grow tired of it:
this need to murder
in the desert
and then lament
those who have died.
Yet, when faced with
the twisted sinews
of the mind, frayed
and torn by so many years of –
is it neglect? misuse?
the wrong path taken again and again?
whatever it is,
I run straight to the temple
looking for answers,
to the question
of my suffering
as if that were the issue,
the thing that is
at stake,
How long must I wait?
Even the question
being asked,
keeps taking me further
from the truth.
“Delusions are inexhaustible; I vow to end them.”
From the Four Great Bodhisattva Vow
You would think we’d grow tired of it:
this need to murder
in the desert
and then lament
those who have died.
Yet, when faced with
the twisted sinews
of the mind, frayed
and torn by so many years of –
is it neglect? misuse?
the wrong path taken again and again?
whatever it is,
I run straight to the temple
looking for answers,
to the question
of my suffering
as if that were the issue,
the thing that is
at stake,
How long must I wait?
Even the question
being asked,
keeps taking me further
from the truth.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Annexed by Desire - A poem
Annexed by Desire
“To fill a Gap
Insert the Thing that caused it-“
Emily Dickinson
But you can’t
Fall again - in love -
not like this,
with the red and yellow leaves
crackling beneath our feet
we shouldn’t be
holding so close
together
up from the ground,
as if to show us
exactly where we are,
a slowly oozing mud,
while halfway around the world,
an opening of hatches,
military aircraft
resuming their assaults
on terrorists.
Whatever caused us to believe
these stories about happiness we tell?
Even the sparrows
don’t care to stay and look,
as my hands slide down
your back,
quickly,
into enemy territory.
“To fill a Gap
Insert the Thing that caused it-“
Emily Dickinson
But you can’t
Fall again - in love -
not like this,
with the red and yellow leaves
crackling beneath our feet
we shouldn’t be
holding so close
together
up from the ground,
as if to show us
exactly where we are,
a slowly oozing mud,
while halfway around the world,
an opening of hatches,
military aircraft
resuming their assaults
on terrorists.
Whatever caused us to believe
these stories about happiness we tell?
Even the sparrows
don’t care to stay and look,
as my hands slide down
your back,
quickly,
into enemy territory.
Monday, March 28, 2011
My Lover, Monsanto - A Poem
My Lover, monsanto
My lover, monsanto,
who owns the garden,
who does me well by choosing
the seeds the food will grow by,
is out in the fields as we speak,
sweeping the dead away
so that our love can grow some more.
Who owns the garden?
my lover monsanto,
who is out in the fields
wrenching the soil
for the food the new body
of food needs to grow.
Who does me well by choosing
but my lover monsanto
who is out in the fields
as I lie here on a bed of food
waiting for the August winds
to blow in the harvest
of September.
“The seeds the food will grow by,”
my lover monsanto tells me,
“take the soil by force
and clear the fields
like a fresh sheet
clears the air after love.”
My lover, monsanto, is out in the fields as we speak,
and I cannot wait much longer
for the seeds the food grow by
to come in and make themselves at home.
“Sweeping the dead away,”
my lover Monsanto tells me,
“is easier after the sun has
cooked the bodies down
to a skin so light that
even the slightest wind
can come and take it away.”
“So that our love can grow some more,”
my lover Monsanto tells me,
feeding me the tomato
that ran over all the others,
“So that our love can grow some more,”
I hear, as I eat the corn
that cleared the fields
of all the flowers
and quieted the skies above them
by sweeping away,
ever so softly,
the loud, loud monarchs.
My lover, monsanto,
who owns the garden,
who does me well by choosing
the seeds the food will grow by,
is out in the fields as we speak,
sweeping the dead away
so that our love can grow some more.
Who owns the garden?
my lover monsanto,
who is out in the fields
wrenching the soil
for the food the new body
of food needs to grow.
Who does me well by choosing
but my lover monsanto
who is out in the fields
as I lie here on a bed of food
waiting for the August winds
to blow in the harvest
of September.
“The seeds the food will grow by,”
my lover monsanto tells me,
“take the soil by force
and clear the fields
like a fresh sheet
clears the air after love.”
My lover, monsanto, is out in the fields as we speak,
and I cannot wait much longer
for the seeds the food grow by
to come in and make themselves at home.
“Sweeping the dead away,”
my lover Monsanto tells me,
“is easier after the sun has
cooked the bodies down
to a skin so light that
even the slightest wind
can come and take it away.”
“So that our love can grow some more,”
my lover Monsanto tells me,
feeding me the tomato
that ran over all the others,
“So that our love can grow some more,”
I hear, as I eat the corn
that cleared the fields
of all the flowers
and quieted the skies above them
by sweeping away,
ever so softly,
the loud, loud monarchs.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Image/Her-Story - a poem
Image/Her-Story
Bent over a bowl, her
hands froze in water.
Lost: the life that came
before, and after
she was disrobed
and set before us.
As it is, she appears
to be traditional:
White, orderly, slightly
rough but modest.
This is what we see
at least, but then again
there is that rumor,
the one about the maker
Mary Cassatt
and that painter of ballerinas,
a trifling little thing,
or maybe not
but in any case,
not usually part of
her story, or history,
just like the life
of the woman
she set before us.
Bent over a bowl, her
hands froze in water.
Lost: the life that came
before, and after
she was disrobed
and set before us.
As it is, she appears
to be traditional:
White, orderly, slightly
rough but modest.
This is what we see
at least, but then again
there is that rumor,
the one about the maker
Mary Cassatt
and that painter of ballerinas,
a trifling little thing,
or maybe not
but in any case,
not usually part of
her story, or history,
just like the life
of the woman
she set before us.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
The Language of Home as it Stood in 1984 - A poem
The Language of Home as it Stood in 1984
“I have my own place and live there alone.
In some ways we shape each other perhaps.”
William Bronk “The House That Doesn’t House”
Our’s was a home
that gained no intimacy in winter.
While the snow outside
washed away the grammar
of the previous year's suffering,
the high ceilings
and hardwood floors
held on to the cold
we produced tightly.
Ours was a grammar
of five word sentences
and silent,
restrained gestures.
It was nothing short
of a religion,
agitated psalms falling
from the haunted attic
to the crumbling basement,
where the adopted cat lived,
making its own grammar
out of the leftovers.
What it built
was a lexicon
without a built in warning,
so, that, when the cat
sank it's teeth
into the calves
of each of our legs,
we could have taken that
as the missing signal,
but instead chose to maintain
our own places,
and send the cat packing instead.
*Note - the majority of this poem comes from a series of poems I wrote in 2001.
“I have my own place and live there alone.
In some ways we shape each other perhaps.”
William Bronk “The House That Doesn’t House”
Our’s was a home
that gained no intimacy in winter.
While the snow outside
washed away the grammar
of the previous year's suffering,
the high ceilings
and hardwood floors
held on to the cold
we produced tightly.
Ours was a grammar
of five word sentences
and silent,
restrained gestures.
It was nothing short
of a religion,
agitated psalms falling
from the haunted attic
to the crumbling basement,
where the adopted cat lived,
making its own grammar
out of the leftovers.
What it built
was a lexicon
without a built in warning,
so, that, when the cat
sank it's teeth
into the calves
of each of our legs,
we could have taken that
as the missing signal,
but instead chose to maintain
our own places,
and send the cat packing instead.
*Note - the majority of this poem comes from a series of poems I wrote in 2001.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Happiness Begrudges An Interview - A poem
Happiness Begrudges An Interview
Before you ask
Yes
It is cold out
and
No
I will not be staying,
not with you like this,
having to be
like a doll for you
to dress up and parade
down one street after another.
No! I will not
be doing that again,
nor will I
be handing out
directions
to my house.
If you want
to find me,
you’ll have to stop
all that incessant chatter,
call and then listen,
call and then listen…
Any questions?
Before you ask
Yes
It is cold out
and
No
I will not be staying,
not with you like this,
having to be
like a doll for you
to dress up and parade
down one street after another.
No! I will not
be doing that again,
nor will I
be handing out
directions
to my house.
If you want
to find me,
you’ll have to stop
all that incessant chatter,
call and then listen,
call and then listen…
Any questions?
Saturday, January 22, 2011
When You Wake To - A poem
When You Wake To
the neighbor’s dog half awake and whining again
*
the middle of the night fog
*
mice that don’t really care what they are waking to, only
that they can
move through the darkness
of their little worlds, locate
a bite of bread or something
to chew on every now and then.
*
a heartbeat, yours, your lover's,
the merger of the two
*
a rustling in the trash can
near the foot of the mattress,
giving rise to thoughts
that maybe the midnight snack
wasn’t the best idea
*
a hard rain
the neighbor’s toilet running:
competition at 3am
*
tiny feet fleecing the fiberglass
behind the sheet-rock
*
thoughts of your vow not to kill
as you take a shoe
slam hard, once,
on the wall,
hoping that whatever falls
takes with it the rain
the neighbor’s dog half awake and whining again
*
the middle of the night fog
*
mice that don’t really care what they are waking to, only
that they can
move through the darkness
of their little worlds, locate
a bite of bread or something
to chew on every now and then.
*
a heartbeat, yours, your lover's,
the merger of the two
*
a rustling in the trash can
near the foot of the mattress,
giving rise to thoughts
that maybe the midnight snack
wasn’t the best idea
*
a hard rain
the neighbor’s toilet running:
competition at 3am
*
tiny feet fleecing the fiberglass
behind the sheet-rock
*
thoughts of your vow not to kill
as you take a shoe
slam hard, once,
on the wall,
hoping that whatever falls
takes with it the rain
Sunday, January 16, 2011
if you’re longing for a clear answer to your questions- a poem
if you’re longing for a clear answer to your questions
to be sure
the Mississippi is too busy
making its way down south
to stop and tell you
to be sure,
it’s too busy being itself
to warn you of the myriad of ways
just turn away –
look
under the pines behind you,
how those mangy feral cats
lift their legs without a trace of shame,
spray the trunks of the trees
with hot urine, and then claw
at the bottoms
as if to signal
to the world
that they have finished
what they came to do.
surely there is nothing else,
don’t you think
as the wind burns the tips
of your ears,
of your heart
and the river
so seemingly still,
long and fabulously ordered,
breathing in every cloud,
fallen branch,
and ray of sun
taking you along for the ride,
whether you like it or not.
to be sure
the Mississippi is too busy
making its way down south
to stop and tell you
to be sure,
it’s too busy being itself
to warn you of the myriad of ways
just turn away –
look
under the pines behind you,
how those mangy feral cats
lift their legs without a trace of shame,
spray the trunks of the trees
with hot urine, and then claw
at the bottoms
as if to signal
to the world
that they have finished
what they came to do.
surely there is nothing else,
don’t you think
as the wind burns the tips
of your ears,
of your heart
and the river
so seemingly still,
long and fabulously ordered,
breathing in every cloud,
fallen branch,
and ray of sun
taking you along for the ride,
whether you like it or not.
Saturday, January 8, 2011
Confirming
Confirming
i have a way of
meddling, figuring,
picking up red leaves
and trying to return them
to the trees.
take the stories of birth
and death, how they’re
blown out by a language
so fixed and nostalgic
it barely touches the ground.
with every breath, another
string of busy body consonants
annexing the space
between my ears.
with every hurried step,
another string of boorish vowels
slopping up the land
i claim to love.
is it any wonder why
you feel so all alone?
looking as you do
with those timid, brown eyes,
at every passing
bare branch, believing
this one could be it,
the one, trying
on your tippy toes
to touch the bark, confirm
what never needed to be.
i have a way of
meddling, figuring,
picking up red leaves
and trying to return them
to the trees.
take the stories of birth
and death, how they’re
blown out by a language
so fixed and nostalgic
it barely touches the ground.
with every breath, another
string of busy body consonants
annexing the space
between my ears.
with every hurried step,
another string of boorish vowels
slopping up the land
i claim to love.
is it any wonder why
you feel so all alone?
looking as you do
with those timid, brown eyes,
at every passing
bare branch, believing
this one could be it,
the one, trying
on your tippy toes
to touch the bark, confirm
what never needed to be.
How Many Tears
How Many Tears
How many tears must I shed
before you see this life
for exactly what it is?
Endless white mountains
blocking every step;
the heart cannot beat
fast enough
to make a fire
sufficient.
Time has never been
an enemy,
but too often you have chosen
to make it so.
The ice on the river
barely goes below the surface;
even the pressure
of a single foot could break it,
if only you’d step forward.
There’s nothing lost
in crying, so long as
it’s let to stain you,
through the skin
straight to the marrow
without stopping
in front of mirrors.
How many tears must I shed
before you see this life
for exactly what it is?
A lone crow calling
from a barren tree;
the midnight moon
melting the snow
before these very eyes.
How many tears must I shed
before you see this life
for exactly what it is?
Endless white mountains
blocking every step;
the heart cannot beat
fast enough
to make a fire
sufficient.
Time has never been
an enemy,
but too often you have chosen
to make it so.
The ice on the river
barely goes below the surface;
even the pressure
of a single foot could break it,
if only you’d step forward.
There’s nothing lost
in crying, so long as
it’s let to stain you,
through the skin
straight to the marrow
without stopping
in front of mirrors.
How many tears must I shed
before you see this life
for exactly what it is?
A lone crow calling
from a barren tree;
the midnight moon
melting the snow
before these very eyes.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
