jim-hillyt - Hello Poetry

It was by our old garage door beneath a spot long favored by birds to build nests of mud and string. The neighbor’s cat had not yet found it, though by dusk its deathbed would be merely flattened grass and a tuft of down. Perhaps I had seen this one the day before, its head turned skyward, beak gaping in a torment of appetency. It was a juvenile— not long expired, I knew, one black eye neither open nor closed, but stilled in that way the dead gaze without seeing. Its plumage was nearly complete: the tell-tale russet breast, the mottled gray. So near to taking its perilous leap— one unforgiving day, or maybe two, had been the space between flight and fall. This was a lovely work of feather and flesh, an inchoate beauty, its pinions and bristles nearly made. I nudged it with my boot and glimpsed beneath the wing a naked leg and trident foot— all reptile scale and claw. With less than a thought, I let the thing roll back upon itself, wing upon leg, to await the coming of the marauding cat.

0

Jun 25, 2018

Jun 25, 2018 at 11:13 AM UTC

Dichotomy

It was by our old garage door beneath a spot long favored by birds to build nests of mud and string. The neighbor’s cat had not yet found it, though by dusk its deathbed would be merely flattened grass and a tuft of down. Perhaps I had seen this one the day before, its head turned skyward, beak gaping in a torment of appetency. It was a juvenile— not long expired, I knew, one black eye neither open nor closed, but stilled in that way the dead gaze without seeing. Its plumage was nearly complete: the tell-tale russet breast, the mottled gray. So near to taking its perilous leap— one unforgiving day, or maybe two, had been the space between flight and fall. This was a lovely work of feather and flesh, an inchoate beauty, its pinions and bristles nearly made. I nudged it with my boot and glimpsed beneath the wing a naked leg and trident foot— all reptile scale and claw. With less than a thought, I let the thing roll back upon itself, wing upon leg, to await the coming of the marauding cat.

33

It was a taking-away for you— eight years of Providence slow unfolding— like cloud-shadows passing over low, green fields— as the obedient soul yields to its story’s ending. Perhaps I shall yield as well at a point I cannot foretell— though you may see an altered course: a truck weaving up the blind-side of a hill, or the lonely iceberg sitting utterly still.

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Mar 27, 2018

Mar 27, 2018 at 6:35 PM UTC

A Meeting, Eventually

It was a taking-away for you— eight years of Providence slow unfolding— like cloud-shadows passing over low, green fields— as the obedient soul yields to its story’s ending. Perhaps I shall yield as well at a point I cannot foretell— though you may see an altered course: a truck weaving up the blind-side of a hill, or the lonely iceberg sitting utterly still.

15

Pale purple crocuses crowd beneath the apple tree by the stone foundation warmed by a mid-March sun April, I know, brings spring but also snow feather-flaked and heavy bends the creeping rose low to the garden’s cheek If the cold should come again will the huddled crocus mustering crowd of luminous stem and petal peek head from snow or bow at last a quiet submission to harken Spring with its early passing

0

Mar 27, 2018

Mar 27, 2018 at 5:54 PM UTC

Early Flowers

Pale purple crocuses crowd beneath the apple tree by the stone foundation warmed by a mid-March sun April, I know, brings spring but also snow feather-flaked and heavy bends the creeping rose low to the garden’s cheek If the cold should come again will the huddled crocus mustering crowd of luminous stem and petal peek head from snow or bow at last a quiet submission to harken Spring with its early passing

18

At 104th street a great bulk of igneous rock heaves itself from Central Park— wet black-green in halide streetlight like a breaching submarine. I hadn’t seen this place before; still, I passed, all a funk, mind inside itself (a typical brood), moving past with just a sidelong look. By a low stone wall at the foot of the cliff, a man (black parka, pants too long, high-top shoes) leaned as if in muttered collusion with the ground. He spoke to someone as I passed (I figured he was drunk). “Fella,” I heard him say, as if to me. I stopped, and looking back, saw from across the wall, crouched on the side of the cliff a raccoon, black-masked, capacious gray coat, tiny hands. It sat there watching me, or rather, just watching, attentive to some attraction I didn’t see. And then another. And another. And all along that black expanse must have been twenty raccoons (I didn’t think they could be so varied) quietly foraging, awaiting, I came to understand, the man in the black coat. He threw bread to them like the old pigeon lady in Mary Poppins and five or so gathered nearby on the other side of the wall not minding his humanness, only eating. “I come out here every night,” he explained. “I don’t got a girlfriend anymore, so I come out here and feed them to **** time.” He tore a piece from a half-gone baguette and threw it to a little one. “There’s like fifty of them now,” he said. “There were twenty when I started; they have four or five babies every spring. Nobody knows they’re here except me.” As he spoke, a baby raccoon climbed up a sapling by the wall, extending its sharp black nose toward the man who held a scrap of bread. The raccoon took it unreluctantly. I flinched at the thought of tiny raccoon teeth missing their mark on my index finger. But habit was fixed and easy here between man and raccoon. “They’ll come up and sit on my shoulder...” he said at last and then trailed off. I stood and watched for several minutes— this assembly of raccoons along the black cliff and the man who called them “fella” and “baby.” At last he said with satisfaction, “They call me the raccoon man.” Deciding he had said his bit, I gave a soft, enthusiastic whistle between my teeth as if to say, “Well done.” At 105th street, I felt remorse for not having said more to the man who drew his nocturnal congregation every night right there on Central Park West. And in a gesture of regret, I turned slightly back as I walked to the see his black form bent over the low wall dispensing bread.

0

Dec 6, 2017

Dec 6, 2017 at 12:17 PM UTC

Raccoon Man

At 104th street a great bulk of igneous rock heaves itself from Central Park— wet black-green in halide streetlight like a breaching submarine. I hadn’t seen this place before; still, I passed, all a funk, mind inside itself (a typical brood), moving past with just a sidelong look. By a low stone wall at the foot of the cliff, a man (black parka, pants too long, high-top shoes) leaned as if in muttered collusion with the ground. He spoke to someone as I passed (I figured he was drunk). “Fella,” I heard him say, as if to me. I stopped, and looking back, saw from across the wall, crouched on the side of the cliff a raccoon, black-masked, capacious gray coat, tiny hands. It sat there watching me, or rather, just watching, attentive to some attraction I didn’t see. And then another. And another. And all along that black expanse must have been twenty raccoons (I didn’t think they could be so varied) quietly foraging, awaiting, I came to understand, the man in the black coat. He threw bread to them like the old pigeon lady in Mary Poppins and five or so gathered nearby on the other side of the wall not minding his humanness, only eating. “I come out here every night,” he explained. “I don’t got a girlfriend anymore, so I come out here and feed them to **** time.” He tore a piece from a half-gone baguette and threw it to a little one. “There’s like fifty of them now,” he said. “There were twenty when I started; they have four or five babies every spring. Nobody knows they’re here except me.” As he spoke, a baby raccoon climbed up a sapling by the wall, extending its sharp black nose toward the man who held a scrap of bread. The raccoon took it unreluctantly. I flinched at the thought of tiny raccoon teeth missing their mark on my index finger. But habit was fixed and easy here between man and raccoon. “They’ll come up and sit on my shoulder...” he said at last and then trailed off. I stood and watched for several minutes— this assembly of raccoons along the black cliff and the man who called them “fella” and “baby.” At last he said with satisfaction, “They call me the raccoon man.” Deciding he had said his bit, I gave a soft, enthusiastic whistle between my teeth as if to say, “Well done.” At 105th street, I felt remorse for not having said more to the man who drew his nocturnal congregation every night right there on Central Park West. And in a gesture of regret, I turned slightly back as I walked to the see his black form bent over the low wall dispensing bread.

87

The great horned owl, the naturalist told us, has senses so wonderful it can hear our hearts beating in our chests, the rush of blood through our open arteries. That's how, she said, it hunts its prey, tiny mice hiding beneath the snow. Discerning their tremulous pulses, it bears down on them like doom from the pine branch, reptile talons outstretched upon faceless snow. Does the mouse’s pulse, I wondered, quicken as the owl’s Valkyrie wings descend? For one—me—unhunted by the raptor there is a longing to be heard to bare one’s chest to the aching ears of the bird to beat the worried rhythm of my soul to this listener, hoping vaguely for reply or for succor. Why this desire for this secret discourse, this singing one to the other, beating heart to bending ear? We move, each day, among throngs of us, crowds of us, bumping, passing, every soul beating its peculiar drumbeat, every street a percussive chaos— joyous crescendos, dirges, incantations— yet we are as silent to one another as the timpani of the ninth to its feverish creator. This bird sits within its wood and wire enclosure hissing at the passerby, irritated to be awake, pine-cone shaped but for its feather “ears,” absurdly lopsided on its swiveling head. Still, it listens and looks with a knowingness that makes me linger hopefully by the cage-side. For this infinite moment, I will whisper to the interested, will pause discreetly for the owl to look in my direction and, with no more than a show of its black, impassive pupils, hear me.

0

Aug 21, 2017

Aug 21, 2017 at 1:53 PM UTC

The Owl

The great horned owl, the naturalist told us, has senses so wonderful it can hear our hearts beating in our chests, the rush of blood through our open arteries. That's how, she said, it hunts its prey, tiny mice hiding beneath the snow. Discerning their tremulous pulses, it bears down on them like doom from the pine branch, reptile talons outstretched upon faceless snow. Does the mouse’s pulse, I wondered, quicken as the owl’s Valkyrie wings descend? For one—me—unhunted by the raptor there is a longing to be heard to bare one’s chest to the aching ears of the bird to beat the worried rhythm of my soul to this listener, hoping vaguely for reply or for succor. Why this desire for this secret discourse, this singing one to the other, beating heart to bending ear? We move, each day, among throngs of us, crowds of us, bumping, passing, every soul beating its peculiar drumbeat, every street a percussive chaos— joyous crescendos, dirges, incantations— yet we are as silent to one another as the timpani of the ninth to its feverish creator. This bird sits within its wood and wire enclosure hissing at the passerby, irritated to be awake, pine-cone shaped but for its feather “ears,” absurdly lopsided on its swiveling head. Still, it listens and looks with a knowingness that makes me linger hopefully by the cage-side. For this infinite moment, I will whisper to the interested, will pause discreetly for the owl to look in my direction and, with no more than a show of its black, impassive pupils, hear me.

42

There is something about churches— the sanctuary filling slowly, brass ***** pipes arrayed like halberds in a medieval arsenal, stooped ushers handing out programs as the congregation accumulates softly like snow. And the pulpit—like a queen in a hive of wooden pews all of polished walnut, stands hushed and expectant. (I know within that pulpit there is a place to put cough drops, a legal pad, second pair of glasses.) Sanctuaries have a peculiar smell, redolent of potted lilies, Youth Dew perfume, aging hymnals, the suspired breath of five hundred faithful lifting their voices to that soaring Byzantine dome. I was glad for your presence that day, the sound of your marvelous voice, the warm sense of your shoulder next to mine. You cradled a hymnal benevolently in your hand as though you were baptizing a child. "Jesus Christ is risen today, Alleluia!" I sang more loudly, I suppose, for gratitude that you were with me. I held my hymnal with more care, sang and looked up more hopefully to that pulpit than I might otherwise have done on any given Easter. I prayed more ardently for good things to happen, thought more kindly of the man beside me who wouldn’t make room when we three entered the pew but stared blandly ahead as if waiting for an opera to begin. When the minister spread his arms in benediction and bade us all go in peace, we stayed to hear the postlude and watch the Easter crowd wind its way to the narthex and spill out into the boisterous parade on Fifth Avenue. I sat there and listened with you as the organist played his sonorous farewell. When I was a boy sitting next to you in church, you might gently pat my thigh when the organist’s final note passed through the sanctuary like a great bird in flight. You would smile as if to say, “You made it through the whole service!” On this Easter, when the hymn began, and the mighty ***** notes swelled around us like God’s own voice in song, it was the thought of your shoulder near mine, your hands upon the pew, that halted my singing for a moment, to let a silent bolt of longing pass through me like a solitary dog crossing a road. Then it was gone, the thought, but so, too, was your palpable nearness, the idea of your voice ringing through the church like a celebration.

0

Apr 19, 2017

Apr 19, 2017 at 4:45 PM UTC

Easter, 2017

There is something about churches— the sanctuary filling slowly, brass ***** pipes arrayed like halberds in a medieval arsenal, stooped ushers handing out programs as the congregation accumulates softly like snow. And the pulpit—like a queen in a hive of wooden pews all of polished walnut, stands hushed and expectant. (I know within that pulpit there is a place to put cough drops, a legal pad, second pair of glasses.) Sanctuaries have a peculiar smell, redolent of potted lilies, Youth Dew perfume, aging hymnals, the suspired breath of five hundred faithful lifting their voices to that soaring Byzantine dome. I was glad for your presence that day, the sound of your marvelous voice, the warm sense of your shoulder next to mine. You cradled a hymnal benevolently in your hand as though you were baptizing a child. "Jesus Christ is risen today, Alleluia!" I sang more loudly, I suppose, for gratitude that you were with me. I held my hymnal with more care, sang and looked up more hopefully to that pulpit than I might otherwise have done on any given Easter. I prayed more ardently for good things to happen, thought more kindly of the man beside me who wouldn’t make room when we three entered the pew but stared blandly ahead as if waiting for an opera to begin. When the minister spread his arms in benediction and bade us all go in peace, we stayed to hear the postlude and watch the Easter crowd wind its way to the narthex and spill out into the boisterous parade on Fifth Avenue. I sat there and listened with you as the organist played his sonorous farewell. When I was a boy sitting next to you in church, you might gently pat my thigh when the organist’s final note passed through the sanctuary like a great bird in flight. You would smile as if to say, “You made it through the whole service!” On this Easter, when the hymn began, and the mighty ***** notes swelled around us like God’s own voice in song, it was the thought of your shoulder near mine, your hands upon the pew, that halted my singing for a moment, to let a silent bolt of longing pass through me like a solitary dog crossing a road. Then it was gone, the thought, but so, too, was your palpable nearness, the idea of your voice ringing through the church like a celebration.

73

Cardinal couple at the bird-feeder today, he all in red, she in orange-gray. They’re not like us, this mismatched pair, she on the snow below, he circling in the air. They never part but seldom unite, conjoined by love and freed by flight.

0

Feb 11, 2017

Feb 11, 2017 at 2:16 PM UTC

Cardinals

Cardinal couple at the bird-feeder today, he all in red, she in orange-gray. They’re not like us, this mismatched pair, she on the snow below, he circling in the air. They never part but seldom unite, conjoined by love and freed by flight.

12

At Singing Hills Down upon the earth, boy, brushing dirt from broken flints. The woman, tall, in khaki pants, slowly stands and squints. Down upon the earth with pockets full of stones. A hundred yards across the land where knife-grass spears the sand a bullsnake sleeps in sunlight. Speak of arrowheads and Utah, you, with dignified excitement; speak of ostrich eggs! You and I, she'd say, Galapagos! Where armored turtles heave their bulks across the land. Here Mother Earth lies naked to her bones. Flint bones, in sun as white as lamplight. With your Thermos cup in hand talk of arrowheads again— or Galapagos— Where giant turtles rule the land!

0

Feb 1, 2017

Feb 1, 2017 at 4:05 PM UTC

Galapagos and Arrowheads

At Singing Hills Down upon the earth, boy, brushing dirt from broken flints. The woman, tall, in khaki pants, slowly stands and squints. Down upon the earth with pockets full of stones. A hundred yards across the land where knife-grass spears the sand a bullsnake sleeps in sunlight. Speak of arrowheads and Utah, you, with dignified excitement; speak of ostrich eggs! You and I, she'd say, Galapagos! Where armored turtles heave their bulks across the land. Here Mother Earth lies naked to her bones. Flint bones, in sun as white as lamplight. With your Thermos cup in hand talk of arrowheads again— or Galapagos— Where giant turtles rule the land!

26

Come to the window, dear; listen to the sea-swell comb its patterns on the sand. Stand by my side and hear the clanging of a buoy-bell, breakers crash upon the strand. Tonight, then, you and I may stand and breathe the evening waiting hopefully to see the dusk-fire turn to night, the drunken ***** go weaving from their holes into the sea.

0

Feb 1, 2017

Feb 1, 2017 at 3:55 PM UTC

The Sea at Twilight

Come to the window, dear; listen to the sea-swell comb its patterns on the sand. Stand by my side and hear the clanging of a buoy-bell, breakers crash upon the strand. Tonight, then, you and I may stand and breathe the evening waiting hopefully to see the dusk-fire turn to night, the drunken ***** go weaving from their holes into the sea.

12

You, bright-smiled sun-lover descend on feet of flesh past the hundred-headed best, past the high-court Rhadamanthus. And the hollow-gazing dead look up from hollow homes, and voices from the deep inquire, "Whither now, oh flesh and bones?"

0

Feb 1, 2017

Feb 1, 2017 at 3:53 PM UTC

Descent

You, bright-smiled sun-lover descend on feet of flesh past the hundred-headed best, past the high-court Rhadamanthus. And the hollow-gazing dead look up from hollow homes, and voices from the deep inquire, "Whither now, oh flesh and bones?"

8