Self-Portrait at Twenty-Three
Running late after stumbling for the wilds of our bodies, sewing oats to borrow that phrase & so much rain in the forecast putting it mildly, righteously or cool. You choose. Was punched a time or two, you betcha, & I myself wasn’t always loving, thoughtful or kind, did not genuinely thrill when the century closed over those of us living there, i.e. a century of cigarettes & pills before the next stood up & took its rightful place. At the crossing gate, the conductor still waving from the window of her train. For what wrongdoing would we tie an arm twice across that track? What for a ribbon through the machinery unscathed? Lost too are the schoolbooks, the pillows as though in a room we never knew. There, I hung my clothes to know where the wind was blowing.
For Which We Have No Language
A most mothering shade in this sky, not for long & like anyone I’d prefer my evenings without regret. Neither am I here to complain for the walls awaken a word like water or is it the stolen image of a lime, make it half a lime among the oranges. I’ve spoken plenty for the flood of restlessness, having wanted some exception, to be exceptional minus the lopsided heart or lending my name to a disease. We’ve taken hours, wished all afternoon to float & know to what lengths we might keep our breath. To own the love of finches? That’s one way of beginning. To survive like a softened pear? The children come, believing the moon follows us alone. We hold hands briefly, again before not sleeping.
Where Dogs Like Flowers Play
The grown man cries despite the radio, the sun & moon, just this morning when his daughter spooned peanut butter for the dog. Those speckled paws, those feet that smell like Cheetos, but why pretend I’m not the one drugged & the truth a minus sign, the absence & lack, believing my books would somehow make this easier: another poem of heartache, a song best shared on the final, cruel drive. Each of us off to a land called Meadow, a cloud named Someday, a last goodbye christened Gratitude. So much daylight in a silver bowl, clean & dry, put away until next time & here, my god, these empty blankets.
