Glade
March 14 2013


Between the green canopy
and pungent ground,
deep with needles, decomposing leaves,
the glade was cool, and damp;
chilly morning air
contained
in its stillness.

In the afternoon heat
the relief was immediate,
entering into its shade
as if a door had been closed
behind me.
The way cool air has weight
so the light stays true,
free
of turbulent heat,
the open glare
lifting.

And something haunting, bewitched.
The smooth bark of cedar
running up
curving twisting trunks,
like whimsical beams
in some fantastical structure
not built by man.

And balsam fir, ruler-straight,
with densely spaced branches
sticky
with resinous spice.

And needles, turgid green,
in any shade
I imagine.
Layer by layer, looking up
until every space
is filled.

Interspersed with birch
too white for nature.
And weedy aspen,
fast-growing trees
that die far too young.
Their small leaves
dappled with sun
tremble in the slightest breeze,
like schools of fish
darting as one,
silver flanks flashing.

I rested in the glade,
slipping out from under the weight
of heat, and exhaustion.
As if stepping back
into dawn
the very same day.
Given to live
all over again.

There is a small copse of cedar, down by the lake, that invariably invigorates me when I walk, in the heat of summer. There is something witchy about cedar; and their grey smoothness, their sculptural shapes, makes me want to touch.

I love the way a stand of trees will hold that cool morning air, preserve it through the heat of the day, convey a sense of timelessness. And how restful it feels to escape the light and heat, luxuriating in its cool relief.

It may seem strange for me to write this poem on a cold winter day. It was inspired by a photograph I saw, an illustration that accompanied a magazine article, but looked more like a impressionist painting: a smokey, haunting view of a green forest, dripping wet.

I know I've written a lot of descriptive poems about trees, and hardly need another. But I guess I look at these as being many iterations of a single poem: shamelessly plagiarizing myself; but slowly working toward the one single perfect tree poem ...after which I can throw out all the rest!

Eating With My Fingers
March 12 2013


Eating with my fingers
is like painting without a brush,
messy, and sensuous.
But warm skin
and grazing tongue,
instead of cool
and frictionless.

Not the whole hand
in its clumsy greed
combative grasp.
Just fingers and thumb,
the great homunculus of touch
that rules
my outer cortex,
conjuring the world
from its black hermetic cave.

Eating
must be impolite,
full
of urgent craving.
Warm grease, dripping.
The push and pull
of salt, and sweet.
A heady whiff
of bitter.
Meticulously licking
every last bit

And for dessert
my lips on your skin,
tasting
breathing you in.

How I have you pictured
with my eyes closed,
like a blind man
who paints with his hands
whose brain lights up.

Who has practiced well,
listening softly
honing touch.


When we become adults, we leave the childish things behind. Not for us the messy, immersive, sensuous stuff of finger-food and finger-paint. Because stern parents, in no uncertain terms, taught us that in polite company, one does not eat with one's hands.

This poem is about the richness we miss, distancing ourselves with hard cold implements. The experience of food is more complete when we go all in, using touch, smell, temperature and texture; by recruiting more than simple taste. While the blind man, who has attuned his neglected senses, can paint a more intimate portrait than a cursory look. And how can we learn to love, if we don't learn to let go, risk the mess?

And why, of all things, minimize touch? Because in the sensory cortex, the real estate devoted to the fingers is far greater than that required by mere anatomy:  the brain is disproportionately weighted in favour of touch.

The poem opens with a comparison between finger-food and finger-painting. Later, when it segues from food into sex -- from one of the great sensory experiences of life to another -- there is painting again, in the form of a blind man picturing his lover by touch:  made richer by feel; made more complete on the canvas of the mind than it is in real life.

Old Snow
March 5 2013


2 weeks
and the burden of snow
has settled.
A winter desert,
badly in need 
of a fresh white cover.

Old snow
makes me feel depressed,
as if it's over-stayed its welcome.
Too cold to melt,
too warm
to feel like winter.

Parched wind, and cycling sun
have left a hardened crust,
strong enough 
to walk upon
with wide deliberate steps.
Its surface is dull, and brittle
scattered with debris,
as tired and effete
as the ancien régime,
ripe for collapse.
And in the distance
I hear insurgent whispers
gaining strength.

So we wait
for the next big blizzard
to overthrow the world,
over everything, equally;
a utopian dream
of the level field.
Slowly raise 
its modest flag
of white-on-white,
proclaim
the soft democracy 
of snow.

There Is Always Something
March 2 2013


There is always something
needs to be done
in an old house.
Taps dripping, attic draft
backing septic sludge.
Unholy rattle, wheezing shudder,
an ancient boiler
firing up.

There is always something
in late middle age, advancing life
that unexpectedly
blind-sides.
The usual pains, here and there
unexpected stiffness.
A comedic slip
on side-walk ice.
The thinning fringe of hair,
which will turn white, and finely frizzy,
like an old man
with that distant stare.

I can hear the steam heat
needs the air bled.
And the rest
is like living under renovation,
supper on a hot plate
covered in plaster dust,
and always something
coming up.
That was supposed to take a few months
has lasted more than 50 years,
and the contractor's son
carried on when he retired.
When the stairs
became too much,
and he found himself
forgetting.

They say resilience comes
from seeing the positive
finding meaning,
the strength to re-frame, and adjust.
Much as re-framing this house
reduced to studs.
So I hammer 2x4s
replace the sheet-rock.
Extract a mummified mouse
who shorted everything out
back in the Eisenhower administration.
Rewire, re-glaze
re-plumb and upgrade.
Or just buckets of paint
over old scars,
some quick cosmetic changes.

On a good day, the place
won't burn down
freeze up
flood,
in subterranean winter.
Or more forgiving summer,
when the garden blooms
and the house is just as beautiful,
perennials still robust
and the lawn lush,
smelling as good
fresh cut.
The saplings I planted, and left to nature
have matured, branched out,
returning leafy shade
the wisdom
of patience.

One day, one will topple,
from the rot
no one sees at the core.
Shatter all the way down
to the ground floor,
fulfil my morbid fears.
When the house is dark,
and no one's been home
for years. 

In Season

Feb 27 2013

In the wet season

the light

is easy on the eyes.

The low sky

feels claustrophobic, to some

sheltering others.

Comforted

as we tend to be

in small familiar rooms.

In a cold rain

I shiver

hold myself stiffly

gather my collar close.

Or hot and humid

in fetid monsoon

getting harder to breathe,

fearing flood, high tide

storms at sea.

Rot

entering everything.

Rarely

a patch of blue, a shaft of light

piercing through.

And we all look up,

blinking

in unaccustomed sun.

Soon enough

it will be dry,

the season of parched tongues

and blinding dust.

The wind, in the distance

sounding its ominous note,

like the dry rub

of exhausted soil

rolled between finger and thumb.

As I kneel

in a cracked and wilted field.

Either scorch

or drown,

in the ocean of sand

creeping slowly closer.

Shooting Guns
Feb 26 2013


The gun lust
I remember from childhood
was for BBs,
a prized Daisy repeater.
And pellets,
stubby, lethal
they tell us
could take out an eye, at least.

With a dry phhhht, expelled
from the cold grey barrel.
The bulls-eye, on flimsy paper,
too weakly pierced
to satisfy
our need to blow things up.

No standing tough
against enough recoil
to dislocate your arm.
No concussion
that leaves the world distanced, muffled,
and something fuzzy
like tiny ringing bells.
.
So I think I understand
shooting guns.
The pleasing weight of steel.
The precise stillness,
heartbeat steady
between held breaths.
The power
of a single finger, gently tensed.
How all-consuming intent
sets you free.

But mostly
it's the disproportion
between action, and consequence
that so intoxicates.
If a butterfly flapping its wings
half a world away
can move a hurricane,
then what about a man
who feels like nothing
handed one?

The banal lethality
of swagger.
The chaos theory
of guns. 

The Vanishing Point
Feb 19 2012


So what's the point
of vanishing?

The road ahead narrowing,
the edge
receding as fast.
As you find yourself
getting smaller,
will distance swallow you up?

Each
looking back

at the other,
no matter who stays
or runs.

But there is no clean escape.
Into tantalizing horizon
blinding solar haze,
given the planet's steady rotation
distance, time
and rate.
The iron laws of physics
in which everything
relates.

How you can poke a balloon
with a finger,
and somewhere else
it gives.
How sound continues to carry
after the dominos have tipped.
Because energy cannot be destroyed,
and the simplest act
is consequential,

endlessly cascades;

as rigidly coupled

as shunting trains,
gossamer
as touch.
Over millions of miles
as gravity does,
or in ultraviolet;
invisible worlds

lighting up.

So you may not vanish.
May not shrink
into pity, loathing
or shame.
Still,
there is always hope
you won't
be noticed,
watching her walk away.