I imagine there is no place that I could go
where you haven't imagined me
Something, someone
that I am not

Before 18
Never smoked, never kissed, never dated
Never touched, never danced, nor wanted
“Below average student”
Unsuccessful in every way

Vaguely plain
probably poor
as things go
From undistinguished family
Big name
Wrong branch
Below budget
"You can always spot the clothes
the wanna-be's
the losers linger last-- hoping
to be chosen

Mercifully not

under-performers
hangers-on
The underside
So outside
til only now....

Somewhat silly
Too ready to do whatever it took
to be even liked-- a little

But too deeply shy
wandering away
to be loved another day

Probably not--

Not about all this....

Never!
Never look strength
straight in the eye
It must be born of something... someone... somewhere

I need

...but have been too long alone
untouched by desire
the presumption of love
in joints of dust –the lame of lust

So...

Unseen
Years creep by
Silent, numb

No one remembers
who I was

Raising my eyes
to the window—
–a flock of sparrows rise as one
into a gray sky
of mind

Beauty left by the back door of day
unnoticed in fading light

A dull ache
is all

Golden

Two blocks away
between the houses
the sunset smolders golden
through an oak

Cold creeps behind it

The infantile moon
With its smile of mischief
just short of malice
among the waves she drags along behind
A single diamond
glittering
in her navel
below

The rest of her
left
to the black sky
of my imagination

To Be Read over my grave

But what can I say?
    He has spoken to me, and he himself has done this.
I will walk humbly all my years
    because of this anguish of my soul.
16 Lord, by such things people live;
    and my spirit finds life in them too.
You restored me to health
    and let me live.
17 Surely it was for my benefit
    that I suffered such anguish.
In your love you kept me
    from the pit of destruction;
you have put all my sins
    behind your back.
18 For the grave cannot praise you,
    death cannot sing your praise;
those who go down to the pit
    cannot hope for your faithfulness.
19 The living, the living—they praise you,
    as I am doing today;
parents tell their children
    about your faithfulness.

...In honor of my red maple, cut down yesterday
and one from my childhood
________

My father had the tree cut down
Drought finished it... after a couple years of blight

A hundred seasons
Spreading sweetness
commanding grace

Mom took pictures of it
coming down
Neighbors with lawn chairs
Ring-side seats
for the aerial gymnastics
this circus of snarling saws
Dad joked about selling selling tickets
backyard picnics-- a Red Sox game

While silent photos watch
she surrenders her shadows
to the terms of light
stumps, dust
stages of death
the good-bye of a friend

What must that Yard look like now?
A shadeless glaring lot

Excuse a few silly moments to mourn a tree
to remember lying on flagstone
after sweeping them off
(They must have circled her trunk once
kept finding more as I worked with a broom)
building a sweat, a fort, my private place
under the tree that offered shelter

My father worked too
Trimming, raking, mowing, cursing her keys...
Maple keys...
that when you stamped
had that satisfying snap
of plastic bubble packing

Says he's gonna buy a new one
...sterile, hybrid, keyless kind
...so I was tired and lay down to watch
white clouds float in the bluest sky
I can remember...
...daydreams...interrupted... Air Raid Warning...
..Noon...
Then clouds again
...and I was with them

She talked in leaf language
and had much to tell
When her song part came, I slept somehow...
Since then years of singing in my head

At the end of the world
when the young man left
I lay on a hammock under her

When music turned...Savage
Hers?   The same...
presence... yearning...rooted... direction

this letter says. “She's fallen”
a slab of trunk for family members
A neighbor will have firewood for years

Her memorial?
...in my front room
to set coffee on...
to lay magazines....

But I will find the rings that belong to us!
Cut her song from tangled voices
in anxious traffic
on clearer days— when clouds won't float
but grasp, instead
a sky attempting a silvery-blue
...the cooler shades of memory

From the lawn chairs—groans, apology!
“ Not many trees like that one!”

Not many lives have majesty....

I used to think the wind was born in her arms
...then spread to all the other trees

Keep trying to remember what she said...
but there's only her hush

...and the rings that belong to us

I think about you...
Route 84
How many times we traveled
to get home

...by the side of the road
that winter day
fumbling with your phones
as we hold one
to my father's ear
So he could hear
Good-byes and Love yous
in your voices
too far away....
to drive
in time

for one last...
your voices
in his ear...his mind