Home Town

April 28 2017

The local paper

in my home town

is good for the ads,

and did for the puppy

when she learned not to pee on the floor.

It has all the scores

from high school.

Saturday's yard sales,

the worthy mayor's

speech to Rotary,

pictures of men

leaning on their shovels

around a half-filled pothole.

That is

all we really care to know.

And inside the back page, below the fold

some wire-service stories

about great affairs of state,

consequential men

somewhere else.

But by then

your hands are smudged with ink

and you just want to toss the thing,

flimsy paper

that could use more gloss and bleach.

Except we'd shake our heads at the waste,

and who would ever be willing to pay,

and anyway

it's always been like this.

But only after clipping out the piece

about your great aunt's big day.

Who will turn 90 next week;

and, as the story crows,

has lived her whole life

in her childhood home.

Or so far, at least.

I still read the big city paper. And now the digital edition; so it's not even a “paper”. But when the car was in the shop the other day, I picked up the complimentary copy of the local daily, and it reinforced how disconnected I am: in the media universe that comes to me over the airwaves, I could be living anywhere ...or nowhere. But mostly, I noticed how thin it was, and how provincial.

The real impetus for this poem came from a New Yorker article (A Long Homecoming – May 1 2017; by Ariel Levy) about the author Elizabeth Strout. She wrote Olive Kitteridge, a memorable character who embodies all the flinty repression of coastal Maine: I never read the book, but loved the serialized version on HBO.

As the subtitle of the article says, “The novelist Elizabeth Strout left Maine, but it didn't leave her.” It was this complicated interplay of attraction and repulsion, of belonging and ambition – ambivalence about notions of home; the contrast between “perching” and feeling rooted; the push/pull of claustrophobia and comfort; the pinched conformity of both tradition and expectation rubbing up against the restlessness of youth – that made me want to write about small town life. Except that would be an essay, or another novel. I'm too impatient and too susceptible to instant gratification for that. Hence, poetry: a modest poem about just one thing. I think this poem is as much encomium as gentle criticism: that there is nothing wrong with daily life, bourgeois values, the comfort of home; or doing what you can in the real world you actually know and touch.

I know I will be reprimanded for saying consequential men instead of people. I went back and forth, and only settled on the sexist version because of the sound. Although it could be argued that this works here because it reflects the patriarchal view of small towns and older people. It also calls back to the 2^nd stanza, where the most consequential thing the local men do is manual labour.

I like the mischief of the last line. The misinterpretation of “having lived one's whole life” is a lame old one-liner. But it also hints at a restless undercurrent of escape. And even more, it shares a joke with the reader about the improbable prospect of change, at a life just beginning at 90!

Broken Wing

April 27 2017

Cradled in my hands

the injured bird went still.

The antelope comes to mind,

taken by a pride

when the fight goes out of him.

A lioness

crushing his neck,

teeth tearing

at living flesh,

his disembowelled entrails.

As he lies, unresisting

unblinking eyes glazed.

Do we all surrender, in the end

detach from pain?

So it's fight or flight

then giving in.

But how this came about

by evolution

makes no sense,

except to imagine

that nature has no use

for suffering without purpose,

that even in death

the universe is merciful.

A consoling truth

for those who believe in a higher power;

but for me

one more of life's great mysteries

I cannot explain.

The give and take

of finely-tuned touch, unconscious muscle

as I loosely cup the bird,

adjusting to its trifling mass

and sudden stirrings;

the fluttering of its tiny heart,

the unnerving lightness

of airy feathers

hollow bones.

Neither crushing

nor letting go.

A broken wing might heal

if it isn't killed by fright.

Or the shock

of a wild thing caged.

Would I choose death

over confinement?

                             Will this bird, biding its time

muster the will,

gathering strength

to fly again?

I've probably been watching too many nature documentaries. But this recurring image is really quite striking: the prey animal, lying calmly, as it's being eaten alive. We identify with the victim, and there is a consolation is seeing that it appears, however incredibly, not to suffer. But the biologist in me can't understand this. Because evolution operates by survival and reproduction: yes, playing dead might in very rare cases help an animal survive; but vastly more often, a prey animal is certain to die, so those genes that confer this singular mercy will be lost, not inherited. How, then, could this great rush of terminal endorphins ever be selected for?

No, I didn't rescue an injured bird. And have never held a living bird in my hands, But I have picked up a dead bird (who had flown into the picture window) and felt the surprising lightness. This poem started with a vague image of a bird in the hand that was used as a metaphor in something I recently read. The source has completely escaped my mind. But I think the author talked about the hands' precisely calibrated balance of pressure and touch, and this somehow stuck with me. Was he writing about a movie director managing his temperamental stars? A coach in professional sports massaging egos? Whatever it was, it was clearly a very effective metaphor!

Open Water

April 25 2017

The first canoe

was on the lake

before the ice was out.

But until the boat cleared the point

I couldn't be sure

those were voices I heard,

chitchatting

so unnaturally loud,

broadcast

from who-knows-where.

How sound carries

on open water.

Where the ice

wind-driven, and dull with slush

was nicely off shore.

I was shocked

by its glossy paint,

fire-engine red

against the water's grey chop,

the drab tufts of grass

and low leafless shrubs,

the dark jumble of rocks

half-submerged.

3 brightly dressed bodies, in a tippy boat,

its gunwales barely clearing

the lethal cold.

How hungry we must be

for sun, and open water

after winter's long hard slog.

Like starving prisoners

stumbling from our frigid cells

into unaccustomed light,

blinking, and rubbing our eyes.

They paddled lazily

zig-zagging along the shore,

not fishing

or racing

or out to explore;

a convivial boat ride

on the first warm day.

As if oblivious

to instant death

mere inches away.

It had been forever since we'd been down to the beach. (I use “beach” in its broadest sense. If you're picturing a manicured spread of tropical sand, think again!) I wanted to see how the break-up was coming along, and if there was enough open water for the dogs to swim.

Could those be voices? Could they be coming from the woods, across the narrows? No, it couldn't be: was someone actually out canoeing, in this lethally cold water? I looked hard, before I saw them, appearing from just behind the point and heading this way.

I would never be out in a boat, this time of year. My reaction was admiration and envy, mixed with pity at doing something so dangerously naive.

Now a few comments about some of the choices I made.

I was very surprised to find myself writing “nicely out from shore”. I've always regarded “nice” as a weasel word: too wishy-washy for poetry. And then to use the adverb – my least favourite part of speech -- no less! But something about it works here. Perhaps this is nothing more than the simple resonance between “ice” and “nicely”. Or maybe it's the implication that the open water was just inviting enough.

“Gunwales” can also be “gunnels”. But I prefer the traditional nautical spelling. Which is OK, as long as this isn't an unfamiliar spelling that the reader then sounds out literally.

I'm pleased with “fire engine red”. It not only captures the startling contrast in colour, it conveys a sense of emergency: a telling bit of foreshadowing that makes sense with the final stanza.

Winter Dogs

April 22 2017

A line of cedars

facing north.

Where, in a nascent spring

at the foot of the trees

a bank of snow persists.

A remnant of winter,

radiating cold

as I approach.

And like ticking-off a calendar

it tracks the sun's ascent,

edge receding

as the shadow steadily shrinks.

The succession of seasons

in a strip of shade

that will thin, day-by-day;

until the very first of summer,

when it reverses abruptly 

and the countdown to winter begins.

A pool of melt

where the dogs sluggishly step,

pink tongues

lapping glacial liquid

with slow deliberate flicks.

Eyes staring

as if mesmerized by drink

in this unaccustomed heat,

never questioning

the presence of water

the changing of season

the unfamiliar warmth.

The soiled snow

where the dogs contentedly sprawl

is concentrated by thaw,

has lost its pristine whiteness.

Gone, soon enough,

when the dogs will seek out the same sliver of shade

in the lee of the cedars

in a feverish spring;

and I can only wonder

if they know summer is coming

remember the season that was.

Sleeping dogs, in their winter coats

lying in the shade,

tongues lolling, sides heaving

eyes quivering beneath their lids.

Emitting high-pitched yelps

as they dream of beds of snow.

My kitchen window faces roughly southeast. On the far side of the driveway, a line of cedars stand like sentinels, in a gently curving arc. So I look out on the side protected from sun, where a bank of snow persists: a combination of the shade, and the accumulation from a winter of snow-blowing.

Toward my vantage point, there is a depression where the melt pools. The dogs, sensibly enough, sprawl full-length in the snow in the unaccustomed heat, and saunter up to the water as if it had always been there, and was naturally intended for them. They're Labradors – the quintessential Canadian dog! -- and do wonderfully in the coldest winter. The change of season is hard on them, and summer a trial without someplace to swim and reliable shade.

So I've ended up writing both a weather/seasonal poem and a dog poem all at once: two tropes I assiduously try to avoid, since I think I've already done both to death. But sometimes a poem comes, and my job becomes one of simply taking dictation. I needed to write; and this is what came to me, looking out my kitchen window on an unseasonably temperate day in a late spring that has whipsawed between warm and cold.

A Slip of the Hand

April 18 2017

Choose seasoned wood

that's soft, and clear of knots.

The granular strop-strop-strop

of a finely honed edge

on whetted stone.

Cut along the grain

angling away.

The thumb's broad callused pad

fine-tuning the blade,

muscle memory

feeling by way

of pressure, cant

depth.

Shavings curl off

in long smooth strips,

leaving a dark patina

of sweat and skin

from the carver's warm grip.

From all the people

who have handled it since.

Fingering, palming, passing it on.

Stroking its fine-grained finish.

Holding it up to the eye, and intentionally turning

so every side is seen;

the smooth surface

of burnished wood,

the play of light and dark.

One constructs by subtraction,

the mind's eye

conjuring negative space.

The way a growing brain

prunes its wiring,

until the ultimate hardening

of function and form.

Undone

by a slip of the hand

aberration of eye,

a fleeting lapse of mind.

Like red ochre paint

on the wall of a cave

too deep for natural light,

a length of found wood

somehow turned

to an enduring work of art.

A nameless carver

unschooled in his craft,

who never thought

he would leave his mark

on posterity.

4 Seasons

April 11 2017

She told me once

it takes all 4 seasons

to be sure.

Because love begins in summer

walks hand-in-hand in fall,

shares the same stale air

in winter's cramped fortress.

But is tested in spring,

when the frozen soil warms

green shoots unfurl,

blooms strike colour

into a dull brown world.

Petals, recklessly beckoning

the subtle attraction of scent.

Who isn't tempted

to re-invent themselves

in all this intensity?

Stepping-out

into sweet mild air.

The feel of sun

on impervious skin

unaccustomed to touch.

Made restless, and rash

by the lengthening day

softening light.

Urgently aware

of the fecundity of life

and its merciless transience.

The flowers of spring

are their own wedding bouquet

and funeral march.

Because life is short;

summer over

almost as soon as it starts.

It's very early days, and I naturally started to write about spring ...like a million other boring predictable poems before this one! But then, thinking about seasons, I remembered what she once said. Which gave me an entree into a poem about relationship: one that could be built on the scaffold of seasons, but be more than merely descriptive.

How it got from there to a poem about temptation, and even infidelity, is the mystery of the creative act. But spring has that paradoxical effect. There is the inspiration of new life and new beginnings, set against the awareness of the transience of that life: the sobering awareness that inertia is slow death; and that if you don't do it now, you may never.

Rock Cut

April 8 2017

The rock cut

glittered with quartz.

In its darkened well

a ribbon of road,

thin asphalt

the weight of rock.

Sheer vertical walls

as if they were carved;

the diamond-tipped teeth, titanium arms

of some leviathan saw,

screeching through

solid rock.

Except it was TNT

in a massive charge.

Civil engineer

as anarchist,

toying with dynamite

in hard hat

corporate tie.

So the route need not vary,

flat as a level

due north.

Steam-rolled pavement,

through boreal forest

over muskeg and swamp

splitting igneous rock,

as if a ruler had been placed

between 2 points,

its builders instructed

to muscle through.

As if the planet's surface were true,

time

of the essence.

Eyes on the road

enclosed in tinted glass.

The cut, whisking past

in a heedless blur,

millions of years

of geologic time

reduced to seconds.

Cold rock, unearthed,

basking in sun

unaccustomed air.

Its granite face

in gradations of pink, and grey

catching the last

glimmer of light.

I glimpsed this reproduction in the Saturday Arts section: an ad for a gallery.

It immediately struck me how familiar and generic a rock cut like this appears to us. And how we tunnel through in a straight unerring line, as if the land were inconsequential, its vast history of no useful interest.

Except that the last rock cuts I drove through were, compared to this image, absolutely sheer and geometric: a perfect aesthetic for human mastery over nature.

Roads originally followed the path of least resistance. They may have been refined from cow paths, or may have taken advantage of trails made by wild animals. When you had to be observant, pick your way, detour around obstacles. When we moved in nature, not willy-nilly through it.

(I have some questions about the artistry here. It's an almost photographic rendering, and as such is technically impressive (as pretty much any visual art is to me, since I haven't progressed much further than stick figures and finger paint!); but I wonder what it actually says, what the artist wanted to express. Because the piece lacks any sense of narrative, any human interest, any particularity of place. ...So, could that be his message: the absence of people in a landscape that has been altered by man, yet where nature's majesty and indifference persist intact and undiminished?)

The Secret Life of Trees

April 4 2017

They hide in plain sight,

the secret life of trees

in their forest cathedral.

There's a path through the woods

where it straightens out

and trees line either side.

Smooth trunks, evenly spaced

rising-up like sentinels,

a canopy

of dappled green

in a gently curving arch.

Like the nave

of a great medieval church

I feel sanctuary under its vault;

the filtered light

the cool air

the lofty open space.

But the mystery of trees

is their underground existence.

Roots, dividing finer and finer

until they intertwine,

an elaborate web

passing molecules, messages.

Branching mycelia

who feed, and are fed,

microscopic saprophytes

resurrecting the dead.

And chemical signals

from porous leaves

resounding through the air;

the cacophony of trees

in the wood's majestic stillness.

I listen to a hard rain

on an aspen in spring,

its tight succulent buds

beginning to unfurl.

On a sprawling maple's

autumn foliage,

its brittle parchment's flattened note.

And a cedar's dark green fronds

absorbing, softening.

Like bird song

I learn the woods by ear;

each, a distinct sound

in a community of trees,

a congregation

singing from its hymn book.

Stopped

in the cool shade

of its high green canopy

we are small,

tiny inhabitants

of a larger body

too vast to comprehend.

We thought there were trees

when forest

was all there was;

a single organism

we never heard, and never saw

walking through its heart.

Scroll down to the bottom, and you'll find a link to the article that inspired this poem.

Ed Yong is a staff writer at the Atlantic, and almost every day produces a terrific piece of scientific journalism. The article is his review of a book by David George Haskell, The Song of Trees.

Yong describes Haskell as “a kind of naturalist-poet”, and I find this greatly appealing. My poetry is very much about close observation and microcosm; and from the sensibility and prose style this review suggests, I think Haskell and I think very much alike, are trying to see the world in much the same way.

The things that please me most about this poem are getting the religious metaphor just right, without laying it on too thick; and managing to shoe-horn in a couple of complicated technical words -- mycelia and saprophytes -- without jarring the flow. I really dislike taking poetic license with the science. 

I think the religious metaphor can be seen into the final stanza, even though there are no explicit references there. Because the idea of being in something bigger than ourselves but that we're unable to discern could be taken as a religious allegory as well: that is, our smallness and solipsism, set against the ineffable mystery of God  ...creation  ...the universe. 

By the way, there really is a spot like this. On one of the trails near my home on Hazelwood Lake. Harder to tell in winter. But once it's leafed out, this tunnel of green is quite outstanding. My first time there, the word "sanctuary" came to mind, as it does repeatedly each time I visit.

Anyway, here it is. I'm counting on the Internet's reputed capacity and permanence (as if!) to keep this link live.

http://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/04/trees-have-their-own-songs/521742/