The Small Things Hold Us

The small things hold us
to this earth.
I wash the dirt from the baby's face
on his head the hair turns

a small nebula

Under my hands
he comes up gasping, astonished
in the fall air
trusting the light will hold him

if I cannot

My girl picks up the dead
butterflies like worn flowers
at the edges of the road
California sisters & painted ladies

she has learned to name them all

This hungry year
we cut pictures from the papers
she is learning to read: war, grief, fire
she makes houses for butterflies

lined with hard words

& her brother spells them out
in this fall, fighting free
of childhood as he fought
from my body

through the bright blood

That long ago blue wail
fixed me to this world
certain as nails: I am here
no betrayer

The road is narrow

past my cabin
lined now with the dead
leaves & next year's
young raspberries

they grab my hands as we walk

Come visit; I will show you
how these things
passing leaves, a child's hand
heart's blood

hold the door & keep me here

(never published, and I don't think I even sent it out, because it felt too discursive. But here it is; a poem that might be subtitled "and my kids keep me from killing myself, darn it!". A few years after I wrote this I did walk the edge again, for what I hope was the last time.)

Letters from Nineveh

1.
When the tower fell I was there
in my oleander dress leaning
from that high window
rimmed with rose & jasmine
not having your body to lean against

Here in Nineveh death takes a long time
also love, that clean unveiling
& the unfanciful bounty, body's truth:
when the skies fell how could my broken
hands not be open

who sought you so long
against the shattered daylight

2.
The days go by in Nineveh
& the sharp nights
Last week the sea birds flew
here by inland light &
I could taste again the salt
dried on your skin

Then it was always summer
we tried words
on innocent tongues: apple
peach, plum; bird in the wet grass
sleek hair, my new breasts
in your hands

To reconcile
death, lust, grief, love
takes such a long time
In these long dreams
I meet you, holding out a glass
empty or full, sweet, bitter

I can't guess where we are
to meet again; some white room
or garden, some pleasant hell
accustomed as my cards
cups & swords, king here, lost queen
lost summer skies

How was it so easy once?
Now at the boundary
I hold to what is left, the broken
light through these plum trees
the empty air, the unmade
bed, door open

3.

Against the boundaries
of our broken lands
I look for you, still water

these long times
In the south gardens
the early fruit is gone

& the foxgrapes come
& quince, scenting
the bare rooms

& unripe persimmons
bitter lantern
in the open woods

My children hunt for earthstars
the white angels, & the good
chanterelles

which smell of your skin
Rain settles
its familiar touch

on these intimate
bends of river, crevices
of sandstone

With my hair blown
across my wet eyes
how will I know you, my life

walking these dark roads


(this one was also printed in Prairie Schooner, back in the day. I wrote a number of Nineveh poems, but this is my favorite)

To Give Everything Away

Perpetual beginner, it was love
you wanted to tie to all the worlds

patterns of fir trees & sunlight
running stitches & knots

donkeys browsing the hearts
of thistles. You sewed certainty

across the lifelines of your children
the prayer rugs of desire

At this distance we can cover
everything with our outstretched hands

the moon, the home, a childhood
of whispered secrets, oh goodbye

we learn to give everything away
here on these moving waters


Last summer I thought I'd tuck many of my poems here--and then we moved the shop, and then my computer died, and my files were lost...Time intercedes, life crowds in. It's been...3 years? 4? since my sister-outlaw died, telling me with her last breaths that it was all okay, it was all right, and how beautiful the flowers were.

IN THIS AUTUMN LIGHT

I wanted only good news, angels

from a blue sky, gentle

rain on my face: your intelligent fingers

I wanted news from all

directions, silver papers full of stars

confetti & confections & all signs

declaring Yes

pure happiness is possible

clear as a cup of spring

water, inevitable & shining

but my astrologer never visits me

& mail, all purple stamps & promises

takes a wandering course

through the countries of despair

& desire’s canyons. My first love

writes from Paris “Le Volcan is still

here, & the bakeries & gleaming

fruit stands” He sucks the sweet

pulp of blood oranges

in the cool Parisian sunlight, his love

squinting for the camera, juice

running through their fingers. “Yes

hold it!” I call across the oceans

“it is too precious to throw away”

meaning orange juice mornings & wishes

true love, hope, & all the heart’s

brave confidence in this temporary life.

With chemo her long bright hair falls

Across my bed I scatter all the cards

like the blackbirds’ flight through morning

I long to read your face

to learn the transient & lovely

blaze of fully greedy bodies

in this autumn light. More rain.

No news, my life, from you.

So, no, it isn't really autumn. But with the fires burning all around me as I type, it does feel like a smoke filled, hot early autumn day. Rain would be good.

IN THE PARKING LOT OF DEATH

For H.S.

My beautiful daughter stands

like a painting by Rosetti, red hair

stealing the light by the stars

of the Chinese mallow, blooming

even in the parking lot of death

this sullen century. She is

a generous lantern, here in

the troubled garden, young as we were

in the Asian war when we loved

each other in innocence & lust.

It’s a long time, decades

like told beads, & you watching now

by the body of a dying woman

by the breaking of the bones

by her disconcerted living & her

morphined dreams, by her pain

crying, by her scarred & tender skin

by her lists of doctors & the light

of morning, by her windows of departure

by the sparrows of kindness

by the small leaves falling

by your hungry soul, by the questions

of wires, by the tubes of desire

by the circles of the final flights

& see, here, beyond us all

in this moment

the blue heron still spreads out her wings

like a last breath

never published, not one of my best, though I like some of the lines in it well enough; it was framed as a passing prayer for a first love who was at the time watching his companion die a long and slow death. Oddly, when I sat with another dear love a few years later, helping her make her own passage, I told her when she wondered if she could do it, if she could die, that as the moment came she would have no trouble. "You will just lift away, as the herons do" I said. As she passed I had stepped out with her dog, to allow her daughter to be with her at that last moment. The dog and I walked by the river, where as the sun set and we turned to come back a heron lifted up, stretching its beautiful wings, and I said goodbye to my dear friend.

BECAUSE YOU ARE DEAD

They told me you can walk on water

on the path of white flowers

balanced on the surge, now in the full

moon. They say you will gather

because you are dead & know the way

now, where ashes do not matter.

Before you died the room was full of flowers.

After you died the flowers were still there

leaning this way & that, some touching

some not. Before you were dead the sun

blinded us, & went down. Now you are dead

noon & midnight hold their regular dance.

Do you really know the way home

& the undersides of everything? The old cat

sits at your bed & purrs. Your son

sees strange shapes, rainbows

& people going far away, their backs to us

on the petalled ocean, each step further, no rush.

This poem was written a few summers ago, never published. A friend told me that the local tribes believed that at the full of the moon, when the path of light is on the ocean, the dead follow the path to the land of flowers and the world of spirit. It would be nice to believe this.

the yellow dog poem

YELLOW DOG INVITES

The yellow dog invites my animal

body back into this world

though we are older, white

at muzzle, gnarled of muscle

We run the dirt roads

under the hawk flash

& over the green fields, tongues

red in the sun spiked air

Such perfume of skunk & dung

So much rejoicing, mud & sprout

& our live blood pounding

The yellow dog says we need this

to leap like deer

to risk everything

I have a poet friend who says we all write at least one dead dog poem. This was a live dog poem, in honor of Buddy, written years back. He died today, very peacefully, nearly 16 years old as near as we can figure.

THE SUMMER OF THE EXIT

When the mustard bloomed

crayoning our wet hillsides

I thought I’d see you

you who walked out so long ago

one step into the drunken traffic

metal & flesh slammed together

a famous story

I couldn’t make sense of

whiskey burning my unkissed mouth

Love, here’s the delayed letter

full of marriage & longing

& escapades of small children

bright flowers moving

with each exhaled breath

on another morning in the summer

of the exit of paradise

a poem after diagnosis...

READING THE FILES OF THE SUMMER OF DEATH

Say it several ways: a cloud

small, in the distance, across the bruised hills

or the intimate smudge on this negative

fusing a scanned secret. White masses

blind us. Laboratory files

refuse grief. Say the stars are forming

at a centered galaxy. Say love has a shape

you’d know, beautiful & wounded.

Now the pain

is distant, let’s talk, say, of your gardens

the white valerian, the arch of ivy

Say there is a place the soul comes to

Say death takes our senses

takes your breath away, that beauty

the woman in her red dress. Say

it makes a certain sense, the lines

of white birches, the blasted lesions

like fireworks exploding

through the brain. They’re pretty.

They could be a row of daisies.

This could be the storm breaking

This could be the falling tower

Your hands tremble

Your nerves are naked

Poetry is the last resort.

I read this poem at a local college, upon request, a few years back. One of the other folks turning out to have been asked to read a poem (oddly, about my bookstore, though I hadn't met him previously) gave me a ride to the rehearsals...and turned out to be an off duty highway patrol officer. "yeah, in my job I have a lot of time driving, and when an idea hits I just pull over..."

The poem came from an inadvertent breach of confidentiality when I was sorting mail for a local health center and a report, complete with x ray, fell out of a package. As I picked it up I saw the name of one of my dearest local friends, a poet. And the diagnosis.

She is still living, and managing her condition okay, with the help of poetry and her dear husband.