City Tree - May 22 2023

 

City Tree

May 22 2023

The city tree

seems unnatural

in its dry patch of soil.

Hemmed in

by thick concrete slabs

between the sidewalk and the street,

its delicate leaves

struggling to breathe

in the blue miasma of diesel fumes

and noxious car exhaust.

While the hungry roots

are stunted

in the hard compacted earth.

Bikes are chained

branches broken off.

Lost Dog flyers

are tacked to its bark,

while random passers-by

pluck a few handy leaves

for no reason than because.

But it's a survivor

and I’m grateful for it.

For the welcome shade.

The oxygen it emits

and water exhaled.

The cool green canopy

that offers such relief

from the sombre greys

of busy city life.

The paved streets

and haggard people.

The looming towers

wrapped in dark reflective glass.

The plastic and paper

and fast food containers

that litter the place

like man-made tumbleweeds.

A shopping bag

is snagged on a branch

just out of reach.

I'm not sure which seems more incongruous,

the orphaned bag

or unloved tree.

It flutters in the breeze

as if trying to break free.

While the tree is still,

anchored

just where we planted it.

We, its human custodians;

like neglectful dads, or absent ones

who long ago

lost touch.

Enough - May 22 2023

 

Enough

May 22 2023

There's a movie

about a man who learns to say yes

to just about everything.

As if this is how to lead

the fully realized life.

I am not this man.

Yes, I fear missing out.

Yes, I know I live

only once.

And yes, the opportunity of a lifetime

has likely passed me by.

But I still said no;

I saw the ad, but never watched it

so don't know how it turns out.

Because there's much to be said for no.

Unstructured time.

Space, to be in the moment.

And whatever dimension it takes

for thoughtfulness.

I'm not rushing through life,

even though I know

when the final credits roll

and the end is near

I will not be done.

But then, no one is.

Yes, you could say I'm settling.

But instead of what?

Of always wanting more

and never satisfied?

Of busyness

for its own sake?

Of racing faster and faster

just to keep up?

How about, instead of yes

enough?

No hot-house orchids

or fancy bouquet,

just the roses

thank you very much.

An even dozen

simply arranged;

luscious, redolent, red

in a clear glass vase.

Holding Out - May 20 2023

 

Holding Out

May 20 2023

On the south side

hard against the trees

a rump of well-packed snow

is holding out.

Late May, and how unlikely is this?

A sanctuary of shade,

a model of persistence.

A hot day

the sun at its zenith.

But standing close

I can feel the cold

washing over me,

step back and feel the heat.

Water

trickles from the bottom

and pools at my feet.

The snow is soiled, coarse, pock-marked

and won't last much longer.

But for now

I relish the incongruity;

winter

coexisting with summer,

the juxtaposition

of fire and ice.

Yet it's only a month away

from when the days start to shorten.

Next year

when the driveway is plowed

I'll ask him to bank it higher.

A mountain of snow,

lasting through summer

and into the fall.

A cool balm

for sunburned skin.

Toboggan rides

and snowball fights in August.

Pina coladas

on ice.

The Joy They Spark - May 19 2023

 

The Joy They Spark

May 19 2023

The joy they spark

in strangers.

Even the bandy-legged man

who reeked of booze

and staggered more than walked

when we passed him in the park.

He was already smiling

in that happily drunken daze

of the all-day alcoholic

as he reached for the dogs

when they ran up to greet him,

tails manically wagging

so their cute little butts

waggled back and forth.

As they do to all who cross our path,

putting smiles on peoples' faces

with their contagious joy.

I flinched,

seeing that unclean hand

that stunk of who-knows-what

reaching shakily out,

but resisted calling them off.

My loving dogs

who never judge

stint

withhold;

who shame me

with their eager friendliness.

A fellow lover of dogs, after all.

And a damaged man

who, like most of us

just seeks a little comfort.

And I very much know

what the touch of a dog can do,

because they also rescued me

from my own unhappy state

in the dark days before.

We all choose

our own means of escape.

Cheap rum for him;

for me, isolation.

So it pleases me the share

with strangers.

The children

who are tentative at first,

but see eye-to-eye with dogs

and have that special bond.

The old lady, leaning on her cane,

who years ago

lost hers

and never got over it.

And even the drunks and vagrants,

who find acceptance

in my girls' warm welcoming touch.

The love

they thought they might find in a bottle,

but haven't, so far.

Ironing - May 17 2023

 

Ironing

May 17 2023

There is no need to iron things.

Not with permanent press

space age synthetics.

And as for the rest

I can live with wrinkles.

But ironing

is a contemplative art.

The iron centres me,

passing

smoothly back and forth

with easy regularity,

a metronome

pendulum

rocking chair.

My eyes glaze over,

arm is on its own.

And the narrow focus

on a pleat/collar/cuff

is like a trenchant Zen koan,

a noticing

distilled.

Walled off

in my my cozy laundry room,

the door firmly closed

and dryer rumbling warmly,

mellow jazz

playing softly just for me.

A lovely interregnum,

detached

from the deadlines and pressures

and diurnal cares.

The sizzle of steam.

That burnt cotton smell.

The solid heft

of the iron in my hand.

And the long tapered board

with its smooth silver fabric.

Encircled

at eye level

by freshly ironed shirts,

like prayer flags

on a mountaintop.

A task

that has a beginning

and definite end,

a result

you can see, touch, measure.

Not numbers, in cyberspace,

or more words

than have already been said,

just crisply ironed shirts

ready

to go out into the world.

But still, never truly done.

Because they will be laundry again,

and ironing day

will come back around.

Which reminds me of the cycle of life;

if suggesting such a thing

isn't too presumptive.

The creative destruction

of life after death;

how the dying make way

for their descendants.

And how, down generations

we repeat our mistakes

over and over again

   —  the audacity of youth,

starting fresh

but sure they know better.

Repetition

is a kind of meditation.

The mantra

you know by heart

that anchors you,

the familiar routine

you find so comforting.

A way

to regain your bearings

in a turbulent world.

Like laundry day.

So while there's need to iron things

I do it anyway.

We Will All Know - May 16 2023

We Will All Know

May 16 2023

I don't know how grief

is supposed to look.

But when I saw her

I could feel it;

like a black hole

from which no light escaped,

her sadness

had a force of gravity

that inexorably drew me in.

Bereavement is contagious,

contaminates

all who approach.

Some blame,

looking for scapegoats

and cursing fate.

Some cannot contain themselves.

They weep, wail, blubber,

suffer

the unbearable pain

of a broken heart.

They wallow in tears

and collapse in someone's arms,

calling out

the name of the departed.

Some take charge,

micro-managing

to distract themselves.

And some wait,

pushing the pain

down into some deep dark place

where it will fester and curdle

but never go away.

Will ooze up, someday;

a black sludge

that fouls all it touches.

But even the quiet ones

no matter how subtle

are easy enough to tell.

The flat faces

drained of blood.

The slow gait

distracted gaze.

The slumped shoulders

and sunken eyes.

But me, I'm not a crier.

I don't easily share.

So I was an automaton,

sleepwalking through

the entire ordeal;

perhaps stiffer and grimmer

but still my stoical self.

Because no one knows

how grief looks.

Even though, in the fullness of time

we will all know how it feels.

All in Good Fun - May 14 2023

 

All in Good Fun

May 14 2023

Under the jaw

the skin was tough;

but the barbed hook

still tore a jagged line

in the stretchy pale flesh.

Then, tail thrashing

gills gasping

I threw it back,

where it sat, momentarily stunned,

before darting off

in a flash of silvered scales.

Catch and release

unharmed.

Or so I've been led to believe.

A passing fish

going about the business

of being a fish,

impaled

then jerked into bright alien air

before granted its escape.

——————

An errant shot

cracks the cold still air,

and a winged deer

staggers off into the woods,

its soft tawny coat

camouflage

against the dull autumn underbrush.

A tough animal,

descendent of survivors.

And the man

in his hunter-orange vest

shaking his head

at how badly he missed.

The random shot

of a avid outdoorsman,

and a wounded deer

whose hard life

would now be all the shorter.

——————

The dull thud

of a bird against the glass.

How unnatural

to see him motionless;

a creature of flight

dead still,

a thing as light as air

weighing down the grass

and easy prey.

But cupped

in my warm steady hand

I feel the tiny heart fluttering

too fast to count.

A shiver

passes from head to tail,

the body tenses,

wings spread.

Then, almost effortless

he leaps into the sky

and slingshots upward,

as if released

from the chains of gravity

that tether us mere mortals

to earth.

Merely concussed, I can only hope,

not brain damaged

and summoning up

one last heroic feat.

An injured bird

back in his element.

And the conceit

I have nursed it back to health.

——————

Our attempts

to set the world right,

return things

to how they were.

But the arrow of time

moves in only one direction.

What's done

is irrevocably done;

there is no undoing,

no turning back the clock.

Happy 13th - May 13 2023

 

Happy 13th

May 13 2023

13.

A Bar Mitzvah boy.

Baker's dozen.

Prime number.

Which might delight a mathematician

but makes it hard to celebrate;

just try dividing a cake

13 ways

and keeping it fair.

So who knows

why 13 is bad luck.

A day

when sensible people hunker down.

And god forbid

a black cat should cross your path,

ladder

block the way,

mirror shatter.

This May, it falls on a Saturday;

missed Friday

by that much.

And contrarians like me

who scoff at superstition

and tempt fate.

After all, why should Friday be different?

And the elevator

that skips 13

still stops at a 13th floor.

1 of 30 born

on that fateful day.

So how special do they feel

having defied the odds?

And what are we to think of them,

the cohort

of the 13th day,

hiding among us

in plain sight?

I wish them all

a happy birthday

whatever month they celebrate.

But most of all

those turning 13

on the 13th day,

at the witching hour

in the dark of night

at the stroke of 12 am.

Good fortune and good cheer

on this day you entered the world

for good.

The Perfect Lawn - May 13 2023

 

The Perfect Lawn

May 13 2023

The perfect lawn

is succulent

verdant

barefoot.

Jewelled drops of dew

rainbow in the sun.

A sprinkler circles,

phhht-phhht-phhhting

its graceful arc

of cool spray.

The reassuring rhythm

I fondly recall

as the soundtrack of summer.

The small suburban ranch

sprawls in a vast field

of emerald grass.

A waste of land, some would say,

a toxic monoculture.

But when I see the children

turning cartwheels

like effortless sprites,

skipping double dutch

and chanting nonsense rhymes,

its beauty

is undeniable.

All that work

keeping a perfect lawn.

And the “keep off” sign

blithely disregarded.

The verdant carpet

is too inviting to ignore.

So I play along,

stretching out

under a warm summer sun,

luxuriating

in the lawn's cool softness.

My scofflaw inner child

   —  who hasn't made an appearance

since who knows when  —

thoroughly delighted

to be making mischief again.

I’m not sure if this is a criticism suburbia and its bourgeois sensibilities, or a celebration.

The poem began with nothing but the bare-bones idea of lawn care. Stream of consciousness took me the rest of the way. Typically, this comes to me in images, and is often carried along by the language itself: the musicality of words; the emerging rhythm and rhyme.

And, as usual, where it landed was as unexpected for me as I imagine it is for the reader.

Lake Ice - May 12 2023

 

Lake Ice

May 12 2023

It's finally hot

in this benighted spring

of freezing nights and dull days,

but the last island of ice

still grimly persists,

a dazzling white

in the cold grey water.

Diminishing

day-by-day

as I track its slow demise;

dense ice,

thawing

from its smooth outer edges,

water

sloshing over the top.

And all I can do

is admire its doggedness,

almost defiant

in the struggle to survive.

I stand near shore

where cold pours off the water.

There's a density

to this frigid air

that seems nearly solid.

And in this unaccustomed heat

it's like a cool cocktail

on a tropical beach.

A fancy concoction

made of rum and something sweet

at some tacky tiki bar;

a umbrella on top,

ice

clinking against the glass.

Missing

just the swizzle stick

and fizz.

Plain water;

cold, grey, flat.

Boreal - May 11 2023

 

Boreal

May 11 2023

This sense of place

that persists

no matter how long since you left,

as if bred in the bone

imprinted in your DNA.

The accent is gone,

even though, to local ears

something might seem off.

You dress better,

or at least appropriately.

And like anything that becomes familiar,

the landscape

that once felt foreign

you don't notice anymore.

But when you return

you're instantly at home.

The light.

The rocky soil

and stunted trees,

the harsh geography.

Fresh water everywhere,

and too much space

for so few people.

Even though all your family

have also moved away

and few friends remain.

The power of landscape

in and of itself.

They talk about blood and soil

belonging

attachment.

And you

the idealist and cosmopolitan

who embraces all humanity

and was more than happy to leave,

yet cannot cleanse yourself

of this particularity.

Where you were born and raised,

your people buried.

As you too will be;

under a tree

in a shallow grave

in its hard stony soil.

The home

you thought you'd escaped

but really never left.