the letter h

hindered heart,
hurry.
hurt heron,
hurry.

hangdog help,
hackneyed horse,
half-horror hues:
hurry.

homesickness hardens.
hate hits harshly.
hazards happen.
hurry. hurry.

hasten happiness.
hold humdrum highs.
hallow hard honings.
hope.

beat

on days like today
you can hear the earth singing
in and out of tune.

sometimes when i’m emotional, i don’t know what will happen next

bread rises in my heart like weeds that spawn
overnight, like an inevitably rising tide of want
and corruption. trash piles up in the streets.
oak tendrils drift and eddy along every windshield
on my block. somewhere in among these currents
lies the creative spark. i know this. and still,
it seems impossible to tell waste from growth:
this sensation will grow, devour itself, and die.
yet here is the warm, mothering smell of yeast.
here, the tender moisture of a tea-towel shroud.
i have stretched and pulled the dough, i have known
it with both hands: a web, a stone, a trap, a child.
the brown, glutinous lump, within which i can sense
something fermented and self-defeating going on,
appears to me both tragic and mysterious. alive.

holed up

i’m in an odd place with it, a transition.
i might be getting better, but it could
go either way. when the boys in blue
kick in your door, haul you out of bed,
that’s when you know. i’d like to think
they’re on their way now and i’m ready.
there’s a chair under the door, water
and canned food if i need it, batteries
for the camcorder, and your number
on my speed dial. in the meantime
i will keep on writing, writing, writing.

therapy

clumps of grass spring up
shockingly green and dense
at the dog park these days,
islands in a dusty stream,
little anachronisms of growth.
the father-figure delicate
on splayed lawnchair legs
watches hounds and terriers
gambol across the field
of hard-packed, chain-linked
dirt, raising great cloudy
pillars of fine oklahoma dust
with an eager affection
never shown to him by children.
he is in the wilderness now,
wanting some guide by day
and perhaps finding it here,
perhaps not. he isn’t sure.
his own children feared him,
and he would never throw
a ball for one of them.
(although at least he didn’t
hit them. they never wanted
for food or shoes or a roof.)
he likes animals’ oblivion,
their stark speech of presence
and present mood, of scent,
of motion and resting.
these elemental signs
appeal to his small soul,
resting there like manna
that clung to clumps of grass
every morning but one.

routine

we’re all glancing outside hoping for
a break in the clouds. production
and efficiency measure out each day
into chunks of professional development,
bounded on every side by bad coffee
and smoke break gossip among those
of us who plan to get the most out
of our medical benefits plan, braving
the cold and the carcinogens just to
make contact with other humans. just to
say we did it. something inside of me
keeps wishing for being to crash its way
noisily through the cubicles and copiers
and endless calendars of becoming, like
a spaniel tumbling through a tedious
round of chess or monopoly, nevermind
that it will be impossible to remember
just how it went or what were my next moves:
here are the eyes of insight and a great
heart. that’s what i’ve been missing. a little
slapdash. a little, sudden earnestness.

record

pokeberries drove him mad,
some said. he was accustomed to
thinking abstract thoughts, talking
about them in an abstract way,
but when the bomb fell
and everyone went underground
and then came up again,
he had to fend for himself
in some pretty uncomfortable ways.
pretty concrete. pretty desperate.
then this one old topsider who
never went down at all but just
holed up in the most inhospitable
mountain country there is
and somehow made it, he told
our man about making poke ink
and how it wouldn’t deteriorate.
from then on it was all juice
and mash and sieves and boiling.
he stopped eating and sleeping
regular hours. started looking
poorly, had that crazy gleam
people used to get in their eyes
right before they got baptized
or played a solo on a lit stage.
had it all the time. some people
said it was just his time. and some
said it was the flu – everyone’s
immune systems were pretty awful.
but i’m the one that found the body.
and i’m the one who read the words
he wrote all over himself (they didn’t
make any sense, only a few were
even English). and i say he died
because he wanted it too much:
that old life. the one with dreams
and progress, learning handed down.
the one, in other words, that’s
not ever coming back.

prime

there was a night last week when
i really felt it, whatever it was:

the strain of looming debt or
the shadows of future conflict.

food insecurity.

the unease of broken norms,
falling behind with an assignment,
obligatory gift giving done awkwardly.

the slow decay of the automobile.

the queues at every grocery,
always saying yes out of habit,
being agreeable no matter what,

you know how it is. it adds up.
it’s the standing ten hours a day,

the waiting for bad news,
the putting down of the dog,
the cheques too old to cash.

feeling suddenly unwelcome.
consecutive bad haircuts.
the stack of unwritten thank yous.

who could have foreseen this season?
in this god-blazing noonday hour,
in the hue of battle, bloodsongs
ringing in the ears and every nerve alive,
in the very pith and prime of life,

i had thought it would be different.

when i am not engaged
on every side with foes,
when i am not so terrible,

so scarred and nicked
with disappointments
subtle, swift, sharp,

come to me then.

come speak to
me a little
cheer.

twenty-six

start underneath. pry.
prod, poke, turn over my earth.
soon the ground will freeze.

depends

talk to the parts.
pull them with words:
this way, over here,
almost almost.
a little farther.
telling the bones
might seem in youth
like giving a gift
your know-how
your executive direction.
they say, yes. yes.
the structure complies
in the early days.
only much later
do they occasionally
say can’t. won’t. no.
then it comes out
that they have been
giving gifts all along,
themselves,
and are now poor.