tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-222902832024-02-19T04:31:19.327-08:00calm captainnow with significantly less angst!Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.comBlogger141125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-41545654322291100152011-11-13T15:00:00.000-08:002011-11-13T15:15:52.253-08:00poem a todayOF THE FARM<br /><br />Clouds ambling in the sky above my father,<br />whose back, dark with sweat, hovers over<br />the field like a period, far from the road where<br />my mother and I, kicking up slow, lazy dust<br />clouds of our own, drive back from church.<br /><br />The sun on my face is a baptism, the mint melting<br />to nothing in my mouth, a communion.<br />The mechanical cacophony of the riding mower,<br />only a hum in the distance: some hymn<br />whose words have been long forgotten.Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-56747624151695690422011-11-11T14:06:00.000-08:002011-11-11T14:41:42.888-08:00poem a sometimesWALKING IN WINTER<br /><br />The clouds all swollen with snow<br />and leaf-smoke in the air,<br /><br />Firelight through the trees<br />like candles in a vigil,<br /><br />The darkness covering us gone<br />heavy with things unsaid,<br /><br />But each breath hovers, drifts,<br />like some minor cloud, and<br /><br />There is no sound so rich<br />as your voice saying my name.Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-60113382718607469652011-09-16T23:47:00.000-07:002011-09-17T00:12:05.529-07:00A MEETINGI have, of course, gone over it all before:<div>not the time of day or the place, even, but</div><div>the movement toward each other, and</div><div>the general shape of my hair, the positioning</div><div>of my arms, out (I suppose) or on their way out.</div><div>I do not dare pose you. So, in the going-overs, you</div><div>are the unmapped continent, the endpoint, my</div><div>destination. And your voice says my only my name,</div><div>endlessly. </div><div><br /></div><div>And if I could take back my lie, I would say</div><div>that the time of day is during the cool sigh of morning,</div><div>the last week of summer, and the place is unfamiliar</div><div>to both of us, but chosen. Or, perhaps, in twilight,</div><div>by half-chance, at autumn's easy peak.</div><div><br /></div><div>You saying my name and me saying yours,</div><div>tumbling together, tired (always, we are tired),</div><div>concerned then less about the <i>where</i> and the <i>when</i>;</div><div>the <i>who</i>, in every instance, is answered:</div><div>you, you, you.</div>Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-20463189969577486532011-08-21T12:05:00.000-07:002011-08-21T12:16:34.717-07:00Oh, the sudden hollow silence--
<br />no electricity. The white-noise of the fans
<br />gone. The lights gone dark and gone. I
<br />awoke in a playhouse, where all things,
<br />upon inspection fail: taking up space, they
<br />do not perform. Useless,
<br />
<br />I moved between the walls of this place,
<br />half-drunk with sleep; flipping fuses with
<br />dumb faith, I was shocked
<br />each time that the lights, the fridge, the stove,
<br />did not obey my tiny, clicking command.
<br />
<br />Two hours later and with a beep the walls
<br />are shorn up again, my net of electricity
<br />gratefully restored.
<br />Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-52559828851184692172011-07-26T01:30:00.000-07:002011-08-07T23:26:12.406-07:00poem an occasionally<div>poem under revision</div>Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-14688562604182738462011-07-21T21:34:00.000-07:002011-07-21T21:35:48.664-07:00<a href="http://data.tumblr.com/tumblr_loa7mqFAeW1qduukyo1.mp3?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAJ6IHWSU3BX3X7X3Q&Expires=1311309290&Signature=gbMSe6MwiWM7345G1GBRgsw%2B7Wk%3D">o</a>ops, nevermind. it didn't work.Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-23866507511722765982011-05-19T16:51:00.000-07:002011-05-19T17:10:33.599-07:00morbid poem a daySUNBURNS<br /><br />Seven years, they say it takes,<br />for every cell in the body to be replaced.<br />I've often thought about the path it takes--<br />does it start on my feet, my fingers, my face?<br /><br />Or is it more like tossing one hundred rocks<br />in one hundred lakes: the ripples working the locks,<br />laying another layer of sediment in all those rocks,<br />my face just the current face of my body's many clocks?<br /><br />And when, sun-burned, dried and dead,<br />my arms, my neck, my face are shed,<br />could the ring of window-white around the red<br />tell me anything <em>but one day you'll be dead</em>?Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-42274465961514674482011-04-30T17:03:00.000-07:002011-04-30T17:05:38.354-07:00poem sometimes?<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">THE DEATH OF AN AIRTRAFFIC CONTROLLER</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">Mulhouse, between Switzerland and</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">Germany, France; narrowing the focus,</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">say <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">airport</i>, then <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">control tower</i>, its tight-</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">knit network of offices, cubicles, paths</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">of least resistance erupting like a flower</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">whose stack of blooms is each another floor.</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p><span style="font-family:georgia;"></span></o:p></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">A corner office, maybe, or the one </span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">across the hall from the one</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">he really wanted: its windows only</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">catch the light between noon and one</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">and the secretary attached to it always</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">reminded him</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><o:p><span style="font-family:georgia;"></span></o:p></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">of the girl he loved in high school, in</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">the way she looked up with her lips</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">parted slightly and her hair all dark</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">and nearly brown but red, really, red.</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><o:p><span style="font-family:georgia;"></span></o:p></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">Small consolation it may have been—</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">to see how effortlessly his blood</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">matched the color, to be reminded of her</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">as he bled out at eight in the morning,</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><o:p><span style="font-family:georgia;"></span></o:p></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">the sunlight creeping in already,</span></p><br /><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">lapping at his face.</span></p>Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-14792444109861828462011-04-13T02:15:00.000-07:002011-08-07T23:26:49.152-07:00no title poem, too tired for titlespoem under revisionWalthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-59771593754242209862011-02-04T18:37:00.000-08:002011-02-04T18:45:49.754-08:00poem poemy poemTHE THING ABOUT HOME<br /><br />The thing about home is<br />that it has never<br />existed. The four walls you<br />hung your posters or post<br />cards or letters or whatever<br />on were only ever walls. In-<br />stead, it is a place cobbled from<br />the minor and the mundane:<br />the scuffmark beneath the window<br />from your shoe as you exited, the<br />one you scrubbed until it was light<br />but not gone, and the pockmarks<br />from pins and nails, and there<br />was the corner you faced every<br />night as you fell asleep, all<br />built on the floor from a different<br />house, with a door from a house<br />you can't remember--<br /><br />only the light from beneath<br />as you lay in the dark. Home,<br />then, is the feeling. It's the gas<br />expanding to fill the space.Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-14259399968586486602011-01-29T17:27:00.000-08:002011-01-29T17:36:05.841-08:00poem pome pmoe mpoeWaking up in a rainstorm on<br />the Utah freeway is like waking up<br />a glass coffin: the water rushing<br />thick like dirt on the windshield, each<br /><em>thwmp </em>of the wipers another shovel-<br />ful heaped up until<br /><br />there is no land deep enough<br />for such a grave unless I<br />am some mountain's seed<br />and in the sun I will bloom.Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-89209176373456511162011-01-04T18:33:00.000-08:002011-08-07T23:27:09.851-07:00poem a this timepoem under revisionWalthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-24425034696352085982010-12-23T00:30:00.000-08:002010-12-23T00:51:03.898-08:00poem a sometimes, i guess<div>I HAVE CONFLICTING FEELINGS ON THE SUBJ.</div>Sleep, after all, is a kleptomaniac<div>who steals moments and hours,</div><div>hoarding them until the time is right--</div><div>when it can appear from behind the couch</div><div>shouting SURPRISE, and saying that after all</div><div>this time, it has learned the lesson:</div><div>a life is for all cycles of the sun and moon. But</div><div>every time the room is empty, the last light</div><div>turned on with a timer to make-believe</div><div>someone is home to ward off the burglars, the</div><div>ne'er-do-wells, and you</div><div>who will never return</div><div>have gone. Or else, less often,</div><div>you and sleep sit across from each other,</div><div>the bags under your eyes darkening</div><div>as you look at the opened present on your lap </div><div>realizing that you had asked too rashly,</div><div>that you never really wanted this. Wondering</div><div>how long it has been since you both ran out</div><div>of things to say and</div><div>when you get</div><div>to open that other, really big present.</div>Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-57187789959814414392010-12-19T00:11:00.000-08:002010-12-19T01:16:33.655-08:00poem a man i should be sleeping<div>THERE IS NO WORD IN ENGLISH</div><div><br /></div>And at the end I have only one<div>word that my life has com-</div><div>pressed between its slight layers so</div><div>it shines now pearlescent now</div><div>muffled like the last word </div><div>in a phrase bit back (i</div><div>t would have shed some fresh light</div><div>in the dark corners, where the</div><div>lamplighter of our conversation never tread) but</div><div>I have never been to Portugal and</div><div>time tips ever onward so I can say only</div><div><i>saudade</i>, softly, <i>saudade--</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>feeling nothing so sharp but longing and</div><div>let it be my last word, that I love you,</div><div>that you are lost.</div>Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-82620788830099339472010-12-18T18:06:00.000-08:002010-12-18T18:15:29.366-08:00poem a harglefagofhPACKING A BOOK BOUND FOR POCATELLO<br /><br />Packing a book bound for Pocatello;<br />it's been years since I was there. When,<br />after eighteen hours on the road, I<br />found the cheapest motel in its winding<br />avenues, passing a group of kids playing<br />baseball in the park at 10 pm, all their parents<br />watching from the stands while a block over<br />the pink neon outline of a woman flashes<br />flashes. And I slept on top of the covers,<br />waiting to fall alseep, half-watching a show<br />where a cougar dances among a throng of<br />younger men, her legs flash like headlights<br />coming through the narrow crack of the blinds,<br />and their faces animal-hungry for the chance<br />to return, to be back next week.<br />I was on my back,<br />wondering if my car was safe.Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-84533662948675531182010-12-12T13:23:00.000-08:002010-12-12T13:27:45.248-08:00poem a day or so<p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">THE WORLD'S SMALLEST MAN</span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"> </p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">The world’s smallest man has a face like Don Knotts--</span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">all big teeth and bulging eyes, a weak chin and </span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">the kind of cheeks children draw on animals – </span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">his neck looks impossibly long beneath such a face,</span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">his arms too seem long, but they must be to do what his height cannot.</span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">His skin everywhere looks tight, knuckles showing their joints</span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;">like each one is a ring he wears and cannot remove; <em>yes</em>,<em> I am</em></span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;"><em>small now</em>, it says, <em>but I remember what it was to be smaller</em>,</span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;"><em>smaller than I am now</em>,</span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family:georgia;"><em>smaller than I may ever be again</em>.</span></p><p style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class="MsoNoSpacing"><?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p><span style="font-family:georgia;"></span></o:p></p><p><span style="font-family:georgia;"></span></p>Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-20486653610321112922010-12-04T00:50:00.000-08:002010-12-04T01:17:54.932-08:00poem an almost twice today<div>GOD! GOOD!</div><div><br /></div>Each of us carrying off the other<div>like a thief in the belly of the night</div><div>and in the morning we find the thing</div><div>we stole and had stolen was the same</div><div>so like mirrors reflecting themselves</div><div>we grow darker as each reflection compounds</div><div>and by stealing we have made the thing</div><div>more solid still.</div><div><br /></div><div>Perhaps alone we may have called it</div><div>into being but only together could</div><div>such a thing survive.</div>Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-53672293885371114732010-12-03T01:27:00.000-08:002010-12-03T01:56:15.308-08:00poem a today<div>MOOREEFFOC</div><div><br /></div>Dickens called it <span style="font-style:italic;">mooreeffoc</span>,<br />when the mask of the world slips<br />and its true face is glimpsed between<br />those frantic, fluttering fingers, and<br />we have all struggled in reflections;<br />so what is the word for calling true<br />that which cannot be? for seeing <span style="font-style:italic;">mooreeffoc</span><br />and saying <span style="font-style:italic;">coffee room</span>?Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-50563798218063628242010-11-20T16:27:00.000-08:002010-11-20T16:28:11.477-08:00poem a whenever #somethingTWO POEMS<br /><br />I have two poems<br />And neither is wholly mine<br />Because I carried away lines<br />And phrases whole from you.<br />God, god, they were good—<br />Which is why I had to have them.<br />The annals of things<br />Which I have forgotten are already<br />Too full to add these few more; so<br />I have two poemsWalthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-68330045880220325602010-08-15T01:43:00.001-07:002010-08-15T01:43:12.825-07:00poem?Does each choice branch away<br />from the bough of the one I made<br />so that by squinting into the distance<br />can I see, just over there and<br />faintly, the shadowy, bright, brilliance<br />of the life my life could be?Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-58193731141738119242010-06-03T17:44:00.000-07:002010-06-03T17:54:29.052-07:00poem a sometimesON WATCHING A VIDEO OF A RUSSIAN WOMAN SMASHING BOTTLES IN A STORE<br /><br />Oh, ceaseless fury,<br />slipping along your lake of spirits<br />and wine, your feet are pocked<br />by broken glass your hands rain down.<br />What systems created you?<br />Whose high pressure pressed up<br />your low? And upon which shore<br />will you land, vapor-drunk,<br />buffeting against<br />the mountains until<br />you disperse, are dispersed,<br />and wail no more?Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-91204108719747783552010-05-11T16:46:00.000-07:002010-05-11T16:51:32.400-07:00poem an occasionallyand, god, how<br />she dances. once she<br />said it was the spirit,<br />and now, in the wind,<br />you can almost see hands<br />saying <span style="font-style:italic;">dance</span> in the way she moves her wrists,<br />how her knee knows to bend.<br /><br />and you hate the world for conspiring against her;<br />that, once at rest, <br />the spirit leaves.Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-91361762941849129572010-03-13T18:48:00.000-08:002010-03-13T18:55:12.798-08:00poem an occasionallyTHE ISLE OF THE DEAD<br /><br />In China, Shanghai, they call it the isle of the dead.<br />Not that it ever was surrounded by the gentle rubbing of water, but<br />it is an island now, an isle, and the lights<br />from the city around work<br />hard all day and the not-quite-dark<br />at eroding it until<br />finally<br /><br />there is only one building<br />on a graveyard of thousands: easier<br />to topple just one. <br /><br />And no one here ever speaks of ghosts--<br />They have all left to the city's bright heaven.Walthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-59521564710445158622010-03-08T14:44:00.000-08:002010-03-08T14:48:51.602-08:00sadaspojfEACH PASSING MOMENT<br /><br />now now you locks shining<br />in the sun framing each shining<br />star and the pearls of your laugh shining<br />in the cold new day all the air shining<br />each time before along the necklace shining<br />in almost the same way but now shining<br />darker or lighter but still<br />and now now you<br />in<br />and<br />alwaysWalthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22290283.post-40890338451323426322010-03-02T19:47:00.000-08:002010-03-02T19:54:33.976-08:00poem a blahdyblah_____________<br />the word tumbling syllables down<br />to bounce across your ear drum<br />you turning and there has only ever been<br />one word between us<br />how quoting you spoke phrases<br />which were like but not<br />what you were looking for like<br />oh but they were close and <br />into a more violent sea and<br />in remembering your face is so beautiful<br />and if i could have a word for it<br />i would speak that word foreverWalthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09774365223710047483noreply@blogger.com0