These monuments, they speak to me
in shadowed figures set in stone
recording births and deaths in solemn tones.
I shiver with the wildness of this place,
awed how time reclaimed a haunted spot
of sacred ground, neglected – now forgotten –
family plot.
My boots crush meadow grass,
and trumpet vine assaults the rusted fence,
sharp evidence no one comes
to tend this place of pine box memories
lost to verdant fields and pin oak trees.
The body breaks down,
it has to, I tell myself,
watching her breathe,
wishing she’d just stop.
I could clean my calendar
of this shell,
hollowed of affections
and memories —
the firing of a few
unsympathetic neurons
the wedge against
moving past, moving on.
It’s terrible
this holding pattern
of here and not.
No peace except
between heart beats,
love and history stripped down
to something baser
than flesh and bone.
I bring cookies
for the staff who feed
and bathe her.
My selfishness
masquerading as caring.
Crossing the grounds
of the nursing home
on my way in —
the Sunday dew,
cheap shoes, wet leather
stains my skin.
The girl you are plays in taxi cabs in Cherokee Park.
Kentucky’s forests are filled with animals.
Spite is one of them.
I go beyond the block without permission while
scared to touch the family’s blue porcelain figurines.
I beg my mother for Battle-Armor He-Man
to fit with children that have no care for me.
I need no ornament. Mí swing es tropical.
We are the same today.
We break rules in persimmon light.
Pin me to the ground, punch me, take it, raise my cloud,
kiss me like a fool, your sister smashes down my brow.
That girl loves the world and throws rice at virgins.
Her casket is a length of oak,
swathed in kudzu and poison ivy,
and her body decays uncovered,
exposed.
In her palm lies a fruit,
indistinguishable from its own rot,
encoiled in serpentine vines
that bury themselves into bone
and turn dust back into dust.
No name is etched
into the bark of the tree where she lies,
though most who would view her
would know her—love her—
but some
some would name her whore.
Her fault,
they would hiss
as their Garden blazed behind them
and a long train of bitter souls
was escorted
from the gates of paradise.
They would console her husband
as they passed,
offer him kindness and condolences
when behind his back,
in his hand, so much larger than hers,
he held the last piece
of the fruit
they shared.
Her casket is a length of rope
passed down to her daughters
and theirs
and theirs
and theirs
on and on until the twine
is frayed and bloodied,
mended in places, needing further repair.
As we pass it, some of us whisper,
her fault
and gesture behind ourselves
to the daughter before them
but the rest of us,
the ones who listened to the stories we were told,
forgive her.
Even as blood drains from our own bodies
to feed our daughters and sons,
to placate the moon and the Son,
we understand,
that whatever that snake promised her
had to have been better
than being naked and alone
with a man
you only thought you knew.
They say
“Don’t let someone else’s fear of flying
keep you from the sky.”
But you clipped my wings
when I was young,
so I guess it doesn’t matter.
They say
“If you love something, let it go.”
But you caged me
and crushed my spirit
and we agree to call it love anyway.
They say,
“Time heals all wounds.”
But I doubt I’ll live long enough
for that.
Shakespeare and the Company:
A kitten, book-smitten,
naps on the second floor and
a lonely typewriter sits there, too,
surrounded by bookshelves,
waiting on Sylvia Beach
or James Joyce
or any of the long-gone friends
to return.
Livraria Lello:
There are no kittens here,
instead, there are swarms of people,
desperate to take a peek at
the most beautiful of all
in the world.
Livraria Bertrand:
A treasure trove of books,
established in 1732.
Now, a mecca for writers, readers,
and dreamers from all over the world.
A foggy morning
on the Atlantic of deep blue almost black
waves, white caps tangled, undone
a mist rocks the boat, silence, a calm–
the ferry leaving Star Island,
across front Appledore, where a salon existed,
hosted by Celia Thaxter–painter, poet, gardener–
hollyhocks reached the sky, poppies red
sway and bend in Childe Hassam brush strokes–
an American impressionist held hostage now in art museums.
We all know Celia’s friends–Thoreau, Emerson, et al–men–
of course!
I leave thinking about the precise patterns
she painted onto a canvass of delicate white china:
yellow and purple flowers, swirling around vines,
butterflies, their bright sunshine wings stopping to rest
upon a teacup’s handle, her recollections of life
far from the mainland, sketches, insights.
swoop of gulls, the lighthouse beacon, the wind
picks up, low tide, high tide, starfish,
ochre seed weed, orange lichens cling to boulders,
steady clash of wind weather–
a garden returning year after year after year
It wasn’t the tiny empty whiskey
bottles lying in the grass
nor the bottle caps from cheap beer.
It wasn’t the soaked shirt fished
from the water leaving me wondering
how it left a man’s back.
It wasn’t the plastic in all its forms
nor the auto show above the bank,
Z, Vette, and Shelby hoods erect
as owners worshiped at those alters.
It was the cigarette butts – filtered,
unfiltered – swarming the ground,
covering the carcass of a dying planet.
Cowboy, red hair cowlick-ruled, breathes air backwards, washes his mind empty.
