At Least a Semblance

I was so glib about death a decade ago 

     in my mid-sixties,
Even with cancers and mom dying.

Now Death is another occupant in our house,
     and here we are, 

     all together,

     partners 'til the end.

     

We both know that I'm in better shape than you,

     although there's always room for irony in

Who is predeceased and who is left behind.

But whichever one of us goes first--
     This being the end game--

Doesn't that call for a new level of truth

On which to usher in the final stage?

Are we so afraid of losing a hard-won balance?

Or is it just me?

Just me holding back:
Shying away from the honest edge

      we once had,
Not hazarding a fall from this semblance

      of whole heartedness,
      Figuring, I guess, there'll always be time.

That at least one of us will know for sure

     when the absolute becomes imminent.

Will it feel right then--even possible--to finally, 

     once again, bare my soul before you?

     Crawl naked, holding hands, and nearly destroyed 

     into the lacuna of breathlessness 

     before the end. 

That's something to pray for...

    [Nearly three years later, circumstances 

    lead us in the direction of this prayer.]

Found Barefoot on a Winter Beach

Elderly man

Found dead
On local beach
This morning,
Barefoot.

Half in-half out
Of the water,

That much is known;
Heart attack suspected.

A few hours later
I walked by the site
Of his body's discovery--
Part of my regular route.

Nothing seemed different.

You’ve got to think,
Though,
Of that man's last moments alive--

Taking off his shoes
To feel the surf
And sand
Around his feet--
The bracing cold and wet
Of the abiding sea.

Did it seem--for him--

Like an eternity passed
During those last sensations
Before he lost them all?

I believe it's almost a slander 

That the next day

In the morning paper
They were calling his death
A suicide.

Walking into the lapping waves--

Bringing water to water--

Perhaps he just wanted

To become one, once again, 

With Nature.

Wear Signs of the Struggle Lightly?

For reasons having nothing to do 

With the intention of the author,
That slogan "Wear Signs of the Struggle Lightly"

--a chuckle-headed platitude, if I ever heard one--

regardless, it popped into my head 

While reflecting on a New Yorker article
I'd read in bed the night before.

The essay was written by a well-regarded author 

While gazing out a window of his
Ancestral homestead--
a New Hampshire farm.

His ruminations
Are anchored
By the vision of an old barn,
Its roof recently jury-rigged
To prevent collapse--
A hasty repair that, even so, he knows
Will see him out.

The poet spends most of his time now
At this old window,
Watching seasons change
As he thinks about past
Generations of relatives, bodies
Now occupying an immaterial dimension
Around this durable,
Timber-built house.

The image his words evoke in me,
However, is not of some same blood
Concentrated on a few
New England acres
For over two hundred years.

Hell,
Back half that far
My folks were scattered
Over half the Midwest--
Carpenters and grocers,
Dirt farmers,
Half-breeds.

No,
My thoughts, as
the poet lets me
Look through his eyes, are,
Unaccountably,
Of the wood--

The wood that's framing that window,
Its mullions and transoms,

As well as all the doors, and
Wainscoting in the dining room,
Polished pine floors,
Finely grained and thigh-thick
Hewn hardwood beams.
They're of wood!

Moss-backed, rotting in the barn,
Or growing old on a dry and
Amputee oak out toward the edge
Of the yard.

I imagine blackened,
Shredding bark of an ancient
Wisteria stretching, straining,
Gnarling up the front porch.

I can see graying cedar
Fence posts sporting
Polyps of fungi,
Disintegrating into earth.

We take all this wood for granted,
Harshly prune, poison and cut,
Pulp and overuse it,
Scratch our initials
Into its trunk.

Yet, unaccountably,
Thankfully, for us
There'll always be
A feeling of sympathy
Emanating deeply
From the wood.

So,
"Wear Signs of the Struggle Lightly"?
I don't think so.
That sounds like
Some sophistic way of thinking,
That's neither the way of wood
Nor human.

We both support, and bear our scars,
Bend, wrinkle and decay with time
Until we reach the ground, and beyond:
It's our nature.

"Wear Signs of the Struggle Proudly"
Is more like it.

Thanksgiving

On a Friday night after work, 

The first promise of snow is in the air. 

I'm out on the back porch 

Looking east at the sky. 

Up ahead, 

A long distance flight powers down. 

Its light makes tunnels through 

Orange-lit street clouds. 

Its suddenly insistent thrumming 

Joins the theater-voiced city-- 

All the humanity, motors, 

And small animals 

This side of Phinney Ridge. 

Under our black and crimson night, 

A few fresh-faced stars 

Nudge and wink 

Over a private joke 

I'm now privileged to understand. 

A week ago, though, 

Out on the front porch that time, 

I looked at the rain on the street 

And remembered a juvenile me-- 

Even into my fifties, for god's sake-- 

Inhabiting soggy afternoons just like this, 

All drug-addled, brain-fevered, and flopped sweat, 

Stalking what passed as normal, 

But getting nowhere near. 

Oh, thank you, merciful Lord. 

Thank you, my dear wife, 

And daughters, and 

Recently departed mom, 

For bringing me back here 

From where I used to think I belonged.

Under the Skin

Under the skin, 

All over my body, 

Pieces of something 

Have taken root. 

My nose has sprouted 

Seedlings, 

My forehead, 

A sebaceous cyst-- 

"Like the stump of the horn 

Of a shorn devil," 

I think, 

Romantically.

Chilling at the Ragged Edge

The other night I was
Crossing the living room carpet
After turning off the lights
And checking the doors,
And I felt--
Really felt--
Something strange,
Like electric,
Coming from the shadows on the floor.
I was stoned--yeah--but still, it was there:

An energy crackling,
A feeling giving me tingles,
Making it impossible to sleep.

(You know what I mean,
Or maybe not--no foul--
But let me tell you:)

The Olmec and Iroquois were down there
Chanting denial of oblivion.
They were
Pounding in the basement,
Carousing, bloody ghosts of the defeated,
Becoming more raucous by the moment,
Demanding to be joined.

Would you be coming, too?

Back Up

Under a chill and fitful sun,
Past the parking strip trees
Being whipped by a spring wind:
I'm driving again.

In preparation for this foray,

In a discreet paper bag
I have carefully packed
An extra pair of pants
And underpants,
On top an absorbent pad,
And--just in case--an adult diaper.

The bag's on the seat beside me backseat now,

Helping to keep my mind at ease.