Hidden under the honeysuckle
and hibiscus
Lies a stone.
And as I sit, drinking a gin and tonic
Looking over the spent plates
where crusty bread
fried calamari, which is a fancy word for squid,
and two Oysters Rockefeller
sat
until recently consumed by two parents
both in that awkward state of freedom
and longing
when their child is at camp,
out past the ducks on granite rocks
puffing themselves up
flapping their wings
towards afternoon sun on Winnipesaukee
my thoughts and eyes are drawn back
to the wheel of stone
leaning against the rotting wall of railroad ties
covered in a remoulade of Honeysuckle
Rose of Sharon
and other viney things
that are unidentifiable to me.
It has been painted during its time
but the paint is faded and chipped
and the feeling is that the stone
has outlived the painter.
Yet I do wonder.
What was its job 50, 100, 200
years ago?
Was it in a mill?
Did it lie flat, grinding?
Did it roll, upright, crushing things?
What else did they use round stones for?
Is this what retirement for a working stone is?
Cast to the side,
forgotten
hidden under the honeysuckle
and hibiscus
in an alley next to a waterside Wolfboro restaurant
where parents sit
Looking at Winnipesaukee
over spent plates of bread, squid and Oysters Rockefeller
thinking of a child at camp.

A stretcher by a roadside
some place hot
as long as the person on it
isn’t completely covered
there is hope

Heads raise
eyes question
false buried
anguish flies
echoes
stronger demons hang
awaiting their turn

As remnant snow fails to reach the ground,
promising sunlight through window
warms cold feet
placed there
by an eager
lover of summer

Summer's webs remain behind.

They are tucked between an air conditioner
who is leaving for vacation on a shelf in the laundry room downstairs
and the window frame that faces a lonely winter
tucked out of view on a short wall staring at the pond next door
which has been emptied by this Autumn's drought.

And like that old mottled and greyed lace dress I saw hanging limply in a thrift shop once,
they speak of livelier times.

Spring reaches full stride
blades grow greener and taller
nag of summer work

Post deluge, slick hoppers lay suspended, savoring fresh water

Little tea bag talking head
Your cheeks are round and rosey
But every time you speak your "mind"
We see what you don't knowsy

young talons on a snowy roof mean no small beaks at the feeder below

Tangled in thick grass the young dragonfly, freed by a gentle gloved hand.

Nothing tastes as good,
***** thin,
as alive feels

I am thankful for you dear
and will until
you no longer hate me

In a sunny spot resides a new bench.
It would be a perfect place to sit among the flowers
with children sitting at your feet
teaching them all that you know
about animals
about the great outdoors
from a time when they were experienced in person
not on the Discovery Channel
not on TV

You could read a book to them there too
like Wild Animals I Have Known
by Ernest Thompson Seaton
the naturalist.

You could sit quietly in the sunshine
and nurse an unfortunate animal back to health
like a Gecko
or turtle
or opossum

You could just sit
your Dunkin Doughnuts iced coffee in your hand
and take it all in
or let it all out
your choice.

But you never will do any of these things
on this bench in the sunny spot
among the plants
and flowers
and smooth river rocks painted in your honor
by the children to whom you are missed
because the bench is dedicated
with your name on it
in memory of you.

From underbrush it creeps
along spring's damp ground
crawling, dragging towards light
Then
A crutch with which to achieve up
begins the climb
tendrils grabbing bark
First
a few at the end of the grow
more and more as maturity is gained
and grow moves upwards
Three
Green leaves on of each stalk
waxy, jagged and glistening
Will turn red in autumn
Pretty
But best left alone
should rash and itch
follow the handler's
folly

Things were done
well,
or badly.

Ok, I get it.

The answers I have
are what I have
and
just because
my answers
aren't what you want,
or need so desperately
to hear from my lips
to fit your view
or agenda
does not mean that
I am not telling you all that I know.

When a boulder falls from a height
And crashes into the forest below
Focus not on the boulder
How it fell
Why
Focus instead on the sheltering oaks
In the peaceful forest
Shattered and broken by the unexpected impact
And the many little acorns they sheltered
Crushed
Which will never grow to tree

The first enchilada was created in the summer of 1968
In a small house near Seal Beach
In Southern California.

The house was owned by a friend of my dad's
Or my mom's
And we had gone over for dinner

I was eight

I would like to say that it was a cool beach pad
With wood paneling, all the rage back then
And an Eames recliner in the corner of the living room

I only remember the paneling
but since I am writing this
The Eames piece stays

We had gone for dinner
And the owner of the house had made enchiladas
Beef ones as I recall with sauce from a series of Old El Paso cans

I can still smell and taste them
They were the first world food I had ever had
Besides canned Chinese food from the supermarket which doesn't count

And because I loved them with their ground beef and sauce
Their hot oil softened corn tortillas, sour cream, cheese and green onion
And little tiny bits of black olive

They became the prison guards
Throwing open the gates of my suburban Connecticut upbringing
Letting me leave the confines and walk freely in the sunshine for the first time

They were followed by many other firsts
Sushi, Crepes, haggis,  tiki masala and sea urchin to name a few
All of which owe their very existence in my life

To that first enchilada.

A tall man shakes hands with a shorter man.
No big deal.

But it is a big deal.
Years ago the shorter man bloodied the tall man's nose
when they were younger
after the shorter man had rebelled against his father
whom the tall man liked
because the father was his friend and
despite the terrible things the father did to his family
the tall man liked him
because the father did things for him.

When the shorter man rebelled and threw the father from his home
the tall man, much younger then, tried to throw the short man out
and return the house to his father
but when the tall man burst through the door full of youthful indignation,
the short man bloodied his nose, turned him around and threw him back out the door.

For over fifty years they lived next door to each other never speaking
but now
at the funeral of a mutual friend
they meet face to face
hands are joined
and a smile is exchanged.

A very big deal indeed.

They say "it's never easy to go home"
Which is true, sometimes.

I went home today to the hole where, until two days ago
the house where I had spent most of my life before marriage
stood.
It's gone now leaving only a hole
and as big as the hole looked
in the bright sunshine of a Connecticut Sunday in May
It is not as big, I know, as the hole in my sibling's heart
having had to say good bye to the only house
she had ever known.

The house stood
on a slight rise just
on the edge of the village.

It looked out
over
a broad spread of West Country farmland.

Not a remarkable house by any means
It was about thirty years old
squattish
squarish
made of brick
and
had four windows
set in the front
of a size
and proportion
which
more or less
exactly failed
to please the eye.

The end is coming soon
Contracts are inked
Agreements and inspections done

So after the deal is done,
and the house gone, soon  to be razed
what will be a mother's legacy?

A new home in a town nearby
A secure business on the west coast
A range of new possibilities waiting to be taken
College for a granddaughter

None of which
A mother knew possible
Before she was gone

What defines the line between
Like
and
Love?

Are there ranges of either?
We use the words a lot.
About people
food
drink
cars
TV shows

Do I love Salmon?
Yes

Do I love my wife?
Yes

Do I love Salmon as much as my wife?
I'd have to say no.
So there must be a range of love.

And what of like?
I like certain cars.
I like some of the people I work with.
Do I like cars as much as some of the people I work with?
I'd have to say no.

I really like cars.

The man says morning ice, sleet and rain
Then the man says maybe no ice
Next he says sleet, not so much
Day will be warmer too
and no rain either
I think I'll go
to the beach
instead
bye

The Man was a man of a color they were afraid of
so they hated him already.
When he offered his hand so that they could walk together
down a new path, they chose another hand.
A hand from behind
from a dark path covered in the sharp thorns
of intolerance
of hate and fear
of lies and misleadings.
So they rejected the hand of The Man
and turning their backs on him
strode proudly into the dark
where their clothes and skin were torn
and cut.

Still The Man offered his hand
and a way out of the darkness
of the lies and intolerance
of the hate and misleading
of the fear...
But the hands from the dark kept a firm grip
and the voices of the blackness
called out to them and played upon their fears
of the new
of the different
of those who were not the same as them
and they kept walking backwards
into the dark.
....
....
....
finally...
when they had reached the deepest darkest bottom
and their clothing had been rendered from their bodies
and their skin was shredded and bleeding
and they had nothing left
they realized...

and they turned to look for The Man
but they couldn't see him
for they were in too deep
and had turned from him
when they had had the chance...
the chance to walk together with the rest of us
into the brightest of forwards.

As I sit here, at the dining room table and stare over decaf coffee at the screen on my Mac
my eyes are drawn, once and awhile, to the picture sitting on the buffet in the butler's pantry.
Before we continue you should know that "butler's pantry" in this case
means the "third bedroom" that we saw in the listing on Realtor dot com before we bought the house and that,
in the usual real estate-ese, is an optimistic label at best.

But I was talking about the picture.

The picture sits, slightly askew, in a carved wooden bowl given to us by my wife's boss
as a housewarming present.
It, the bowl I mean,  came with salad tongs or forks,
depending on what it is that you call them,
made of water buffalo horn.
They sit in the bowl too and,
although she'd never admit it,  
I know that the thought of serving salad with water buffalo horn salad forks...
lets just say.....
doesn't appeal to my wife.

Right, the picture....

It sits in on the buffet,
in the carved wooden bowl,
next to another wood bowl.
This one full of carved wood fruits and vegetables,
which evidently, includes sugar cane.
When my wife's dad moved from his house to an assisted living facility
the kids, my wife, her brother and sister, took turns going down to help him move.
My wife was the last and dad insisted that
someone
"had" to take the fruit.

But, the picture....

It, and the wooden bowls full of fruit and unused salad forks,
are surrounded by both faux and real glassware
and placemats
which all sit perched
on the top of the buffet as precariously as refugees
and all of their belongings
on the deck and roof of an overloaded fishing boat
chugging from their homeland
to some place that is hopefully better.

The picture...

It was painted by my father-in-law and,
of all the others we have in the house,
is one of my favorites.
It sits on the buffet, askew in the carved wooden bowl with the horn salad forks,
amid polycarbonate and glass drink ware,
and placemats,
unframed for some reason.
All of his other works came framed
but this is one he did not...
and did I mention that it is one of my favorites?

I like his choices of frames on all of the other pictures we have,
but this is just canvas, stretched over a frame,
sitting in that carved African wooden bowl
with those salad forks made from water buffalo horn
on the buffet next to the other wood bowl full of wooden fruits and vegetables,
and wooden sugar cane,
in the butler's pantry.

Sun paints cloud bottoms
paints mist over lake orange
Summer day begins

In a second grade classroom
a tiny ant with a treasure thinks only of taking it to his colony.
A big hero he will be.
So he drags a piece of popcorn much bigger than he.

he drags
and pulls
and tugs

On a second grade classroom floor,
the ant's work is hard but will be worth it.
A big hero he will be.
So he drags a piece of popcorn much bigger than he.

he drags
and pulls
and tugs

On a second grade classroom rug,
the ant's task seems insurmountable but he knows of no other way.
So for an hour, he retraces his path backwards dragging a piece of popcorn
across the classroom rug.

He drags
and tugs
and pulls

In the open of a second grade classroom,
the ant feels exposed on the carpet but cover is closer now, he can feel it.
It's just there, where the wall meets the carpet.
A space just big enough to hide an ant.

Closer and closer.

He tugs and pulls and drags his prize closer still
Pulling and dragging the popcorn lurches across the carpet.

His rear legs reach cover
Then his thorax, his abdomen, his head with antennae and mandibles

then

The Problem.

and...

In a second grade classroom
a line of popcorn rests
where the carpet meets the wall.

I don't know what the day was like
But I want to believe that it was glorious
Cold
Clear
With the sting of February on the face of a doctor
A father to be
Hurrying his wife
Probably in labor
Down the steps to the car
For the trip to the hospital
Actually the sanitarium in Clifton Springs

Then, after awhile in the waiting room
The news
And the promise of a baby girl
His first child
The first of five

The child who won't die at the hands of a drunk driver
The only one who won't be a doctor
Who will marry
Have three children of her own
Loose a husband
Gain daughters and a son in law
Grandchildren
And who
Sometime later
After the roar of a hurricane passes
Will pass herself
Hiding the pain that ravages her small body
And tells her that she's still alive

But for now
In the sanitarium
In Clifton Springs
Only the promise
Of a baby girl
In the arms of a new mom
His wife

The promise of a gurney
is that things will be fine
unless
the sheet covers your head

Flopped in the house on the floor alone
Sullen and saddened wondering
Are the missing near or far away from home

Nails scratch circles into the hardwood floor
Wondering whether the missing will ever return
Then in an instant, a car door, and the realization that the missing no longer are.

The trouble with poetry is
that sometimes, often
it likes to hear itself talk too much
with words no one understands
with metaphors about beaches and rockets
and how they relate to love and loss
just to make the poet
feel superior
to the reader
and the reader
to hate poetry

If a man offers you water
without demand of recompense
and you are thirsty
do you look at the color of his skin?
do you ask what his politics are?
how he leans on an issue?
Or do you drink
full and deep?

Why does the titmouse
flick from feeder to clothes line
with his small beak still empty?

Titmouse does this as
your face is in the window
the face of a grumpy bear

Today
After forty three years
Of love
Loss
Happiness
Anguish
The family house
Passes to another
To be razed
But remembered forever.

Morning sun catches slick legs, toes outstretched, frozen in warmth near surface

Little plastic chest
holds a tiny misshapen pearl
placed under pillow

Tiny plastic chest
holds a pearl
for under pillow

Turkey Day has come and gone
with food
and dec'rative fittings
So it's down with the harvest
and up with the Santas
and a month full of gettings and givings

The great tree
Leans a bit more
Now that the wind and rain have passed
A few more branches lie beneath it on the ground
Torn by storm from where tree touched sky
But once again tree survives
Yet
The tree knows
That this time
Roots broke under the strain
Of wind and rain
And the likelihood is
It won't survive the next storm

Two trees stood in a wood
Three saplings grew beneath

One tree killed suddenly
in a storm misunderstood

The other dies slowly
from infestation

One sapling is transplanted
to another place out of sight
from the other two

Two are left
But one has turned towards
the sun

and the other

back to the stumps behind

so they no longer see each other

Tremble little polliwog
the pond's Great Bass is nigh.
and if he should to catch you up
you certainly will die

But wait, ahead some reeds so stiff
that should you wriggle in
could be as strong as prison bars
and protect from tooth and fin.

I worry I may be a troll
Some kind of smart assy funny web bot
For when social "friends" get on a roll
I fire back when I probably should not
See, though I'm a fighter
and will pull an all nighter
I'm sure my points will never be got

Those yelling "FREEDOM"
So they can stay with the crowd
Are not truly free.

Truth
The non surgical
treatment
to rumor

You can not tell the truth straight out
it simply shant be done
It makes the people scream and shout
and build walls by the ton

But if you lead them there by "chance"
a chance you planned before
they'll grab it first in vict'ry dance
and love you even more

Twenty is a number of perspective
To a kindergartner it is old
not "really old" like thirty
but still old.
To a man in his nineties
it might seem young, a long-ago-young
a time through which many of his friends,
Americans abroad,
didn't make it through.
Twenty dollars is a lot to a man
in an old coat
sitting on a bench in DuPont Circle
being handed a bag from CVS
containing a toothbrush
some soap and
new socks.
To a woman standing in line
at a Starbucks
glancing out the window to admire
her new Range Rover....
Twenty dollars is nothing
pocket change
she'll spend it here in this line
over the course of the day.
And what of me?
Of my perspective?
Twenty is measured in years
Hard ones
Not quite as hard ones (face it, it's never easy)
Years filled with laughter and watery eyes
Of jubilation and anguish
But years through which I can not imagine another path that I could have taken
to get here
to this point
this moment
with you.

I am 20 1st Avenue
Just as I am also St. Albans Drive
Old Stamford Road
Whitney Avenue
and a little Albermarle

But 20 1st Avenue is where I learned
How to make snow forts, big ones
and pillow forts that filled a living room

It's where I saw that if you plant a little tree
and hang around long enough
that you will have a great big tree
that drops black walnuts
So that you can caution your kids kids
that the walnuts can turn your skin black if you're not careful

It's where I learned what a Woolworths was
and that they sold plastic army men
with mortars, radios and M16s
by the bag for a dollar
nobody wanted the mortar or radio guy

Its where I learned what a honest to God toy store was
and because of that,
who Mr. Potato Head was.

It's where I learned about nuts
still in shells
and how to open them
with a crank nutcracker
or a little hammer
and how to get the meat out
with a lobster pick.

But most of all I learned
what a grandma was
that old people could be great fun
that they knew cool stuff
that they might allow you to do things your parents wouldn't
and that they could keep secrets
then finally
that they weren't forever
but their shadows in your life
were.

Two clay vases sit by my fireplace
recently discovered in their post move-in places
and relocated there.

One is small,
easily fitting into the palm,
and is covered with smokey brown lines
left by hair, lost during chemo,
placed on the vase while still hot from the kiln.

The other, large
filled with artificial roses
where once real ones burst from it's rim
and watched as people sat in wooden rows
remembering.

Both remind me of a lost one
someone who is no longer around
and yet, through fired pottery
is.

On Father's Day
I remember Dad
His practical jokes
His anger
His love
His temper
His laugh
His frustration at life
His creativity
and now
at 53
11 years older than he ever was
I understand