Watermelons
Green Buddhas
On the fruit stand.
We eat the smile
And spit out the teeth.
–Charles Simic
somewhere all is green
and we laugh like baby buddhas
we pin flowers on
our sleeves we wait for the
blossoms to bear fruit
we don’t sit we stand
everywhere the sunshine goes we
follow we forget to eat
a river calls us to the
edge the water like a smile
rocks like invitation and
the river gods spit
us out
our flesh bursting like ripe peaches see the
dragon’s teeth
he walks up pointing his cane at our flowers. I know your people, he says. they’re good people. we’re all good people around here. we were good kids back then. I remember. we didn’t do nothing real bad, stole us some watermelons. we had some fistfights, yeah. but, oh — those boys could play ball. your granddaddy was a pitcher. he had an arm, boy. we were just kids, he says, just kids. he wipes his face, puts the rag back in his pocket. well, he says, I buried my son today. it don’t seem right but you know, these things happen. they happen. nothing you can do. he sighs. well, tell your daddy I knew his daddy. I always remember good people.
it’s still cold —
I hope no one notices
the turkey vultures
my arms bend at awkward
angles as I leave this smoldering
fire my skin carries splinters of
wood like wet grass
I’ve been quiet for one hundred years
I brush soot from my hair phantoms
erased with a blink of an eye
moving into the air sometimes
these ashes rise
men have forgotten the smell of smoke
Humans and beasts are different species, but foxes are between humans and beasts. The dead and the living walk different roads, but foxes are between the dead and the living.
… one could say to meet a fox is strange; one could also say it is ordinary.
— Ji Yun, 1789, in Notebook from the Thatched Cottage of Close Scrutiny
you are here old
sorcerer where this pile
of leaves becomes soil
I see your fox teeth
what magic do you
bring the less I say
the better
I see your seven tails
I will find you another
moon your golden spine
cracked with lightning
I see rain falling from the clear sky
nothing is constant
neither is this absence
constant
—Göran Sonnevi
this sigh
of morning this early
eye this sad stomach
queasy with guilt
neither is this cold barren floor
this whisper
of mourning dove
this soft slice of
light this memory
neither is this day like yesterday
the last time you flew
you came home with pockets full of denmark. silver bracelets and bright feather earrings that tickle your neck. strange white rocks that remind you of the beach—how the air was warm but the water was way too cold. every time you call me I hold my breath. belize. madagascar. barcelona. I open the door on this ohio backyard. it rained last night; now everything smells like turning. fall is finally here. somewhere a hawk screams and my little dog wants back inside. when I hear the phone ring, I wait—just a minute. I know where you’re going this time.
yellow leaves moon
I climb the mountain but
you’ve already gone
mask
the old man is in my kitchen, whistling. he came through the window that should be a door. leaves cover the floor like an exhalation. the old man wants a knife; he wants to carve pumpkins. he scoops seeds with his thin brown hands. he lays them out on the newspapers like a body, like sacrifice. he breathes cigarette smoke into the silence: a hymn, a prayer. ash falls from his arms like feathers. his fingers are wet — he holds them in the air. children are here, he says. answer the door.
a child’s voice—
the sound
when the papers fell
cattails (January 2014) | haibun
now it all crumbles
now it all falls
and I step through to the
other
I’m a cliché
my head bursting thatch
arms out the window
(drinking wine when there’s only tea)
your face reflects
without diffusion
covers my fingers
in silver
checkmate
and
I
tumble
she was that
renumeration
she thought of
the very first time
when she had swollen until
she could not see
her fingers
unexpectedly loud
at the end of her
trembling hands
she heard nothing
someone
she should
remember
the red-hot fire
the blue and cream tiles
the room unrecognizable
and slurred
again
she
had
to be
alone
soundlessly
once she laughed
into the air
how you held my heart
in that tiny hand
your voice filled with
indignation
how you told me
to wait
how I waited
how I hold your heart
in my ineffective
hands
my voice filled with
resignation
how I tell you
to wait
how you don’t
this I remember
(a dream)
I am holding my children
together just look
in a meadow
on the banks of a
river the spectacle
begins
truth
ties
my
hands
and
I
stand
forbidden
(anyone who knows becomes god)
I seize as my right
a promise to betray
to sing
I know these things are separated
my grandfather
my eyes
my children
I am valuable
I am witnessing
peace
(it is a good song)
words are pedantry
condemned the day before
as impulse
and
the old preacher
discourses
and ties her shoes
long day coming just like
long days been coming
all her life
she runs a hand over
her time-worn
face
she thinks of days like shoes first one then the other
after awhile
they all feel the same
they all hurt your feet
willa stands up again
crushes her
cigarette
another day another dollar
saving for a rainy day
wind blows in
busts up those
clouds
the sun breaks through like it’s some kind of hope
I’d expect
an irregular stone
polished smooth by all
these clenched teeth these
held tongues
words
bitten and
swallowed
first one
and
then
the
other
so many years
I’d expect it to shine
I’d expect all that copper
to intrude
I’d expect handfuls of
blue backed with
static
slipping through my fingers like a radio dial
1 — about the indian and tea
the indian likes to drink tea.
he watches the infusion, the reds of rooibos swirling like blood in his mug.
he likes the way steeped heat warms his mouth, his hands, his fingertips.
(an ancient turned-earth smell clings to damp crushed leaves)
he savors the taste of life that lingers after the swallow.
he closes his eyes when he drinks.
2 — more about the indian and tea
the indian closes his eyes when he drinks.
he sees a moon-sized sun, an unknown flat horizon.
he sees fantastic animals and cardboard cutout trees.
he forgets he is just an old indian drinking tea in a cold river town.
he sips the last drop of sediment (of earth) and he remembers, he cools.
he rinses the mug with his eyes open, surrendering bitterness like a sacrifice.
she stares at you with those eyes
hands
on her hips so loud you can hear it
so what?
I can do that
I can do anything
and she does
now here you sit with your
not-from-concentrate
tang is just a memory and you
hear the whispers
look look at the moon
can you see me
can you see me
I’m walking
and you look
storm warning
she speaks monotonously to the bend in the wall. she drones.
outside this window the field is full of birds: pairs of killdeer, of canada geese.
a red-tailed hawk circles then lands on the broken goalpost.
I turn away; I turn into the cave of this room.
sun binds the space between us.
your mouth is a straight line — a vow of anger, of silence.
red-fisted morning
this branch like a small tree
falls
*
he likes to drink tea
an ancient turned-earth smell
clings
to damp crushed leaves
you came home with your pockets full of denmark. silver bracelets and bright feather earrings that tickle your neck. strange white rocks that remind you of the beach — how the air was warm but the water was way too cold. every time you call me I hold my breath. belize. madagascar. barcelona. I open the door on this ohio backyard. it rained last night; now everything smells like earthworms. spring is finally here. life in the budding tree chitters and squawks. somewhere a hawk screams and my little dog wants back inside. when I hear the phone ring, I wait — just a minute. I know where you’re going, this time.
big leaves moon –
she books a flight
to albania
lend me your ear while I call you a fool
— Ian Anderson
the day you were born, girl, we counted turtles. we counted fingers and toes. the red-haired neighbor printed your star chart. she talks to angels. you hid leaves red yellow and brown in her shoes. you built fires, girl, and stood in the rain whispering to the moon. I saw you; yeah, I saw you. I knew. are you still happy? the day you were born, girl. just tell me — do you still smile? I keep a lock of hair in my pocket. is this something I did or something I didn’t do? you blew in like a breeze. you blew in like a handful of dust. the day you were born, girl. I bought you a pony all your own. now I stand here, watching as everything I love grows wings.
if no one ever
marries me—
constellations*
miz quickly’s #6 | *Fool’s Paradise — yay words! | process
the songs: The Witch’s Promise — Jethro Tull | fire and rain — James Taylor | Girl — Beck | She Talks to Angels — The Black Crowes | If No One Ever Marries Me — Natalie Merchant | Constellations — Jack Johnson
it’s hard
to be a whale
these lilliputian eyes
water the same endless blue as
the sky
work: n. the transfer of energy from one physical system to another, especially the transfer of energy to a body by the application of a force that moves the body in the direction of the force.
this is what she means when she says
it’s hard to breathe
silence hums like an oxygen tank
she fades
into the chair
on the surface
she sees you
touch her
you are a fallen tree branch
you are evaporation
a ribcage rises
a windpipe struggles
the air is already
saturated
touch her
you can hear her say that this
is what she means
I had children of my own
in the glaring white gap
how fibrous and incidental it seems
to open your tiny beak-mouth,
that looks as if it would never open
let silence drill its hole.
now I hear the clock snap I swipe an ant
I’m drunk.
I stand on the porch in my bathrobe
a hundred times consider what you said
I had children of my own
recursion three : borrowed lines from Richard Jones “Rest” | Medbh McGuckian “Painting by Moonlight” | Sarah Gambito “Holiday” | D.H. Lawrence “Baby Tortoise” | Daniel Johnson “Inheritance” | Juan Felipe Herrera “tomorrow I leave to El Paso, Texas” | Keetje Kulpers “Across a Great Wilderness without You” | Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux “The Art of Poetry” | poets.org
it was the prairie
that got me
that wide ocean of grass
a promise
of ripening corn
it’s you
that keeps me
that towheaded giggle
a challenge
to morning sun
there’s a tennis ball in the backyard when you come to get your mail. there isn’t anything for you because I throw away everything with your name on it. when I burp it tastes like roma tomatoes. she wants to know how you feel about inviting her mother to the wedding. I stand on the deck wondering if the neighbors can see me. the tennis ball is covered in mud. I don’t know whose it is. why is it here? what does it mean? you say it must be the dog’s. the dog doesn’t care, even though you whistle. he runs from you and pees in a pile of leaves.
soap bubbles —
an empty wine glass
on the windowsill
smoke 