Let Go, Let Come
I know that I am retreating from what I was –
the swirl of these days confuses me –
names don’t adhere where I want to place them –
even my very own on me doesn’t quite stick–
it’s as if I had lost the polestar of vanity in my mind
and so saw things both more plainly and bleakly –
I am only a leaf among other leaves
and the machinery that let sun animate me
is worn out beyond hope of repair –
that gold bird, the sun, is heading south
and autumn plays its ancient script out,
a thing of beauty mixed with glory to make
an elegy while I cling to my branch –
yes, this is confusing, that I am next to nothing,
that I do not know when the wind will come
to harvest me, only that it will come –
there is wisdom, I suppose, in my confusion,
in my learning to let go, to let come, to be done
In The Head Of A Young Person
Who can tell what is in the head of a young person?
Who can tell what lies behind soft smooth expressions?
When we are young we are general issue,
wearing the uniform of possibility.
When I was young there were islands of awareness
maybe even an archipelago in the ocean of bafflement
Time goes on and life writes on our faces, turns
them into masks that hint at what may be inside
Everyone is an enigma, but there are questions
of different kinds, framed by hope and despair.
It is not only that we decorate ourselves with illusions
that are dear to us as life itself, our very own lives.
We decorate whomever we see, whomever we think
we want to know; we pin medals on their chests
What is in the head of a young person comes out
as life goes along and recedes even deeper as well
I look at the young and remember, but remember
all wrong, mixing my own elements up
I don’t know what’s in my head, I still sail an ocean
of bafflement, why should I question the young?
I confess when I look at a lily, at a rose, when I
take their scents in, questions form in my mind.
Less History
As I’ve gotten older, crossing through decades
like Manhattan neighborhoods on a Sunday stroll,
the angst/insight ratio has fallen a good deal –
I see without the same degree of suffering,
the same fuss over suffering, which, after all,
is only as intrinsic to this life as rain,
sunlight, the restlessness of wind, night…
My question now is, “Is this wisdom?” just
this diminution of a ratio that expresses
nothing more than resignation to the effect
that I am first and wish only in second place,
so far back as to be dwindling to a point…
I was once a great connoisseur of wishing,
or so I styled myself internally…in agony
The summer solstice is almost here and then
comes a long lush time as the days begin
to dwindle down to the winter minimum,
that other solstice that’s ruled by darkness
and a wan light from the south… I have made
this trip so many times I have stopped counting
and that decreases angst, too – less history
Seven Freedoms
I’ve lost six of the seven freedoms
and can’t remember the name of the freedom
that I still have…it goads me on, robbing
me of any conviction of my shape or place;
it agitates me with each breath, so that
I am neither short nor long of breath but
syncopated as if a jazz played inside me
continually improvising, exploring territory
not on any map, lost as soon as found
I’ve lost six of the seven freedoms
and can’t remember the name of the freedom
that still has me…having lost their names,
I don’t presume to address the six freedoms:
how much the freedom that holds me still
feels like necessity, as if there were a cusp,
or many cusps where the two met and made
points neither freedom nor necessity but the two
joined to make something new, free bound…
No One Calls
No one calls
these Sunday afternoons
It’s a mixture
of peace and desolation
I watch the light
as it keeps changing
I watch clouds
voyaging the sky
I hear the cicadas
frenzied in their singing
The season is getting
ready to shift
Too few monarchs pass
through heading southwest
I sit and ponder, tracking
myself, eluding myself
Unable to stop
doing either one
The days are shorter
as my days are shorter
I can’t say what I
may have learned
Advice irritates me
even when I give it
Green acorns fall,
first leaves float down
In my heart, there’s
soft and shy music