Birdsong - June 22 2024

 

Birdsong

June 22 2024

Lately, I’ve been awakening

well before dawn.

Some days, I’m unable to sleep at all,

and sit in the silence

of a world at rest

as the sky begins to soften.

Too gradually

to actually see.

Until I notice

that the shadows have slurred

trees sharpened,

and only the brightest stars persist.

When it will still be some time

before the horizon even takes shape.

Yet songbirds

are already calling out

in the predawn murk.

Insistent trills

as if competing to be heard,

short repeated refrains

like clockwork

that carry through the woods.

Either born knowing,

or learned

while listening through the shell.

Early birds,

who, on the longest day of the year

can't wait for the sun,

greedy for even more

in our short precarious summers.

While I have confused my days and nights,

corrupted

by artificial light,

drawb blinds,

the impervious brick

that walls me in.

I may resent

how their cacophony

disturbs the morning calm,

but also envy the purity

of their industrious lives,

the birds

living as nature intended

and their kind have always done.

Up with the sun

and asleep with it.

Like the tides.

Like the earth’s rotation

from day to day.

And like its precession

as the seasons change

and it steadily circles the sun,

they are creatures of light

in sync with the universe.

Songs of Summer - June 20 2024

 

Songs of Summer

June 20 2024



The song of the summer

comes and goes

in a few short months.

Like fireworks on the 4th of July

it burns hot and bright

then soon burns up.

Or like the temporary high

of illicit drugs;

addictive

the first time you hear it

but prone to overdose;

until soon

you need something new

to get you off.

Pop music

bubblegum

ear worms

that burrow in all the way.

Singable songs

with catchy beats

and happy themes

of sun and surf,

puppy love

and the primal urge

sultry weather is perfect for.

Songs that work

according to some formula.

But while the music snobs may disagree,

being popular

requires no apology.

And who forgets

the songs of summer

from when they were young?

Like that first love

an old man gets nostalgic for,

they seem even better

in retrospect.

Something to revel in

for as long as it lasts,

which should be more than enough.

Because nothing is forever.

Because simple pleasures

are the best kind.

And because what more did you expect?

The song of the summer

that gets stuck in your head

and seems to be everywhere

all at once.

Until just like that it’s not.

Mounted - June 19 2024

 

Mounted

June 19 2024

I don’t remember it exactly.

Except that it had the power of revelation

and defied belief;

the moment I realized

the bike won’t fall.

That once in motion

a spinning wheel is stable.

That you can point yourself in any direction

and the bike will track itself;

you're just along for the ride.

It would be years

before words like angular momentum

sort of made sense.

Before you moved

from 2 wheels to 4,

and cared more about speed

style

the girl beside you.

But back then

mounted on our battered bikes

we were pirates

fighter pilots

rally drivers.

Mostly, we were free

to go wherever roads lead;

free range kids

with parents safely at home

who were content to let us roam.

Who knew

everyday physics

would liberate us.

Who knew

what adventures we’d get up to.

And who knew how far;

that if it weren’t for back in time for dinner

perhaps to the ends of the world

before the pot roast and peas.

A Taste for Blood - June 18 2024

 

A Taste for Blood

June 18 2024

I watch how, eyeless

my plants turn toward the light;

rooted,

yet not only capable of movement

but so exquisitely adept.

And how they were here

long before we appeared,

and will continue to thrive

long after we’re gone.

When we’re as extinct as the dinosaurs;

but our ignominious tenure

having been so much shorter than theirs,

the magnificent lizards

who once bestrode the earth.

So why are they “mine”?

What presumption

entitles me to ownership?

Especially now that I wonder

at the inner life of plants

and the ethic that should govern this.

How to navigate a world

where only light is eaten,

and how a nocturnal creature like me

who scrounges to eat

is entitled to survive.

And then those carnivorous plants,

Frankenstein monsters

that blur the lines of difference

by which we make sense of the world.

What to make of those

who, like us, have a taste for blood?

Who can only survive

by the grace of another;

the taking of life

with nothing given in return?

How Smart Are Plants?

https://www.newyorker.com/books/under-review/a-new-book-about-plant-intelligence-highlights-the-messiness-of-scientific-change

A Crumpled 20 - June 17 2024

 

A Crumpled 20

June 17 2024

I extract the soiled clothes

from the basket

one-by-one;

pulling the sleeves right side out,

unravelling the cuffs

they’ll soon grow out of,

and checking pants pockets

before they’re put in the wash,

well-taught, as I’ve been

by bad experience.

Used tissues

and little balls of lint.

Hidden treasures

and old shopping lists.

A random collection

of ticket stubs

store receipts

bent paperclips.

It feels archeological.

Excavating layers,

accumulating evidence,

reconstructing past lives.

So there are no secrets

on wash day.

But with transparency

comes equality;

the democracy of laundry

in the machine,

where stripes and solids mix,

parents and kids

are treated no differently,

and colours and whites

get tossed in

indiscriminately.

As well as an understanding head of state

who thanklessly serves

but also forgives.

Who gets to look back

at the recent past

and smile indulgently.

Gets to keep the crumpled 20

and whatever loose change,

the small secrets

strategically filed away.

Running Late - June 15 2024

 

Running Late

June 15 2024

I watched them die

attempting to summit.

One foot at a time,

stopping for breath

and gulping for air

in Everest’s grim Death Zone.

But first

I stop to admire

the mountaineer's vernacular;

the verbing of a noun,

the unembellished shock

of Death Zone.

A shorthand

for people of action

who have no time for words

when daylight is short

and the top of the world so temptingly close.

No one awakened that morning

thinking this would be their last.

No one looked around

and imagined every person they saw

would be gone that afternoon;

bodies left forever

where they fell

frozen in their death throes,

all brightly dressed

in brand new high-tech gear.

Or at least didn’t permit

such subversive thoughts,

lest they tempt either fate

or cowardice.

Of course, every morning could be your last;

even here

where the air is sweet

the light soft

and the earth flat,

too close

to look all the way down

and see its gentle curve

falling away.

Because when every day is like the one before

such thoughts seem preposterous;

and anyway

there’s too much on your mind

in the morning rush

to bother with mortality.

The final pass

and a bottleneck,

a sudden storm,

the hubris of man.

Or some random weekday

on the busy freeway

when you fumbled for your coffee

and for that moment looked away.

     . . . Running late, as usual.

Lost in the Crowd - June 13 2024

 

Lost in the Crowd

June 13 2024

The faint rumble

of distant thunder

and my pace quickens,

heart jumps,

eyes scan the sky.

Because I am the sum

of all who came before.

The ancestral memory

and atavistic fear.

The superstitions that persist

despite all we’ve learned.

And the skittish disposition

of a small naked creature

in a predatory world.

Not to mention

a grim reckoning of risk.

Am I the solipsist

whom lightning must surely seek out?

Or am I exempt

and somehow protected from chance;

if not specially blessed

then lost in the crowd?

So far

I have slipped beneath the gaze

of the whimsical gods

who toy with us indifferently,

heedless to our pain.

Have evaded

Thor’s hammerthrow,

dodged

the thunderbolt of Zeus.

Have stood out when the rain

was coming down in torrents

and lightning cracked the sky

to survive another day.

But am starting to feel

my odds lengthen

complacency wane

reckoning come.

That from a hundred miles away

a bolt of rogue lightning

will arc across the sky

and strike.

On a clear day

out of the blue

utterly blind.

A random act of fate;

no way

I could see it coming.

Than All the Times Before - June 12 2024

 

Than All the Times Before

June 12 2024



That there’s nothing more to be said.

That the last word has been had.

That language

isn’t up to the task.

That I’ve used up

all my indignation and angst.

That I have been emptied out

of all the rhetoric

and clever repartee

I’m sad to say

were all I had to give.

That more is demanded of me

than mere verbiage

and tired platitudes;

that I should man up, for once

and act.

And the actual last word?

When the Doomsday Clock

strikes 12,

will the last man on earth

call out for help

when there’s no one left to listen?

Will he look up at heaven

and rage at its betrayal?

Will he blame himself?

Or will he think back to that one great love

and beg to be forgiven?

For having been unworthy.

For letting it end like this.

For once again

falling back on words;

as if this time

would somehow not be different

than all the times before.

All Good - June 9 2024

 

All Good

June 9 2024

There’s a point at which it’s all good,

even the setbacks and annoyances.

The secret

to growing old gracefully

is to laugh at yourself.

After all, you have only so many years left,

and what matters now is intensity

in and of itself;

deep feelings,

and simply being immersed

in the sturm und drang of life.

What’s more, you’ve learned

that this too shall end.

That no else really cares

or could be bothered keeping score.

That you are free

in a way you could never be before.

Colours become more vibrant,

and the minor things

you took for granted

now seem almost magical.

And when timeis short

and everything should matter more

you know most things will pass;

so priorities sharpen

perspective expands.

Who knew

that people this age are happier.

Or knew

that becoming invisible

in a culture besotted with newness

would be the superpower

that sets you free to be yourself.

At Risk of Forgetting - June 8 2024

 

At Risk of Forgetting

June 8 2024

The video on my phone

is in an old format

that is nearly obsolete.

It has been dutifully moved

from device to device

through each required upgrade.

But despite conserving it

like a diligent archivist

who knows how fallible memory is,

it would break my heart to watch.

The old dog

— with the rheumy eyes

and gimpy hind legs,

who wears a bright pink diaper to bed —

is still enjoying life.

But a creature who lives in the now

would not likely remember

there was a life before.

I doubt she recalls

long tireless swims,

her noble snout

and determined eyes

poking above the waves.

Loping effortlessly through the woods,

as if she could levitate

above the tangled brush.

Or strutting lightly along

as we walked side-by-side,

a well-chewed ball

held proudly in her mouth

like first prize

in the final match.

That she was a puppy once,

when even I

strain to recall.

That time passes quickly for dogs;

leap-frogging ahead

as we watch age overtaking them;

a preview

of our own untimely end,

telescoped down

to a few short years.

The saving grace

is that she accepts uncomplainingly.

And that she has no fear,

no notion of death.

I have to admit

an elderly dog

is more work than pleasure.

But the compact of care

is also a blessing;

what we owe

for the life we had together

we’re at risk of forgetting

in the perennial now.

The Last Word - June 6 2024

 

The Last Word …

June 6 2024

As if that puts an end to it.

As if, having had

you can walk away satisfied,

a vibration

hovering in the air

that begins to decay

the moment it’s been said.

That even if it’s heard

may never persuade

shame

or steamroll.

In a word

futile.

Either that

or gibberish,

the last man on earth

talking to himself

out loud.

My Late Lamented Youth - June 4 2024

 

My Late Lamented Youth

June 4 2024

Neatness counts.

Attendance will be taken.

No horseplay allowed.

When you stand, don't slouch;

Stomach in

chin up

shoulders back.

But for now, sit quietly;

no fidgeting

eyes front.

I was a compliant child.

Polite

good marks

on time.

I feared

the “permanent record”

that would follow me through life,

craved approval

while hated standing out.

My friends were also good kids

who deferred to authority.

Didn’t let drugs or sex

corrupt us,

rock and roll

lead us to depravIty.

So if I said I regret

my wasted youth

will you even understand?

Back when we knew we’d live forever

so weren’t in any rush.

Back when we knew all we needed to know.

Back when the straight and narrow path

seemed more than enough.

Because the world was just.

Because we were destined for greatness,

and best laid plans

never fail.

Because good things come

to those who wait.

Unmoored - June 1 2024

 

Unmoored

June 1 2024

I’ve become more and more unsure

of what it is I’m seeking.

Or perhaps, I’m too skeptical to be a seeker,

too grounded

in this material world

to be open enough.

Mysticism

is beyond me,

spirituality

seems too self-important.

Or is it not so much wanting to find

as wanting to be found?

Which means I’ve never not been lost.

Unmoored,

despite my attachment

to what I can measure and touch.

Not even God

could come to my rescue.

Because belief doesn’t work for me.

And because a deity

as needy as Him

does not inspire faith.

So lost I remain.

So never have belonged

and never to.

So long unsure

I've given up the search

for my place in the world

for now.