Jan 2023
I. Some Very Bad News
My favorite poet was Edie.
& she said: “even as we sleep
pain that can’t forget
falls —
drop by drop.”
So where do I begin?
“Begin at the beginning.
Go on ‘til the end —
& then stop.”
II. Savage Nature
Between my fingers
& the pen
what rests? The village?
Highway 10?
Or Bethlehem —
one shining face
rekindling
some forgotten place
like Eden:
wand’ring steps, & slow?
I curse the page.
Let cursive know.
III. The Life of This World
… up North daze & miles along, a sunset before we took ourselves up broken to the mountain, to knock in a bottle of sorrow laughter + wine, Z & I wandered the boulevard, from delicatessen to barstool and on down the alley, to a square dreaming park all horseshoed with doorsteps. “Do you want to see Leonard Cohen’s house?” “Yeah, I do.” “Well … here it is”. On the road up through Vermont, we had listened to the man’s late songs — to the sounds of a fevered pilgrim mind, shuffling its cards once more and once last to make a sort of peace with the falling night. I set down lank and curled against the doorpost, gazed at a dead & dried bouquet left weeping on the stoop, and drank in the sight of the park in twilight — maple, gazebo & stone. Z stood laughingsilent for a night well spent, fixed in a beaming grin. There in the peace that was made for us — the sight of something new to take the madness from my eyes. “I thought it was there for good.”
My favorite poet was Edie.
& she said: “even as we sleep
pain that can’t forget
falls —
drop by drop.”
So where do I begin?
“Begin at the beginning.
Go on ‘til the end —
& then stop.”
II. Savage Nature
Between my fingers
& the pen
what rests? The village?
Highway 10?
Or Bethlehem —
one shining face
rekindling
some forgotten place
like Eden:
wand’ring steps, & slow?
I curse the page.
Let cursive know.
III. The Life of This World
… up North daze & miles along, a sunset before we took ourselves up broken to the mountain, to knock in a bottle of sorrow laughter + wine, Z & I wandered the boulevard, from delicatessen to barstool and on down the alley, to a square dreaming park all horseshoed with doorsteps. “Do you want to see Leonard Cohen’s house?” “Yeah, I do.” “Well … here it is”. On the road up through Vermont, we had listened to the man’s late songs — to the sounds of a fevered pilgrim mind, shuffling its cards once more and once last to make a sort of peace with the falling night. I set down lank and curled against the doorpost, gazed at a dead & dried bouquet left weeping on the stoop, and drank in the sight of the park in twilight — maple, gazebo & stone. Z stood laughingsilent for a night well spent, fixed in a beaming grin. There in the peace that was made for us — the sight of something new to take the madness from my eyes. “I thought it was there for good.”
