In case of KITTENS

The Litter

Where is the truth in the day,

this hot one, that suddenly

arrives from the past?

What does it mean that I was

a skinny, golden being then, with

light-filled bones?

My body was so pale and happy

to be lying in a litter

of new kittens.

Their shallow mewing breath.

Their tiny teeth,

blinking.

What house, the crumbling

sun porch?

What year?

I knew the smallness

of myself in the world, then –

Is that it?

Or the neighbor girls in lace

and gingham,

the obvious simplicity of life,

the wreath of time,

the neatly-tied bow of

memory?

Or is it just that I hadn’t met you yet,

and now yours is the life I stand

all my other lives beside?

Or that after bleeding for them in

the years since,

I’ve lost my compassion for cats,

and that’s what kittens grow into?

The mystery.

I am still lying here.

Their softness is still with me,

even now.

In case of TIME

We filled the house, its caverns

With breath and light and noise.

Its stony silence crumbled

Under the cheerful battering rams

Of our bodies.

Empty floors grew tables,

Books sprouted on shelves,

Beds and bedsprings creaked and bounced

Into being.

We loved that house into life.

And it will remember you,

Remember us,

As our only child,

Standing at our graveside in the rain,

Wind at its windows,

Lights on,

Fans spinning.

In case of VIOLENCE

Plague

I asked for pain

In the form of a swung fist, begged

For swelling plum and deep peach to crowd around my eye.

I wanted Sunday school, myself

To be eleven, hand shot up and smugly hyper-right

In all I knew. I wanted to throw a baseball

And devil take it, let it land, hit, or smash what it may.

And so, soul and bodily, I hurled it all away.

My cheekbone opened like a rose.

And yes, the years fell back, and stood to watch

But I cracked wide and broke

Against a truth of consequence and cost.

I read: even a plague of frogs is an act of loving grace.

(I will be something better for these bruises on my face.)

In case of A RED DOOR

It is all true

It is all true --

that thousands of fish have never been named,
that compasses point north,

that pi just goes on and on and on and on and on.

And it is true
that somewhere a man is buying flowers,
and a girl rides the subway, chewing a thumbnail over a book,
sparrows breed to make more sparrows,
and that cries give way to sleep.

It is all --
sea in its vastness
time in its fastness
heart in its fullness
-- true.

It is all true.

And it is true
that when you stand against my kitchen wall,
eyes fixed on a speck or some refracted light,
that you can see
a shimmering
blueprint
of another room,
another house, with
clean windows
a storm cellar,

and a red door,
that you will leave unlocked.

And the sun is a star,
our closest star,
that will not burn out in our lifetimes.

In case of ANYBODY STILL READING

the city that built the bomb

I remember the fight to keep you --
over gristled grilled cheese, blistered and black,
as thought it had been cooked on the griddle of the street.

You were a man from a mechanized city churning
in the desert --
like the city that built the bomb.

You toiled at a task you didn't understand, snapping and pulling
away from me
between bites of melted gold.

And I
wanted to wrap you in clean white sheets and
wanted to cover your hard metal eyes and
wanted to drown the day in ice, but

hesitated, suspended --
like the city that built the bomb -- by nightmares
of keeping a rattlesnake for a pet,
of waking up in fallout.

In case of ALCHEMY

At six, my body is a furnace.

I stoke it out of bed and coax up a flame in my eyes.

I send myself faithfully out.

I am the quiet priest of a quiet religion,

Cloaked in flannel and milk white fog.

At seven, I turn the key in the lock, brass to brass.

I fling wide the door,

Opening, open,

Before a morning has been sung hello,

Before a plank has been lifted or a nail driven,

Before a pen has touched a page.

My body is a furnace,

Opening, open.

By eight, I’ve already served bread to the jangling gypsy band,

Tea to the king’s mysterious wife,

Dark cups of blood to the usual ghosts.

I send myself faithfully out.

At noon, the sun is roaring with his golden mouth,

Opening, open.

I am tumbling in a sphere of metal and glass.

I measure ice and potion,

Weigh metallic heaps of dust,

Pour and chop and carry.

I coax up a flame in my eyes.

At three, I am a cog in the clock of time.

I’m pulling coffee from its dark bean fists,

Separating water from earth,

Sorting moons from stars.

More visitors cluster around to watch me work,

To trade their coins for cups.

I am the quiet priest of a quiet religion.

At six, the sailors come whistling in, homebound.

Beggar children stretch out their hands for hunks of cheese.

The king stops by to ask after his wife.

I kiss them all,

And turn them back to the door.

I am tumbling in a sphere of metal and glass.

By nine, I distill the day into night.

I float through the shop like a white moth in a cave.

The lamplighter comes by, singing,

Offering me his arm.

I turn the key in the lock, brass to brass.

I am a cog in the clock of time,

Opening, open.

In case of SUDDEN, UNEDITED POETRY

I listen to us as a song

Discovered in my youth and caught, bright

Between the panes of memory.

We’re still here

And there

In symphonic phrases

Hymnal lines tripping to their ends

Lyrics insisting FM radio

And in the smoke of our melody

bluer than blue.

I play our love deliberately.

Watch.

I listen to us as a song

A gentle vinyl spin

Scratched by the sharpest of needles

Around and around

Beginning to end

And then –

Silence.