House Of Habit
I live in the house of habit,
rarely venturing out the front door
or the back door,
I stare out the windows and dream.
I keep myself from going too far.
I live in the house of habit
I can’t resist dreaming but I worry
ravishing dreams will be the end of me.
This dreaming beckons to me
without any sense of measure
I live in the house of habit
which I have built slowly over
all my years, even surreptitiously.
Experience comes out of peril, but
habit softly muffles everything.
I live in the house of habit
and can’t tell you how to find me,
because I no longer know my address
where I am alone without myself,
luxury approaching death itself
I live in the house of habit,
a place I never intended to be
that just grew up around me,
with a desk of polished bone
I compose a memoir of nonentity
I live in the house of habit
Coastal Fog
In longhand in blue ink on white paper
at the Claremont Hotel on vacation in Maine
just outside Acadia National Park, I wrote
down with urgency just a few early lines –
about how nothing lasts forever, nothing
is utterly distinct, how each of us is almost
a second coming of others who once were,
who were themselves almost second comings…
and so forth , turning just slightly aside
to notice that the mind lives in complex space
native to a profusion of infinite regressions,
finding myself now on path of genuine interest…
but somewhere between Southwest Harbor
and Harpswell, Maine, the pad and the lines,
and the beginnings were lost, with nothing
quite distinct of it all left in my mind…
I can say what was lost was nothing
and say at the same time what was lost
may have been everything – I write an
elegy for the indeterminate, coastal fog
The Birth Of Pallas
Zeus said, “I have the worst headache
of my whole life since the beginning.”
Zeus thought, “Hera is a pain, but not
like this that is so near my center.”
He swaddled his head in dense cloud
dimming the sun but got no relief.
Since gods are two –year- olds
writ large, he threw a temper tantrum,
scattering thunderbolts to the horizon
so shepherds feared for their flocks
and those lucky ones who had skins
of wine, drank deep as they worried.
Zeus’ tantrum was of no avail, so he
changed times and donned human guise.
He presented himself at dusk to an ER
in San Antonio, one more droplet
in a brown river of nameless suffering
and told the triage nurse that he had
“the worst headache of my whole life
since the beginning” – she came awake.
Zeus lay in the tube of the MRI listening
to noise with none of thunder’s glory.
When he came out, the resident told him,
“Listen Mr. Z we have to operate.
You have the largest aneurysm anyone
here has ever seen. You’ll die if it bursts.”
Just then the pain became even more
lancinating and a small patch of mist
burst forth from his forehead and grew
and grew and took form even as it grew
to be as large as Zeus himself, but with
gray-green eyes whose depth was wonder.
“Ah,” said Zeus, “Pallas Athena herself.”
“Becoming, great Zeus, is suffering,”
said the wise one, daughter of depths
and foolishness and thunder, too.”
Then they disappeared, Zeus and Athena
in just a single patch of cloud, moonlit.
“How should I document this?” the resident
asked the chief of the ER, old Watkins
who replied, “My back aches, my feet hurt –
just let yourself go and use your imagination.”
New And Uncanny, Too
1.
I’m having trouble making anything
because where invention once seemed
like piecing my own only head together,
adding new space with novel views,
now invention seems like taking my head
off my neck, exposing its inner workings,
a matter perilous from the outset in which
I’m likely to lose much more than I gain
I’m aware of an inhibition, a hesitation
that prevents me from taking the dive
so I’m left embarrassed with inklings
of what might be, of what might have been
2.
My old ignorance that licensed my daring
has been replaced not precisely by knowledge
but by experience, thousands of flavors
composing and recomposing atmospheres
that have turned me inwards even when
I’m not aware and feel I’m looking out
To make something new when I’m
someone old, I must use myself as
preamble, go into what has been in
order to let it go, refresh itself, put on
a familiar costume that is yet fabulous –
I make myself new and uncanny, too
Summer 2010
Sweet
Cloud on deep green,
white dog is diabetic,
as sweet as ever
I wait for the mail
with a child’s hope – I want word
from all I have lost
Robin Chicks
I approach the nest
where robin chicks wait for food –
robins dive bomb me
So Hot
So hot, so muggy –
but why can’t I even think?
what ‘s happened to me?
Inner Jungle
In inner jungle
I find words beautiful as
birds of paradise
Door
Each garden holds, hides
a door to Eden, but how
to find it, pass through?
Tall
Tall slender grasses
sway in summer breeze and shed
mists of silver seeds
Basil
First week of summer,
hot and humid, basil thriving
as if this were home
Miracle Ordinary
I try to record
what I call the miracle
of ordinary
Between Patients
Alone with Montaigne
I wait for the next patient
to bring news of now
100 Degrees (Fahrenheit)
In the heat of day
breezes still whisper softly
in deep forest shade
New Pieces
Being with myself
is a perpetual puzzle –
new pieces each day
Almost Think
The heat of day breaks
in late afternoon and I
can almost think now
Small Words
I mumble small words
and then can not decipher
what I may have meant
Soft Fingers
Evening breeze enchants
with soft fingers on my cheek
as moon’s a gold hint
Neither Here Nor There
I went wandering
I was no longer here and
then no longer there
Pale Purple
In the midst of mint,
morning glories are blooming,
white and pale purple
Independence?
Queen Ann’s Lace trembles
in a hot July 4th breeze –
what’s independence?
Intricate
Nothing’s intricate
beyond the fact of being
and knowing I am
No Rain
No rain changes scents –
the sense of dry takes over
along with deep fear
Shadow Net
Of shifting shadows’
net cast across a green lawn
swallowtail flits free
Cheerful…
Cabbage butterfly
as white as a flying flag
cheerful in lilies
Few Mosquitoes
It’s so dry and hot
there are so few mosquitoes –
I start to miss them
Stitch In
Each little poem
a stitch in a bright garment
that I’ll never wear
Old Magnolia
Old magnolia
stands staunch in this blazing heat –
no past, no future
Artificial
Artificial rain,
the drumbeat of sprinkler drops
in parched July wood
Both At Once
Summer evening mood –
a bird sings joy and sorrow
and sings both at once
Too Hot
It’s too hot for thought –
I dream of my dead parents –
missing is missing
Relief
Cardinal flowers,
cardinals – red is relief
in fierce summer heat
Swallowtail
Heart stopping beauty
of swallowtail in the breeze
before twilight dims
Last Fireflies
Last fireflies flicker
lonely lights in late July –
they can’t know sorrow
Drunken
Drunken swallowtail,
yellow patch in heavy air –
rumble of thunder
Getting On
I’m part of nothing
and nothing is part of me –
we get along well
August Sniff
This afternoon breeze
stirs August dapple – white dog
sniffs with her black nose
After…
After weeks of heat
this fine afternoon changes
who I think I am
Gentle Breeze
A thousand worries –
a gentle breeze on the cheek –
which one is more real?
Mesh
Quiet mesh of green
of which I will soon be part
past acquiescence
Bricks
Metamorphic bricks
is what words are – buildings change
without touch of trowel
Orange Flag
Flying in the rain,
monarch, fluttering orange flag –
indomitable
Leaden
My tongue is leaden,
so I stare into the fire,
watching orange tongues leap
I Lost
I lost a few lines
last night, threw them back into
the pond of silence
Almost
From high in green oak
yellow swallowtail whirls down –
almost autumn leaf
Reach Me
I’m always searching
for what’s inside out of reach –
I never reach me
In Sorts
I’m not on good terms
with myself, never have been –
could I be in sorts?
Summer Stir
Summer stir of leaves,
green whispering in the breeze,
high clouds, no moon yet
Color Of Rust
The color of rust,
slimy mushrooms, growing out
from huge fallen oak
On Slate Roof
Acorns on slate roof,
cracks that herald fall’s coming –
squirrels on alert
Moon Dreams
The moon dreams its way
up eastern sky, quells the heat
of this August day
Bluest
Yellow swallowtail
and bluest September sky –
this is still summer
Late Snapdragons
These late snapdragons,
a dream of summer’s passing,
as the sun heads south
Dreamer, A Dream
Everything I see
starts to seem a dream to me –
dreamer, a dream, too
Empress
Empress butterfly,
wings of subtle orange and dun,
still on brown oak leaf
Anemones
Late anemones
at summer’s end are blooming
cool refreshing white
Fading
I’m fading away
from all I was and wanted –
empty, more content
Dream Well
Into the dream well
I lower my bucket, catch
cold draughts of myself
Absent Minded
My mind is elsewhere
when I think – absent-minded
I become myself
Muted
Summer is muted
these last days before autumn –
it has done its work
Flow
How to live, how die?
I watch wind teasing willows
beside the river…
To Learn
All that is, teaches,
if I can just step away
from my wishing’s fount
Into
Yellow swallowtails
fly out of the tall still oaks
and into my mind
Failing?
Is white dog failing?
She’s still completely herself –
white lashes, pink tongue