A Dramatic Poem

The deck of an ancient ship. At the right of the stage is the mast,
with a large square sail hiding a great deal of the sky and sea
on that side. The tiller is at the left of the stage; it is a long oar
coming through an opening in the bulwark. The deck rises in a
series of steps hehind the tiller, and the stern of the ship curves
overhead. When the play opens there are four persons upon the
deck. Aibric stands by the tiller. Forgael sleeps upon the raised
portion of the deck towards the front of the stage. Two Sailors
are standing near to the mast, on which a harp is hanging.

First Sailor. Has he not led us into these waste seas
For long enough?

Second Sailor. Aye, long and long enough.

First Sailor. We have not come upon a shore or ship
These dozen weeks.

Second Sailor. And I had thought to make
A good round Sum upon this cruise, and turn -
For I am getting on in life - to something
That has less ups and downs than robbery.

First Sailor. I am so tired of being bachelor
I could give all my heart to that Red Moll
That had but the one eye.

Second Sailor. Can no bewitchment
Transform these rascal billows into women
That I may drown myself?

First Sailor. Better steer home,
Whether he will or no; and better still
To take him while he sleeps and carry him
And drop him from the gunnel.

Second Sailor. I dare not do it.
Were't not that there is magic in his harp,
I would be of your mind; but when he plays it
Strange creatures flutter up before one's eyes,
Or cry about one's ears.

First Sailor. Nothing to fear.

Second Sailor. Do you remember when we sank that galley
At the full moon?

First Sailor. He played all through the night.

Second Sailor. Until the moon had set; and when I looked
Where the dead drifted, I could see a bird
Like a grey gull upon the breast of each.
While I was looking they rose hurriedly,
And after circling with strange cries awhile
Flew westward; and many a time since then
I've heard a rustling overhead in the wind.

First Sailor. I saw them on that night as well as you.
But when I had eaten and drunk myself asleep
My courage came again.

Second Sailor. But that's not all.
The other night, while he was playing it,
A beautiful young man and girl came up
In a white breaking wave; they had the look
Of those that are alive for ever and ever.

First Sailor. I saw them, too, one night. Forgael was playing,
And they were listening ther& beyond the sail.
He could not see them, but I held out my hands
To grasp the woman.

Second Sailor. You have dared to touch her?

First Sailor. O she was but a shadow, and slipped from me.

Second Sailor. But were you not afraid?

First Sailor. Why should I fear?

Second Sailor. "Twas Aengus and Edain, the wandering lovers,
To whom all lovers pray.

First Sailor. But what of that?
A shadow does not carry sword or spear.

Second Sailor. My mother told me that there is not one
Of the Ever-living half so dangerous
As that wild Aengus. Long before her day
He carried Edain off from a king's house,
And hid her among fruits of jewel-stone
And in a tower of glass, and from that day
Has hated every man that's not in love,
And has been dangerous to him.

First Sailor. I have heard
He does not hate seafarers as he hates
Peaceable men that shut the wind away,
And keep to the one weary marriage-bed.

Second Sailor. I think that he has Forgael in his net,
And drags him through the sea,

First Sailor. Well, net or none,
I'd drown him while we have the chance to do it.

Second Sailor. It's certain I'd sleep easier o' nights
If he were dead; but who will be our captain,
Judge of the stars, and find a course for us?

First Sailor. I've thought of that. We must have Aibric with us,
For he can judge the stars as well as Forgael.

[Going towards Aibric.]
Become our captain, Aibric. I am resolved
To make an end of Forgael while he sleeps.
There's not a man but will be glad of it
When it is over, nor one to grumble at us.

Aibric. You have taken pay and made your bargain for it.

First Sailor. What good is there in this hard way of living,
Unless we drain more flagons in a year
And kiss more lips than lasting peaceable men
In their long lives? Will you be of our troop
And take the captain's share of everything
And bring us into populous seas again?

Aibric. Be of your troop! Aibric be one of you
And Forgael in the other scale! **** Forgael,
And he my master from my childhood up!
If you will draw that sword out of its scabbard
I'll give my answer.

First Sailor. You have awakened him.
[To Second Sailor.]
We'd better go, for we have lost this chance.
[They go out.]

Forgael. Have the birds passed us? I could hear your voice,
But there were others.

Aibric. I have seen nothing pass.

Forgael. You're certain of it? I never wake from sleep
But that I am afraid they may have passed,
For they're my only pilots. If I lost them
Straying too far into the north or south,
I'd never come upon the happiness
That has been promised me. I have not seen them
These many days; and yet there must be many
Dying at every moment in the world,
And flying towards their peace.

Aibric. Put by these thoughts,
And listen to me for a while. The sailors
Are plotting for your death.

Forgael. Have I not given
More riches than they ever hoped to find?
And now they will not follow, while I seek
The only riches that have hit my fancy.

Aibric. What riches can you find in this waste sea
Where no ship sails, where nothing that's alive
Has ever come but those man-headed birds,
Knowing it for the world's end?

Forgael. Where the world ends
The mind is made unchanging, for it finds
Miracle, ecstasy, the impossible hope,
The flagstone under all, the fire of fires,
The roots of the world.

Aibric. Shadows before now
Have driven travellers mad for their own sport.

Forgael. Do you, too, doubt me? Have you joined their plot?

Aibric. No, no, do not say that. You know right well
That I will never lift a hand against you.

Forgael. Why should you be more faithful than the rest,
Being as doubtful?

Aibric. I have called you master
Too many years to lift a hand against you.

Forgael. Maybe it is but natural to doubt me.
You've never known, I'd lay a wager on it,
A melancholy that a cup of wine,
A lucky battle, or a woman's kiss
Could not amend.

Aibric. I have good spirits enough.

Forgael. If you will give me all your mind awhile -
All, all, the very bottom of the bowl -
I'll show you that I am made differently,
That nothing can amend it but these waters,
Where I am rid of life - the events of the world -
What do you call it? - that old promise-breaker,
The cozening fortune-teller that comes whispering,
"You will have all you have wished for when you have earned
Land for your children or money in a ***.-
And when we have it we are no happier,
Because of that old draught under the door,
Or creaky shoes. And at the end of all
How are we better off than Seaghan the fool,
That never did a hand's turn? Aibric! Aibric!
We have fallen in the dreams the Ever-living
Breathe on the burnished mirror of the world
And then smooth out with ivory hands and sigh,
And find their laughter sweeter to the taste
For that brief sighing.

Aibric. If you had loved some woman -

Forgael. You say that also? You have heard the voices,
For that is what they say - all, all the shadows -
Aengus and Edain, those passionate wanderers,
And all the others; but it must be love
As they have known it. Now the secret's out;
For it is love that I am seeking for,
But of a beautiful, unheard-of kind
That is not in the world.

Aibric. And yet the world
Has beautiful women to please every man.

Forgael. But he that gets their love after the fashion
"Loves in brief longing and deceiving hope
And ****** tenderness, and finds that even
The bed of love, that in the imagination
Had seemed to be the giver of all peace,
Is no more than a wine-cup in the tasting,
And as soon finished.

Aibric. All that ever loved
Have loved that way - there is no other way.

Forgael. Yet never have two lovers kissed but they believed there was some other near at hand,
And almost wept because they could not find it.

Aibric. When they have twenty years; in middle life
They take a kiss for what a kiss is worth,
And let the dream go by.

Forgael. It's not a dream,
But the reality that makes our passion
As a lamp shadow - no - no lamp, the sun.
What the world's million lips are thirsting for
Must be substantial somewhere.

Aibric. I have heard the Druids
Mutter such things as they awake from trance.
It may be that the Ever-living know it -
No mortal can.

Forgael. Yes; if they give us help.

Aibric. They are besotting you as they besot
The crazy herdsman that will tell his fellows
That he has been all night upon the hills,
Riding to hurley, or in the battle-host
With the Ever-living.

Forgael. What if he speak the truth,
And for a dozen hours have been a part
Of that more powerful life?

Aibric. His wife knows better.
Has she not seen him lying like a log,
Or fumbling in a dream about the house?
And if she hear him mutter of wild riders,
She knows that it was but the cart-horse coughing
That set him to the fancy.

Forgael. All would be well
Could we but give us wholly to the dreams,
And get into their world that to the sense
Is shadow, and not linger wretchedly
Among substantial things; for it is dreams
That lift us to the flowing, changing world
That the heart longs for. What is love itself,
Even though it be the lightest of light love,
But dreams that hurry from beyond the world
To make low laughter more than meat and drink,
Though it but set us sighing? Fellow-wanderer,
Could we but mix ourselves into a dream,
Not in its image on the mirror!

Aibric. While
We're in the body that's impossible.

Forgael. And yet I cannot think they're leading me
To death; for they that promised to me love
As those that can outlive the moon have known it, '
Had the world's total life gathered up, it seemed,
Into their shining limbs - I've had great teachers.
Aengus and Edain ran up out of the wave -
You'd never doubt that it was life they promised
Had you looked on them face to face as I did,
With so red lips, and running on such feet,
And having such wide-open, shining eyes.

Aibric. It's certain they are leading you to death.
None but the dead, or those that never lived,
Can know that ecstasy. Forgael! Forgael!
They have made you follow the man-headed birds,
And you have told me that their journey lies
Towards the country of the dead.

Forgael. What matter
If I am going to my death? - for there,
Or somewhere, I shall find the love they have promised.
That much is certain. I shall find a woman.
One of the Ever-living, as I think -
One of the Laughing People - and she and I
Shall light upon a place in the world's core,
Where passion grows to be a changeless thing,
Like charmed apples made of chrysoprase,
Or chrysoberyl, or beryl, or chrysclite;
And there, in juggleries of sight and sense,
Become one movement, energy, delight,
Until the overburthened moon is dead.

[A number of Sailors enter hurriedly.]

First Sailor. Look there! there in the mist! a ship of spice!
And we are almost on her!

Second Sailor. We had not known
But for the ambergris and sandalwood.

First Sailor. NO; but opoponax and cinnamon.

Forgael [taking the tiller from Aibric].
The Ever-living have kept my bargain for me,
And paid you on the nail.

Aibric. Take up that rope
To make her fast while we are plundering her.

First Sailor. There is a king and queen upon her deck,
And where there is one woman there'll be others.

Aibric. Speak lower, or they'll hear.

First Sailor. They cannot hear;
They are too busy with each other. Look!
He has stooped down and kissed her on the lips.

Second Sailor. When she finds out we have better men aboard
She may not be too sorry in the end.

First Sailor. She will be like a wild cat; for these queens
Care more about the kegs of silver and gold
And the high fame that come to them in marriage,
Than a strong body and a ready hand.

Second Sailor. There's nobody is natural but a robber,
And that is why the world totters about
Upon its bandy legs.

Aibric. Run at them now,
And overpower the crew while yet asleep!

[The Sailors go out.]

[Voices and thc clashing of swords are heard from the other ship, which cannot be seen because of the sail.]

A Voice. Armed men have come upon us! O I am slain!

Another Voice. Wake all below!

Another Voice. Why have you broken our sleep?

First Voice. Armed men have come upon us! O I am slain!

Forgael [who has remained at the tiller].
There! there they come! Gull, gannet, or diver,
But with a man's head, or a fair woman's,
They hover over the masthead awhile
To wait their Fiends; but when their friends have come
They'll fly upon that secret way of theirs.
One - and one - a couple - five together;
And I will hear them talking in a minute.
Yes, voices! but I do not catch the words.
Now I can hear. There's one of them that says,
"How light we are, now we are changed to birds!'
Another answers, "Maybe we shall find
Our heart's desire now that we are so light.'
And then one asks another how he died,
And says, "A sword-blade pierced me in my sleep.-
And now they all wheel suddenly and fly
To the other side, and higher in the air.
And now a laggard with a woman's head down crying, "I have run upon the sword.
I have fled to my beloved in the air,
In the waste of the high air, that we may wander
Among the windy meadows of the dawn.'
But why are they still waiting? why are they
Circling and circling over the masthead?
What power that is more mighty than desire
To hurry to their hidden happiness
Withholds them now? Have the Ever-living Ones
A meaning in that circling overhead?
But what's the meaning?

[He cries out.] Why do you linger there?
Why linger? Run to your desire,
Are you not happy winged bodies now?

[His voice sinks again.]

Being too busy in the air and the high air,
They cannot hear my voice; but what's the meaning?

[The Sailors have returned. Dectora is with them.]

Forgael [turning and seeing her]. Why are you standing
with your eyes upon me?
You are not the world's core. O no, no, no!
That cannot be the meaning of the birds.
You are not its core. My teeth are in the world,
But have not bitten yet.

Dectora. I am a queen,
And ask for satisfaction upon these
Who have slain my husband and laid hands upon me.
[Breaking loose from the Sailors who are holding her.]
Let go my hands!

Forgael. Why do you cast a shadow?
Where do you come from? Who brought you to this place?
They would not send me one that casts a shadow.

Dectora. Would that the storm that overthrew my ships,
And drowned the treasures of nine conquered nations,
And blew me hither to my lasting sorrow,
Had drowned me also. But, being yet alive,
I ask a fitting punishment for all
That raised their hands against him.

Forgael. There are some
That weigh and measure all in these waste seas -
They that have all the wisdom that's in life,
And all that prophesying images
Made of dim gold rave out in secret tombs;
They have it that the plans of kings and queens
But laughter and tears - laughter, laughter, and tears;
That every man should carry his own soul
Upon his shoulders.

Dectora. You've nothing but wild words,
And I would know if you will give me vengeance.

Forgael. When she finds out I will not let her go -
When she knows that.

Dectora. What is it that you are muttering -
That you'll not let me go? I am a queen.

Forgael. Although you are more beautiful than any,
I almost long that it were possible;
But if I were to put you on that ship,
With sailors that were sworn to do your will,
And you had spread a sail for home, a wind
Would rise of a sudden, or a wave so huge
It had washed among the stars and put them out,
And beat the bulwark of your ship on mine,
Until you stood before me on the deck -
As now.

Dectora. Does wandering in these desolate seas
And listening to the cry of wind and wave
Bring madness?

Forgael. Queen, I am not mad.

Dectora. Yet say
That unimaginable storms of wind and wave
Would rise against me.

Forgael. No, I am not mad -
If it be not that hearing messages
From lasting watchers, that outlive the moon,
At the most quiet midnight is to be stricken.

Dectora. And did those watchers bid you take me
captive?

Forgael. Both you and I are taken in the net.
It was their hands that plucked the winds awake
And blew you hither; and their mouth

teardrop stone
arrowhead mother
copper-red veins flecked with crystalline dust
[iridescent]
[irrelevant]
you are just some fat piece of flagstone-
broke off corner of some stone paver-
seated in an empty flowerpot beside 30+lbs. of rusted chain in an old screwtop pretzel jar

I was introduced to her mother
One Whit Sunday, down at the Hall,
They said that this was a ritual
And suffered by one and all,
She wanted to check your hands were clean
That you had no flaw on your skin,
I wanted to marry her daughter
But if I had, I couldn’t come in.

They led me in through the servant’s door
Down a passageway to the rear,
Marching me past some gloomy rooms
Was an ancient Grenadier,
He didn’t reply to a single word
That I said, his face was grim,
Then into a room with a chandelier
That was gloomier than him.

She sat at the end of a table, veiled
And motioned me to a chair,
The dust was thick on the table-top
And I’m sure there was dust on her,
I’d heard she once was a beauty
One of the greatest in the land,
But she sat there bowed like a coffin shroud
As she raised her withered hand.

‘Show me your hands and your fingers,’ she
Then whispered in gravel tones,
Her voice like the dying embers of
The ashes of human bones,
I raised my sleeves to the elbows and
I held them out to her stare,
‘I’m going to marry your daughter,’
I declared, ‘so be aware!’

She flinched, as if I had slapped her
Then she said, as hard as nails,
‘I’ll write the end of the chapter,
I’ll not heed your rants and rails.
My daughter won’t marry anyone
That I don’t approve, you’ll see,
You think that you are the only one
Come cap in hand to me?’

‘There was a time, I was in my prime
When the world was at my door,
And I could have married anyone
But the love that I had was poor,
A rival had him imprisoned, just
To get him out of the way,
Then said I could buy his freedom if
I’d lie with him for a day.’

‘My love was such that I put my trust
That this Earl would keep his word,
So slept with him on a Sunday, then
He put my love to the sword.
He said that I’d have to keep his bed
For I had no place to go,
That I was fit for playing the *****
And he’d let my friends all know.’

‘I couldn’t cry, I would rather die
But my first thought was revenge,
My heart was broken forevermore
But my love would be avenged.
I ran his lordship an evil bath
With herbs and salts disguised,
Then held him down while it ate his flesh,
And put out both of his eyes.’

I leapt to my feet on hearing that,
And staggered back from my chair,
‘So now you know I’m a monster,
If you cross me, just beware!’
‘I think you’ve told me a pack of lies,
But I love your daughter, true!
I’m going to marry her come what may,
I swear, in spite of you!’

She rose and beckoned me follow her
And she led me through the gloom,
Down through a flagstone stairwell and
Into a tiny room,
A man lay there in an iron bath
That was filled to the brim with oil,
And only his face was still intact
Though his eyes had both been spoiled.

‘He hasn’t an ounce of flesh on him,
The oil just keeps him alive,
He’ll never get out of this bath again,’
But he’d heard us both arrive.
‘For God’s sake, **** me and end it now,’
He groaned from his oily tomb,
‘I will when you bring my Martin back,’
She whispered, there in the gloom.

I couldn’t get out of there fast enough
But I’d lost my way inside,
I knew I couldn’t get married now
I was far too terrified.
She called me back and she raised her veil
And she said, ‘He stole my grace!’
I saw to my horror that syphilis
Had eaten part of her face!’

David Lewis Paget

ONE
Adam and Eve were born of flesh,
and woke from sleep, when God addressed
them both.
"Here is the world - unsoiled, unstained
(The sheet of the sea hides her breast and her veins.)
The time is uncertain; the end is ordained
and when it is finished, begin it again."

They saw God, saw
Lucifer, saw the tree:
felt oppressed. The world
was young but the book had
been opened. All stories conclude
in words and in gestures, wild and crude.
(They left heaven, fled to
the ambergris ocean, the
silk hills.)

TWO
Mad, they went to Egypt, built
Cairo in the delta where
her legs met, Thebes where
her eyes beat on the cataract
made cities on
her body on
credit, faith, and lust.
Until the groaning hungry ibis
and the famine drove them out.

THREE
From Egypt to Rome,
Adam to Caesar,
In Pliny's manuscript, Adam said:
"Here is Rome
a senate in your sympathy
an orphanage in your heart.
Come to his flat avenue, can't you
feel how far I've walked, on every flagstone?
Witness beaten sandals, frayed thongs;
feel your posture sag? I want to rest,
and I want you to help. I sat on the banks
of the Tiber; has Rome washed into my lap?
The streets are the furrows of my skin.

She said:
"I like a fire at my fingertips, not
bellowed to me under the floor."
Rome fell to that barbarian.

PAX ROMANA
God reminded them again.
Adam said:
"The knowledge is good, but it isn't a cure
for an Eden that seems so unlike the brochure."
He pulled back the skin of earth, and found,
a beating heart beneath the ground.
He knew, for once, the world would die.

IV
They went to ***** London, unhappy with
the lot of Rome. Amid the stench of a filthy Thames,
his blood ran with offal, with hate,
leached from the baiting pit, and she
did, too, in the ugly city,
from Knightsbridge to the sea.
They fought like monsters, fought a curse
that God foresaw, and they rehearsed.
An ugly city, from Knightsbridge to the sea,
and full of bitter folk.

V
Such is the end, a world
embalmed in salt and sand,
the leaves burned away; no cities
only orphaned tenderness under
ruined arches and aquaducts, wishing ill
but wanting that world returned,
and crying, yes, but knowing still,
their end was near; for all they yearned.

We have read this story cover to cover;
let Eve close the book, and pray in her sleep while
Adam dusts his hands,
and God begins anew.

An old green motel chair
sits on a flagstone porch
overlooking a lake
and a gap in the mountains
the center of which frames
another peak.
The chair has outlived
three generations
of my family
who are drawn here
to this spot
in West Virginia
where a mountain is reflected,
mirrored in fact,
in the lake
created by my great-grandfather
for that very purpose.

You sat with Jane
in her father’s church
the bright morning sun

piercing high windows
pushing colours on flagstone floors
the silence caressed you

her nearness warmed
her ankle socks and sandals
had an innocence of strawberries

her flowered summer dress
rode up to her thighs as she sat
her hands resting on her knees

can you feel that breeze?
she said
cooling isn’t it

you sensed it as she spoke
yes I can
you replied

your eyes moved along her thighs
then lifted to her face
as partial sunlight

seemed to show
grace there on skin
and dark black hair

and you watched her lips move
as she spoke and said
I was christened here

and maybe I’ll be wed here too
to whom?
you asked

and she looked at you
a thirteen year old boy
then looked away

some birdsong from outside
had caught her ear
and she turned her head

and you gazed
at her neck and jaw
and saw her beauty

in a way you had not before
sunlight catching her
as it had coloured patterns

on flagstone floor
you wanted to reach
and touch her arm

her skin and sense
her pulse of life
that pumped within.

I was sitting, deep in my study
Under a single desktop light,
Listening to the patter of rain
As I wrote, late in the night.
The other sound was the scrape of the nib
As it traced ink over the page,
A setting on out of the mood within
As I traced McMurtrey’s rage.

I often would write at night back then
For the house was dark and still,
With none of the interruptions that
The day would seek to fill,
So the world outside would fade from view
As the Moon came out to shine,
Then I could re-visit the world I knew
In the latest storyline.

Each tale I told from a birds-eye view
As I watched from my secret place,
A god’s perspective of what I knew
Of despair, or a saving grace,
My characters hung from puppet strings
That I dangled down from my pen,
And I teased and taunted with sufferings
In the way that I did, back then.

I never would share with the world outside
What happened within these walls,
Or open up to their prying eyes
My visions of haunted halls,
For that would take them into the light,
Out here where the world is real,
And men could see what a cruel pen
A storyteller reveals.

The night that I sat there, pondering
How to make McMurtrey fail,
He’d been obsessed with the girl Mei Ling
She was like his Holy Grail,
The storm outside was gathering
And the thunder brought more rain,
When after a lightning flash, I heard
A tap on the window pane.

It made me start, I must admit
My skin had begun to crawl,
I very slowly swivelled my chair
Around, aside to the wall,
I pulled the curtains apart just then
And I peered out into the night,
But the face that stared in back at me
Was stark in the pale moonlight.

I heard him say, vaguely, ‘Let me in!’
As the lightning flashed once more,
Despite myself, I got to my feet
Unlocking the outer door,
He strode on into the study, stood
In a stance, most threatening,
‘I’ve come in search of my lady love,
As you well would know - Mei Ling!’

The room had shimmered and shifted then
And it faded from my sight,
We stood in the Hall of Gordonstall
And I thought, ‘This isn’t right.’
The hall was hung with the tapestries
They’d brought from an old Crusade,
But nothing was real, I knew it then,
They were things that my pen had made.

‘Mei Ling’s betrothed to a Mandarin
And she wears his dragon ring,
The last I heard she was headed out
On her way back to Beijing.’
‘Then you’d better pull out your pen, old man,
Ensure that the lady stayed,
Or you’ll never get out of your mind again
While this storyline’s delayed.’

I wander the Hall of Gordonstall
And I see no way outside,
I hadn’t written the doorways in
And the walls are high and wide,
I need someone from the real world
To knock at my study door,
But I fear that I’ve lost myself inside,
As I pace the flagstone floor.

David Lewis Paget

Alone on this dark wet flagstone
hiding not hibernating place
no hedge to hug no worms to dig
stunned torchlit searchlight target
awaiting attack from hostiles
spine chilling prying naturephiles.

Salt Lake City, 2015*

Like a tourist in my own childhood,
I wander the neighborhood of my youth.
It’s not quite a pilgrimage, as
pilgrims know what they’re looking for.

I stand at the flagstone fountain in the park
and gaze across the street
at the red brick bungalow
where my family lived until I was 13.

Am I supposed to intone something?
Summon a spirit? Or perhaps I’m the one
who’s been summoned. Ghost of myself.

On this spot, there’s the illusion of level ground,
but here at the northwest corner of this Victorian
mountain city, the ground slopes in every direction
if you walk a few yards. North up to the Wasatch,
east up to the Wasatch, south more gently but up again,
to the Wasatch, and west sharply down to the valley floor.

Set into the hillside, the house faces west.
A boarded-up plate glass window
makes it blind in one eye.
In the summer, from that window,
we could see postcard sunsets,  
fiery light sinking into the Great Salt Lake.
In winter the gray stasis of inversion.

The old brass address plate—61—still hangs
Slightly crooked on the molding below the attic dormer.
The steep cement steps to the wide front porch
look worn by nostalgia.

My grandparents bought this house in 1938,
and sold it to my parents in 1957, so dad,
the English professor, could walk to work
at the U., a half block away.  I was 1.

Double exposure.  I can’t separate this view
From old photos and recollections.

There to the right on the parking strip,
I once hid under a giant cardboard box
when I knew my sister was walking back from campus.  
As she got close, I jumped out,
causing a satisfyingly chilling scream.  
She tried her best to be furious at me,
but we were both laughing too hard.

1946:  Dad in black and white stands
to the left of the porch’s north column in his graduation gown,
his bachelor’s degree delayed seven years
by a Mormon mission to Scotland and World War II.

1955: all my siblings and all the children
of my mother’s sisters posed on the sweeping cement stairs
for an iconic black and white portrait. Only one missing:
Me.  Not born yet.  All those cousins
Sitting on my steps before I existed.  
There must be a word in some language
for the feeling that gave me. I never could name it.

I start up the alley to the north side
to take a lap around the place.
The brick’s discolored and damaged
from a half-century’s growth of ivy,
recently stripped away, like skin where a tattoo’s been removed.
A picture I took in 1985 shows ivy completely covering the dim brick.

At night, a car turning up this alley would cast crazily
dancing lights  on the ceiling
of my pitch-dark basement bedroom,
through this little porthole-size window.
My heart  would race, knowing it meant my parents were home.

The cement walk alongside the house is crumbling
and has started to melt into the wild grass.

The next window, at the landing of the basement stairs
is where a black widow lived, encased in the space between
inner and outer panes. I used to study the red hourglass
on its abdomen, and tried to draw it.
Couldn’t get it right. Was better at artillery.

In the back, against this wall, an old radiator was standing, waiting for removal  after home improvements.
It toppled over and landed on my brother’s foot.
Crutches for weeks.  Bad luck, but maybe it inoculated
him.  He’s still never had a broken bone.

Here behind the garage, the old crabapple tree still stands,
nurturing its sour but highly flingable fruit.
At its base a hamster lies buried.

The little side yard on the south looks the same,
though the old white trellis that I used to climb
when I was so tiny it would support my weight is gone.

Back to the ***** at the front of the house.
Leaving for school in the morning I would
leap this ***** in a single bound.

The old place looks creased and sleepy.
It doesn’t remember who I am,
is starting to fade into the past.
It’s only about half here.
The rest is memory and desire.

~

Summer dawns
just beyond
the screen door,
across the porch
Dew swept lawn,
emerald weave
shimmering moisture
collecting foot prints
strolling towards

An arched entryway
gingerbread trimmed
covered in jasmine
alive with rainbow
flutterings of
butterfly wings
partaking of
nature’s pure nectar  

Beneath it a
flagstone walkway,
abstract stones,
assorted shapes
and patterns
meandering through
lavender and hollyhock,
daisies and tulips

And upon it
you and me,
hand in hand
watching the sunrise
wash the sky
in floral hued quivers
as we welcome the
*morning together…

Under the arc of days, he set her free in time,
He gave her up to the whimsy of wind,
The ghostly waves of the Sun's heated ethers.
The hours of their togetherness came unraveled,
Came apart at the seams, at the mended parts first,
Though he never sought to repair the tear
Or to comfort the newly opened hole's emptiness-
It was all too hopeless.

And why take you thought for raiment?
Consider the lillies of the field,
How they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:

But instead, he wound it around himself,
Purposely made plans to remove himself, like a spot rubbed out,
Like a runner in a pair of hose, allowed to consume an entire leg,
Until the wearer must certainly abandon it, or else gather up the tatters
Knowing not what to do with them, or how to reweave the mess,
Or worse, continue wearing it, to the obvious surprise of all encountered,
Either pretending not to know, or pretending to wait for a private moment to remove the defective stockings. So, in this fashion,
He would remove her from his life; in effigy, he would cut her from all its pictures,
All the memories he had made with her, he  was now determined to forget.

And why take you thought for raiment?
Consider the lillies of the field,
How they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:

Nobody could put the news back in the can, repair the injury.
And it was a public game, this necessary total forgetting and giving up.
Maybe others couldn’t understand, but it didn't matter
He stared at the headstone flanked by Lillies for a couple more minutes, and then turned,
Walking slowly down the flagstone sidewalk to the parking lot.
There weren’t a lot of mourners; they had only been living here for a few months;
No time to acquire new friends and even less the casual acquaintances,
The ones who always seem to manage to make it to funerals
For whatever reasons they might have.
They had taken the banks of Lillies surrounding the casket and arranged them,
Quite artfully, around the stone and opened grave.

And why take you thought for raiment?
Consider the lillies of the field,
How they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:

The baking car seemed more silent than ever, as it quietly came alive, purring softly.
He pulled out of the cemetery parking area, deliberately not glancing behind him again.
He rounded a few roads, curving sedately around the low mountains,
Marveling at how clear it had become, though earlier it looked angry and unsettled.
He rolled the car windows down, as if to banish, remove the scent left behind.
Though once you have smelled death, been touched personally by it,
Everything else becomes a farce, a denial of what you have already seen
With your own eyes, and felt breathing too close by to ever forget it.
Every day becomes another refusal to continue dying, even if it's the only game left in town.
He laughed a nasty, rumbly sort of laugh, resolved to seek out that little bar,
The one at the edge of town, where he had met her, so many ages ago-
Perhaps luck would favor him twice there, it could happen..
The sun meanwhile filled the windows with tiny prisms and reflections;
All the bright objects going by flashed a microscopic brilliance into the car
That he had never noticed before, as if they wished to touch him even in a minute fashion.
And as he was desperate, desperate for any kind of omen,
He decided these sudden, unexpected illuminations would have to be it.
He could pretend to go on living for a while, till everyone had forgotten about it.
His mother had always told him to keep his business private,
Not become a joke, not lose the respect of others;
Familiarity breeds contempt, and all that.
And when people ask how you are doing, they don't really want or need to know the details.
He thought of the small pale and solemn face, ringed by dark hair, with dirt beginning to pile up above it, the hidden form broken and camouflaged
Above the creamy blue satin lining and the strange high gloss wood.
And only a single tiny muscle twitched, just below his lower lip.
In time, he would learn to control even that.

And why take you thought for raiment?
Consider the lillies of the field,
How they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:

He had always suspected god merely created man
So that he would have some entertainment, something lower than god
A pathetic thing needed for laughing at,
When even being god got to be too much of a bore.
Ah, if the real heaven-and-earth creating god had only to drink from man's cup once,
Things must surely change. The religions really had it all backward.
He fired up the radio and firmly blanked his mind.
He needed to hold on to that ability to forget everything and stop all thinking;
After all, he could still live a useful life.
There were people who still needed him, even if she no longer did.
A sob escaped and made it's way to the top of his throat, but he swallowed it down quickly,
As if thwarting a hiccup. Death is only a hiccup that comes at the wrong time,
He repeated to himself, realizing his mind-clearing trick had failed him.
Memory was only a crutch used to keep the living in the past, and thought was it’s transportation.
This too shall pass, he whispered. The aphorisms piled up, began to tilt sideways,
Threatening to fall over, to obscure all the light left in the stiff, unwieldy light-dying world.
Never again, as long as he lived, would he have another white Lily anywhere near,
Or in any house or room or yard he ever spent any time in.
That was the only sacrifice he dared to make for this day.
If you give up, if you give in, they've got you by the ***** then.
He had seen people who were slave to their emotions, and they were cripples.
As if this idea bothered him particularly,
He glanced into his own eyes in the rearview mirror,
And for the first time, he saw something unrecognizable there,
Saw a person he felt he had nothing in common with any longer.
He didn't want to put words to the things now being etched onto that face.
It was going to take a lot of years to erase that pain; a lot of drinking alone,
A lot of being cold and unfeeling and relentlessly alive.
And at the end of it, if he was lucky, he would live;
Not just become another animated corpse, himself,
Though it was still, he decided, much too early to believe in a future just yet.

And why take you thought for raiment?
Consider the lillies of the field,
How they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:
And yet I say unto you,
That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.

-Matthew 6:28,29  American King James Version

(March 2003)


Alas, ambitious girl, foregone of France,
Thy days are numbered now, through loss of power.
Though once thou led the king a merry dance,
His gaze will wander from a faded flower.

Women are cattle in the eyes of men,
Mere chattels; drear, embattled, scapegoat souls;
How utterly unthinkable, Boleyn,
For queens to rise above domestic goals.

Thy barren womb is witness to thy shame,
Its emptiness brings punishment anew;
The king grows ever scornful of thy name,
Look to thy prayers and dreams, however few.

Bereft of love, one girl branded as jade.
The flagstone cracks beneath the slashing blade.

(Mary was talking to Clara about Surah and her curse.)

I have no courage to act anymore, and for nothing the time I spend.

Having no hope, I decided to follow the path of the fate almost to the end.'

'You know that beyond it, there's oblivion and death. Thus, you have to fight!'

'I can't change Surah into what I would like her to be, but you're right.'


'My dear Mary, I have an unbeatable plan, because the time is short.

On her birthday, when Frederick will come back with his wedding escort,

You will go to the castle to ask Jezebel to come here one day to stay.

Remember, there is no hunger, when in the deep forest there is no prey.'


'But, my dear Clara, Anne is so scared, she will never accept in that day

To keep Jezebel far away from her, though she will feel safe here staying to pray.'

'The curse has effect all day long, only that day, so we can be home at night.'

'The next day, they will marry. In the darkness, with demons I will be able to fight.'
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
(­Surah was searching some poisoning and medicinal herbs on the wild slopes of the mountain. Clayton was walking around.)


Surah stopped to rest on a crest, and she felt something as a raindrop.

She smelled a cool air emerging from the crevice of a rocky outcrop.

She realized that a great cave could be existent in that natural wonder.

She heard a rumbling sound, and she thought that it was a thunder.


She saw the waterfall, which was hiding behind it the entrance of a cave.

The cave was too low for her to enter, and to do this she wasn't so brave.

She asked Clayton to crawl inside, but he noticed that the entire entrance

Was blocked with rocks and vegetation, and to enter they had no chance.


'No person ventured here to remove the underbrush and the *******.

I heard that a wild beast lives in this zone having the teeth very pinkish.'

Returning the next day with ten village people, they entered as spelunkers.

With the aid of lights, they slowly became the beast legend's debunkers.


They renewed their visits daily, proceeding a little farther each time.

They unlocked the entrance, and entered a little room, which was sublime.

It was followed by a narrow passage, which was leading to a secret chamber.

'I'm tired', said Surah,' because reaching this crest was a real clamber'.


They started to break an amount of rock off by using tools before

They penetrated the distance to enter the passage. They heard a boar.

'We are inside', said Clayton. 'After a half of an hour, we will need a pause.'

The passage was interrupted by a chamber. There, they saw some jaws.


It was a king chamber having white walls and a height of forty feet.

'I'm exhausted enough', said Surah.' I'm thirsty, and I have nowhere to sit.'

‘The walls have white travertine deposits of flagstone and brimstone.'

Surah slipped and fell down on the floor. She let out a long, deep moan.


Fossils of sea lilies, shell fish and snails could be seen in the limestones;

The slightly acidic groundwater slowly dissolved the bedrock to make cones.

Along joints, fractures and bedding planes forming passages and rooms,

They walked on a floor sounding as broken crockery, and creating booms.

I stand at the flagstone fountain in the park and gaze across the street at the red brick bungalow where I lived as a child. Am I supposed to intone something? Summon a spirit? Or perhaps I’m the one who’s been summoned? Ghost of myself.

Set into the steep hillside, the house faces west. A boarded-up plate glass window makes it blind in one eye. In the summer, from that window, I watched postcard sunsets. I also learned watching there that the world was TV.  You watched it. It didn’t see you.

On the opposite wall, on a sofa, our family watched on a 15 inch portable Sears black and white with the collapsible rabbit ears men first walk on the moon.  We welled with pride in the space program. I ate Space Food Sticks and drank Tang.

Around to the side, behind the rose bushes, through that small basement window was my bedroom when I was 10. A tiny square of sun on the brightest summer day was all the daylight that ever got in.  There I first felt inside the base of my spine a small hard coldness. The night before, my three best friends had slept over to celebrate my 11th birthday.  Tonight I was alone.  The coldness grew.  It tendril’d into an icy tingle that radiated up my spine and through my arms like a metal cage of disappointment.  

Years later I learned the name of depression. But then it was just  cold inside my spine. And the cold spoke to me. “Davy, this is how it’s gonna be. It’s just you and me. Make room.” “You’re wrong,” I said.  “You’ll see. I’ll meet Ruby Tuesday.” I turned up the transistor radio and pulled the music close to me.

Through that bay window just above, the dining room table, my father and draft-age brother late on summer nights had it out over Vietnam.  

“Immoral, unnecessary, we should not be there,” my brother said.
“You know what happens if we’re not there?” says dad. I was in Korea. When the communists took over, in came the guys with the clipboards. Anyone who spoke English or taught school or owned a business was lined up against a wall and shot.
Yeah, well, we should not be … dying … bombs…bloodbath…reds.

Drowsing I no longer heard the words, only rising and falling pitch, a duet of bitterness, anger, wistfulness, probing for connection And into the night as darkness took hold and the voices merged with the rising and falling rhythm of cricket sounds, harmonizing like sleep.

A fragmented leaf
A crumb of dirt
A screen door

Flip-flops, rugs
Flagstone and gravel and grass
Half a dozen different chairs
Some chilly, fleeting air

A sun somewhere
And over there
The contrails tangle
And quickly fade away

The ever-shifting clouds
Laughter, cars, and blurry words
A dozen different chirps
I feel them flit away

It was here
they used to come,
he fourteen,

she thirteen,
walking to the church
for choir,

between tombstones,
along
the flagstone path,

she peasant like,
seemingly like
some Russian girl,

treading the tundra
in icy cold,
her scarf tight

about her neck,
her coat buttoned up
to chin's hold,

the dark brown hair
messed up
by the evening

November wind.
Now he stands alone,
she has gone,

some ages passed,
death and time
cutting her down

before her prime,
cancer feeding,
and drawn

and dragged
and gone
into the dark

beyond his sight
into
the eternal night.

He stands
and thinks of her,
and the place

they stood,
and where
they first kissed

beneath a full moon,
embraced in love,
wordless, hugging,

cloaked by the moon's
pushed away shadows,
young love,

searched for
and found,
but then gone,

he his way,
she hers,
the countless moons

have come and gone,
full and waning,
waxed and fled,

now he sees her,
not alive,
but in

his older,
lonely
head.

Down at the end of Kilmartin Street
Where nobody seems to go,
A widow lives in an ancient mill
Where the river will overflow,
The mill race turns the mighty wheel
Though it grinds no wheat or corn,
It’s not been used as a working mill
Since before we both were born.

And the widow there is a mystery,
For we don’t know where she’s been,
She doesn’t give out her history
Though we know her name’s Christine,
She’s rarely seen in the street outside
But the gown she wears is black,
And those that visit and go inside
Are rarely seen to come back.

And I’ve watched myself, that paddle wheel,
It seems to go in reverse,
Whenever she has a visitor there
It’s as if the mill is cursed,
For then the water flows uphill
It’s against all laws, I know,
Whoever heard of the water going
Back to the overflow?

There’s a warning sign on the portico
And a warning sign within,
‘Don’t think to enter the Devil’s Mill
If your life is filled with sin,
For it may get rid of the things you want
And delete the good things too,
You may uncover a life within,
But of course, that’s up to you.’

I went one day to the portico
And beat on the old front door,
Then heard her footsteps begin to echo
Across the flagstone floor,
The door flung wide and she stood aside
And I walked into the mill,
But heard the grind of the wheel rewind
Outside, I can hear it still.

I felt my head beginning to spin
As I travelled back in time,
Undoing every single action
That once I’d thought were mine,
Then once outside, I stood and cried
For my world was not the same,
I’d lost my only love, my bride
And forgotten our baby’s name.

I thought I’d possibly get them back
If I went again to the mill,
And stood just cautiously inside
While the wheel went forward still,
But the widow blocked the door to me
And she said, ‘Don’t come again,
You only get but a single chance
Or the end result is pain.’

David Lewis Paget

There was fresh flowers
on the grave
that Jane showed you
outside the small church  

the sun was warm
and cows
were just over
the hedge surrounding

you could hear them
munching the grass
and trotting by
unconcerned by death

or the symbols
of death
and Jane said
the tractor fell

on top of him
the other month
you stared
at the flowers laid there

colourful
bright in the sunlight
a small glass vase
holding a smaller bunch

child picked maybe
they'll have to
move out now
that he's dead

it being
a tied cottage
she said
and you could see

the sadness
in her features
the tearful eyes
mouth slightly open

words like
broken china pieces
where will they go
the mother and children?

you asked
the local council
will house them
I expect

she said
she gazed at the grave
and bent
and picked up

a small flower
from the nearby grass
and laid it
by the other flowers

God bless him
in His peace
she said softly
the cows

stilled munch
over the hedge
a bird called
from the hedgerow

you looked at her
standing there
a blue ribbon
in her dark hair

her green top
and black skirt
knee length
sad end

you said
yes
one of the dangers
of farming

she said quietly
she moved away
and you followed
and she held out a hand

and you took it
and went
into the small church
and sat

in one of the pews
inside and stared
at the stained glass windows
sunlight pouring in

like liquid gold
touching
the flagstone floor
and pew end

at the front
and her hand
still held yours
warm

alive
blood pumping
along arteries
life and living

and she and you
and outside
he sleeping
in his God's peace

and the cows
munching the grass
and birds calling
from hedgerows

and sky
and always
with you
the eternal why.

(Discovering my Quad-polar compartments)

But sleep never satisfies
for long. I find myself
dreaming more and more,
vivid, frightful dreams
as real as being awake
but with less control,

movies play through my mind
mirroring the day In some
****** up way,

and just like that,
Like a drug,
sleep loses its ability
to provide escape
because of tolerance.

I watch a snail move slowly
across the flagstone.
I lose track of how long
I've been watching.
Only the thin line of spit
beneath my pillow
lets me know it was
a dream.

Without escape
There is no reward,
No rejuvenation
only confusion,
and that which is
easy is not.

But this quest has
opened my eyes in more ways
than just lack of sleep.

My quad-polar discovery
has helped me identify
these quadrants of my mind.

     God.            Beast.

     ***.              Love.

My quad-polar compartments.
Confused and bewildered
they will not be merged.

The god in me thinks the beast needs to be loved.
The beast in me thinks that *** is a god.
The *** in me thinks that love kills the beast.
The love in me thinks the beast is just ***.

It’s the love I am most afraid of,
At least during those times when
there is a me,
a me that looks down on the quads,
but mostly that’s rare because
I never know who’s
in charge anymore.

It's such a difficult existence
when what’s theoretically
my greatest need is also
my greatest fear.

If I consider this logically
then the conclusion is clear,

that is,
my dedicated inlets
and my spiritual outlets
cannot get along.

*** and love do not co-exist.

At least not in me.

I’m either penetrating inlets
and ignoring outlets
or
seeking mysticism while
the inlets go on wanting.

I have known this for
a very long time.

Maybe if I find
a new island
I could find
a new inlet,

open the outlet
back up.

Shattered glass falls around my feet as you look away.
Shattered glass that held all my dreams.

My fears are set free from the shards laying at my feet.
Who will be my champion, now that you are gone?
My fears are realized as I watch through shattered glass
As you walk down the street.

The window that you placed around me was pure poetry.
The glass in the frames made with rose tint.
You held me in thrall with he beauty of your art,
And destroyed me when you shattered the glass.

My feet are torn as the shards bite flesh.
My blood soaks the flagstone as I try to follow you.
You leave me in misery and walk free,
Leaving me bleeding among the shattered glass of my heart.

The sharpened stone of summer steps,
Hewn from the Tuscan crust,
Lies cool in terracotta shade
And wind-fetched, thin saharan dust.

Soft footsteps on a flagstone floor,
A sweep of homesewn skirt,
Cool churches where our shadows died
And freed our dreams to dance and flirt.

We yearn for birdsong, peace and sleep
For leather, wood and wine -
A life where rosebuds mark our path,
Lived in a straight unwavering line.

Tread lightly
as not to trample
the stalks of budding dreams
Let them sprout
in the gap between the toes
watch them sway
in the breeze caused
by the friction of your lifting foot
extended towards their counterparts
an endless step away

Choose carefully
with your sparse and
widening  steps
which flagstone  cracked with age
will  resonate  through
you
its  painful
song of  burden
its lifting  song
of  joy

Float  than
gently
push  the  air
repeal   gravity
with    jets    fueled
by     yourself
     that ' s      i  t
                y  o  u  
                       f    l    y

The light from the streetlamps squirms it's way through a ***** windshield
Miles of that road-dust, old and new, takes it due portion of the light
grabs it, casts it all reeling off, diffused

But it's ok, because now we're here, standing outside a corner store, charmingly ****** and completely bulletproof.
It has a sign that says 'Yes, we are open' and a thick, oily padlock that says 'No, we aren't'
It's like a sickly smile and a kick in the shins
A corner store like any other, except for the sound
The bass guitar flexes like a circus strongman breaking handcuffs
And pounds it's all-conquering vibe through the walls of the basement, through the brick and mortar and sidewalk-flagstone
Really more symbols that actual obstacles
The drums are syncing well, sunk as they are in the earth
We approach and find a subtler, silver-tarnish voice, worming it's way through ***** and crack
It's a pawnshop guitar, sizzling like a hot pan
It bounces like a drunk off the brick walls of the stairs leading down
Staggers it's way up, to invite you in
It's deadened just slightly by the giddy, rapidly cooling bodies relaxing there
in the no-man's-land between indoors and out, smoking,
drawing burnt-atomized sophistication in.
We mount the top stair, great explorers regarding a mountain, and proceed to climb down.
Every eye looks up, carefully half-lidded, and bored.
But for an instant, every single one has a message squirm it's way through the dust: "Yes, I am open. Please think I'm interesting. Please think I'm worthwhile."

you’re getting married
in less than twenty-four hours

yet, here you are --
saying hello on my doorstep,
rocking on the ***** of your heels,
nervously clutching your floral skirt
like the way you did
when you're still on
first dates and first bases
sipping ***** instead
of swallowing the shots down

you talk about the towns
that you had driven through
the past two hours --
just so you could see me

but I don't
think,

that you're here
just to say hello
and talk about
the towns you've
driven by

we sit, on the flagstone
mezzanine, idle talks
flowing through pretentious lips
but always dancing, always skirting
past the things we both
know we want to talk about

but we never mention
them out loud

we eat the gravel and grit
and ashes of burnt-out loves
fill our mouths

we are both dying
to say,
what we are both dying
to hear.

it's already late,
later than I would have
allowed myself to
let you stay,

but we open a few more
bottles of beer
you still swirl your
drink in your cup,
let it slosh before you sip
on it -- you still
like to pretend it's *****
when it's just cheap beer

when the moon finally shines
over the ridge of Sierra del Fuego,
an orange coin someone
had hung in the midst
of a blackberry sky,
it beckons you to leave
for home, and you heed
the call

I wish that you hadn't,
because as much as much
as I want you for myself I,
also wish for you to be happy,
and I want you to be free
of me, of what I am -- a liability,
a constant reminder
that you must be responsible
for whatever consequence we
might bring to each other

so I remain silent,

let myself choke on the words
I would have wanted
you to hear, and I
wath you as you
drive away in a Ford,
dust exploding in a
flurry of clouds behind your tires
as it tears through the
gravel pathway that traverses
in front of my house
for the northern highway
where the thorn bush
with the pink flowers
had managed
to bloom, despite the harshness
of the soil that reside there

oh, I watch as the sun
as it travels back to the east
where it belongs!

without words, without
that grandiose score
that cues the end of the world
and the start of the apocalypse,
the world still turns and turns,
heedless of a petty heart breaking

Silence.

and the sound is loudest
when it is not heard.

The black robed monks
genuflect towards
the altar

then bow
to each other
then take their places

in the choir.
I **** the grave
of an old French monk

in the monk's cemetery,
holding up
the bright red poppy

like a pagan's head.
The old peasant monk
sits in the stall

at the back of the church
where the lay brothers
used to sit

in the old days,
he stares
at the spot

on the flagstone floor
where sunlight
comes and lays.

...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

HOW VERY VERY

"One moment he was there..."
said his shadow who

had witnessed
the whole thing.

"...and the next. . . not!"

I was disembodied
floating about on the air

as thoughts do
existing in the here-not-there.

chasing now a leaf as it
makes its way about the square

or a caterpillar
sitting on a deckchair

all by itself
alone

or the journey of a piece of Wrigley's Spearmint
from chewing gum to spat out on a flagstone

before jumping ship
to the sole of a gentleman's shoe

or the metamorphosis of a cloud
from camel to now cow

or a piece of sunlit evening
squeezing itself through leaves

chasing itself
upon a wall.

My shadow was just about to go
find a policeman...saying:

"I appear to have lost
my person!"

When with a thump I was
back inside my

self again!"

"How interesting...!"
I was telling my very boring friend.

"How very very
interesting. . !"

i.

I smile, sometimes, thinking of how I liked the old Byrds tunes
Back in my seminary days, for I have come to know
(Mostly by these cucumbers, hostas, and ****** dandelions)
That there is very much a season for all things,
For our run in this plane is strictly proscribed,
And having the end date somewhat fixed
A blessing from God, in fact,
For it makes one focus on those things
That are truly meaningful,
To appreciate when there is need to make fine gradations
(For if you plant the peas and parsley just a couple of days,
Indeed mere hours too early, an unexpectedly still and cold night
May steal all of your labors, leaving you with tiny, lifeless shoots
Slumped over the lip of a clay ***)
And when not to waste sound and fury, as it were,
Over the most trifling of things;
For, when the final ascertainment is made, it will not be as an audit,
(Saint Peter himself staring over his glasses
As he punches the calculator,
Clucking as he reviews the number of bottoms in the pews,
The weight of the collection plate,
The state of the cement or flagstone
Leading to the stairs of the cathedral),
But an over-long movie, the seemingly most insignificant of scenes
Screened several times (if it please God) for your viewing pleasure.

ii.

For I have sinned, yes, most exceedingly,
Dear Saints and My Lord,
In lack of thought and foresight, in the expedient holding
Of my tongue, in the unthinking failure to act.
Mea culpa
Mea culpa
Mea maxima culpa.
Blessed ******, I cannot,
In the self-serving pride of my guilt,
Ask you to pray for my soul,
But I would pray that, perhaps,
I will have had the briefest of moments
Where I was not totally unworthy.

iii.

I was, at one time, a different lifetime to me now
Part of the Bishop’s diocesan staff in Boston,
Great city of pristine churches
Surrounded by blooms of all the colors He could bring
And shanty Irish rough as the day the boat landed
(One size Fitz all, the joke was back in those days)  
I was more functionary than rising star in the hierarchy,
Nicknamed “The Bishop’s Travel Agent”,
My function was to find a place for those priests
Who had become , in the vernacular, “troublesome”,
Sending priests whose comforting
Of the younger females among his flock
Strayed over the line of purely spiritual
To some remote Aroostook village
Or, if such problems ran more to altar boys,
Some convent in the Berkshires.
We were, so I told myself, being judicious,
And all in the best interests of the Church.
One time we were wrong, horribly wrong;
There was a suicide, whispers,
Letters which should have been burned.
Many of my colleagues complained, bitterly,
That I had been made
An unworthy scapegoat for the Bishop,
But I knew in my soul such an assertion
Was merely halfway correct.

iv.

Yet perhaps I will—no, indeed, I must—be saved,
For our Lord is good, and Christ shall have mercy,
And exchange this long walk through foolishness and vanity
With life everlasting, even for those of us
Who have stumbled along clumsily,
Unthinkingly, unheedingly upon Your creation.
Kyrie, eleison;
Christe, eleison;
Kyrie, eleison.

v.


It is good, then; the days have been dry
And unusually warm, the nights cool
Yet without the danger of frost.
The beans and tomatoes should thrive,
And the sunflowers should grow
Well… like sunflowers, one would surmise.
As for myself, the good days
Are examples of His grace,
The bad ones no more than I can bear,
And the doctors (mere men, after all)
Minister to me as well as men can.
I have, blessedly, no trepidation
As relates to the close of my small one-act play
On this patch of earth.  
Indeed, I am often cheered
That I have seen small green shoots
Rising from the years of fallen leaves
Which I have raked up and dumped upon the brush lot
Between the church itself
And the old graveyard at the rear of the property.

The sea – calm, immense as space
and shining – one instant in time
with breath rushing in before me,
flagstone path turned silver
in the moonlight –

Your hair in the wind -
gently picking up the sand.
It’s hard filling the days
without you.

But the nights fill themselves
the velvet peace that is yours
and soon will slip into me.