Sunday, June 22, 2025

Strict Geometry - June 19 2025

 

Strict Geometry

June 19 2025


We live in strict geometry.


This 4-cornered room

of right angled walls.


This point in time

if time could stop.


The intersecting grid

of perpendicular streets

I travel on each day;

the straight line

through my flat vanilla life.


But also my topography.

My valleys and peaks.

The steep canyon walls

I fail to see.

My illusions

of self-improvement,

in which, like a Möbius strip

I end up simply circling back.


The lines that connect us all.

Like the red string

thumb-tacked to a cork-board

in some conspiracist’s underground den;

all of us entangled

in a web of relationships

that keeps extending out.


The circle of life.

Because everything

begins and ends.


A great pyramid looms over me.

Its apex

where triangular sides converge

and privilege flourishes.

And its load bearing base

where most of us are

in our appointed place,

doubled over

from the crushing weight.


There’s the passage of time

with its measured intervals

and neatly circling hands.

Which certainly seems geometrical,

but actually depends

on whom you ask.

Because time is subjective.

Because time and space are one

and space/time bends.

Because geometry

has more than 3 dimensions,

and it’s the 4th

that changes everything.


So I wonder about a 5th

invisible to us.

As if we were 2 dimensional creatures,

unaware

that parallel worlds existed

both above and below.

As if we were mere doodles

on a sheet of plain white paper;

a thin sheet

sandwiched somewhere in the middle

of a limitless stack.


Bad Uncle - June 15 2025

 

Bad Uncle

a poem for Father’s Day

June 15 2025


I watch the fathers in the park

playing as dads.

They call their kids buddy.

Hug unselfconsciously.

Do stuff around the house

we once called women’s work.


While proper names

were good enough for us.

We rarely hugged;

but if we did, somehow barely touched

if at all.

And it was understood

that the man of the house

was the hard-working provider;

he didn’t bake bread

he won it.


It was hard to say I love you

so it simply wasn’t.

But back then, you spoke when you were spoken to,

so there was much that was left

unsaid.


When I think of fatherhood

I tend to capitalize;

Father of our country

   . . . Our Father in heaven

       . . . the Fatherland.

Stern men, and patriarchs,

the Founding Fathers

out in the world

instead of home.


But the dads throwing baseballs

and playing tag

are just one of the boys.

I imagine that they’re OK with “Motherland”,

and open to the thought

of a female God

if not a fluid gender one.

Perhaps their wives

earn more than them.


I, childless, sit on a park bench

a little envious,

watching the playful dads

taking care.

They aren’t playing at fatherhood

they’re fathers at play.

Dads, in other words.


What kind would I have been?

Divorced, step, part-time?

Bad tempered and coercive

or the bumbling sit-com version?

Authoritarian father?

Authoritative partner?

Laissez faire dad?


I’m at best a bad uncle,

so might I have somehow become

a good buddy?

A hugger

who doesn’t flinch?

A bed maker

and decent baker

who even cleans up

after himself?


The sort of man

who has no trouble saying love?


And not only saying, but practicing it

in a neighbourhood park

some Sunday afternoon;

a game of catch

or playing tag,

last one standing wins.


Perfect Weather - June 13 2025

 

Perfect Weather

June 13 2025


It’s too quiet

for this time of year.

It feels as if the world had tipped

or its orbit slipped

closer to the sun.

How unsettling

to feel that something is different

but not be sure what.


So long since it’s rained

and the lush green

of early spring

has wilted to pale.


While the soil is hard as kiln-dried bricks.

Dust kicks-up as I walk,

and every gust of wind

fills the air

with small brown particles.

It’s hard to breathe,

and there’s a dry spasmodic cough

if I’m out too long.


The sun beats down

from a clear blue sky

all day

day after day.

As if the weather report could be a recording

replayed each morning

on AM radio:

It will be sunny today,

hot and dry

followed by a cool night.

Perfect weather

I’d normally say.


But this quiet feels unnatural.

After all, it’s bug season,

but they aren’t swarming, buzzing, or biting,

aren’t driving us inside

swatting frantically.

Black flies

who are normally so thick

you could cut the air with a knife

are either hunkered down

apathetic

or dead.

The rest fly half-heartedly,

as if no longer sure

of their taste for blood.

The mosquitoes are hungry enough,

but so few in number

I can pick them off

one-by-one.


Birds are also subdued,

as if they’ve gone into hiding

from keen-eyed eagles

and circling hawks.

But there are no raptors

out for prey.

And where are the squirrels?

I miss the constant chatter

of little busybodies

who aways sound displeased,

looking down, from somewhere in the trees

as if scolding me

just for being there.


So I can’t enjoy this perfect weather.

Not when the natural order seems off,

the world

on life support.


We complain when it rains,

when low dark cloud

shrouds the sky.

But now it's not rain,

but day after day

of perfect weather

that has me dreading the next.


A preview of what’s to come?

Of what becomes of a water-world

rendered waterless,

the living planet

dying of thirst?


When its blue and green

turns to shades of brown,

and dust choked wind

scours the ground.


When the only sounds to be heard

are its low incessant rumbling

and ominous howl,

the barrage of shrapnel

battering the walls

we shelter behind.


I could almost do without a bug net so far this late spring. Which, combined with perfect weather, should be delightful.

But I feel ambivalent. I can’t enjoy the weather and relative buglessness without thinking about dry wells and forest fire. About the burst of life in early spring turning from turgid green lushness to wilted and struggling. About the disruption of the natural order of life, in which these missing insects — annoying as they are — are a crucial part of the food chain. And finally, about climate change, which is behind it all. And, with the mess we’re collectively making of it, will only get worse.

Hence this dystopian vision of the far (near?) future: a dry sterile planet scoured by constant wind, the air fouled with massive dust storms. As if, due to our negligence, greed, and denial, we managed to turn Earth into a second Red Planet. As if Elon Musk will be able to stay right here and still have his wet dream of colonizing Mars!

(I just realized that I’m writing this on Friday the 13th. So a suitably fateful poem for the superstitious!)


Domestic Politics =- June 12 2025

 

Domestic Politics

June 12 2025



It’s all politics.


All factions

bombast

and shouting across the aisle.

All wheeling and dealing

and unseemly affairs.


The mess of compromise.

The taking and giving.

The splitting of difference

down the middle

if not a little to one side.


Government

relationships

the inner voice I argue with,

business

as usual;

all politics.

In all of which

no one wins

all they want or all the time.


Doesn’t matter

how distasteful I find disorder.

How either/or

simplifies the world,

dividing it cleanly

into black hats and white,

virtue over vice,

the absolute truth

versus shameless lies.

How much purity appeals

to my inner idealist,

who never doubts

that the good guys are us,

the others are wrong,

and the line between bright.


Meanwhile, we fight

apologize

kiss and make up,

trying not to keep score

or nurse our petty grievances.

And trying even harder

not to let them simmer inside,

stewing in the warmth

of our lesser selves.

Where they’ll go bad,

festering into resentment

or worse, contempt.


And in the end, we muddle through.

A short memory helps,

while forgiveness smooths the way,

ushering us on

with a gracious nod

and wave of its hand.


And after all is said and done

we hold a vote of confidence

so that the house doesn’t fall

government dissolve,

custody over the dog

become a bone of contention.


Convene a new session

with the representatives

in their accustomed seats;

voting

on what’s for dinner

what wine will go with it

and who does the dishes tonight,

accompanied

by the usual bickering

and innocent jibes,

some coyly flirtatious asides.


And later that night

living in glorious sin,

just as common law permits

and marriage gives royal assent.


Then continue to live together,

hoping for re-election

when the next contentious decision

is up for debate.


I might have called it “Post Fight Sex”. But a little too on the nose!

And more seriously, the poem is not just about domestic life. (It certainly didn’t start that way (but then, poems tend to have a mind of their own!)) Everything is messy, compromise, water in your wine. It’s not this messiness that’s the problem; it’s purity. Which, in politics, comes in the form of both idealism and ideology. In business, greed. And in personal relationships, intransigence.

Want - June 10 2025

 

Want

June 10 2025


Sometimes, all I want is to hunker down.


Curl up

like a mummified homunculus,

in the fetal position

head tucked-in

someplace dry.


Or retire into my shell

like a self-contained crustacean;

a hermit crab, in its boneless skin,

slipping-in

to its borrowed home.


Which is really not wanting at all.

Because don’t we always want more, not less?

Isn’t that what wanting is for?

Aren’t we creatures of desire

who accumulate, acquire, possess

then find room for it all?


While I’m against complexity.

I’d rather strip down, divest, reject

than keep these balls in the air.

After all

the world, in all its folly

will go on

with me or not;

the universe

absurd as it is

will expand, collapse, or stop

no matter what.


I am not a survivalist.

I have no practical skills.

I will probably starve, freeze, or die of thirst.

But it will be peaceful there

on the ocean floor

looking inconspicuous.


Not forever, of course.

Even hermit crabs molt, grow, and reproduce.

But even a short respite would work,

protecting my soft invertebrate body

from the underwater predators

who patrol the benthic depths.


As well as the air-breathing ones

who swagger over the land

with insatiable appetite;

inadequate men

ruled by want

who are never truly satisfied

no matter what.


I was reading, as usual, and the words “hunker down” caught my eye, then stuck with me long enough to seem worth seeing where it would take me. As an introvert who is retired and lives a highly hermetic life, the idea is certainly a familiar one! Especially with the world as it is today, with the existential threats of climate change and pandemic; leaders like Trump, Putin, and Xi (I could go on!); not to mention their entourages of enablers, sycophants, and opportunists. So the opening line wrote itself, and then the rest of the poem naturally followed.

After that, lots of odds and ends of things I’ve seen, heard, and read worm their way in. Like the recently seen movie Memoir of a Snail (how much I identified with the main character, animated or not!), and like Neil deGrasse Tyson talking about the absurdity of the universe. Which I thought strange, because isn’t an esteemed astrophysicist and polymath — by virtue of his lifelong enterprise — supposed to believe the cosmos can be described, measured, and explained? At least eventually?

That process — wrote itself — may sound excessively modest, or just evasive or unself-aware, but it really is true of most of my writing. Because it feels much more like taking dictation than a deliberate creative act. That I’m more stenographer than poet. The ancient Greeks had the concept of a muse. Which is a little too mystical for me, but I suppose is as good an explanation/description as any of how that “flow state” feels.


A Secular Prayer - June 9 2025

 

A Secular Prayer

June 9 2025



It wasn’t Biblical.

Nothing like the monsoon.

And if you’ve seen deserts bloom

when the rain comes

once a decade or two

it didn’t compare.

There were no rivers

welling-up from nothing

and gushing through the sand;

no brilliant desert flowers

carpeting the land

you took for dead;

as if life could materialize

just like that

out of barren wilderness.


Still, it came down hard.

So on the 3rd day

when the cloud finally cleared

and a welcome sun appeared

it felt supernatural;

its heat soaking in

to my puckered pale skin

and rheumy bones.


No rainbow,

no promise,

no miracles.

Just lush green grass

that seemed lit from within,

leaves glistening

with crystalline drops,

and a fresh breeze

with a bracing edge.

I felt as refreshed

as a cold plunge,

as replenished

as forgiveness

for confessing my sins.


There were mirrored puddles

containing the sky,

and the world

in all its fecundity

and possibility,

disorder and renewal —

was washed impossibly clean.

At least for now.


I saw men in suits

who stride briskly

head down

making time,

and young women

who can't pry their eyes from a screen,

stop

look up

and take in the sun

as if they’d never seen it before.

You'd have thought that the Ark

after 40 days and nights

of sea-sick animals and faith-testing waves

had finally set down

on solid land;

a firm thump

and a little list to one side.

The boat at rest,

its passengers spared.


But still, it was a moment of gratitude

we all could share;

turning to face the sun

in a secular prayer

of wordless thanks.


The Universe Explained - June 8 2025

 

The Universe Explained

June 8 2025


This writerly life

is unforgiving.


Must everything turn into words?


And must the past be so indelible?

Because there’s no taking back

the short stories

that now seem never-ending,

pretentious poems

that still exist somewhere.

And I cringe

at the self-righteous essays I penned

with adolescent zeal.


How I go through the world

detached.

Distancing myself

like an anthropologist

or worse, a photographer;

taking mental notes

protected by my lens.

Always guided by the cardinal rule

of non-interference

in my subject’s affairs;

all these years

no butterfly wings

to call my own

and cause a stir.


The child who loved escaping into books.

And now, constructs sentences

he takes refuge in;

if not a paper edifice

then a screen made of glass.


The power of words seemed a given,

the printed word

invincible.

As if words could change the world

if enough people heard.

Even have,

if too often for the worse.


But I had no illusions of influence.

It was more delusions of control;

as if anything, once captured in words

could be tamed

and understood.

The universe explained

in the countless permutations

26 letters can make.


But delusion or not

there’s still the satisfaction

of a beautiful line.

Crafting a sentence

as balanced as a jeweller’s scale,

as smooth

as well-aged Scotch;

poured straight

then slowly savoured

before sipping again.


And how convenient to hide

behind their pulchritude;

the emperor with no clothes

who drapes himself in words,

hoping his nakedness

never shows.


This poem was inspired by a recent piece the New Yorker about the oddly frequent phenomenon of doctors who write. The impression I took from the essay is of a common need to process, reflect, and distil complicated experiences that come too fast or too intensely to contend with in real time. Because writing provides distance, gives space for contemplation, and is the medium of thought. And because, by means of the alchemy of a social animal, sharing somehow lessens the burden: like lancing a boil or bleeding with leeches, it feels better just by telling someone else.

My writing, though, rarely touches on the practice medicine (from which I’m long retired). So I don’t write to process deeply affecting clinical experiences; I write because I always have, and because it has become an absolute compulsion. I have to write every day, or I’m left with this unsettled feeling of something unresolved. Which is why the line must everything turn into words? came so unthinkingly to me.

So while I’m not the “doctor writer” Danielle Ofri is, or finds so interesting, perhaps she would include me as an honorary member of the club.


Why Do Doctors Write?

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-weekend-essay/why-do-doctors-write


A Walk in the Woods - June 7 2025

 

A Walk in the Woods

June 7 2025


It's a long steep trail

through dense terrain.


Rocks and roots

ambush me

like trip-wires.


Too often, large obstacles

like rotting logs and fallen trees

block my way.


Thickly needled branches

drape across the path;

I push through

sweeping with my hands,

as if wading hip-deep

through a fast-moving stream.


In the shadows

small pools lurk

in still black camouflage.

As if the path has been booby-trapped

for unwary shoes.


So I walk looking down,

only taking in the view

when stopping for rest.


It’s too hot to hike,

at least for a sensible man.

Sweat drips in my eyes

new sneakers pinch.

Nevertheless, I persist.


Clouds of mosquitoes

swarm my head.

Like winged predators

armed with hypodermic needles

they probe my defences

and siphon-up my blood;

even their chainsaw buzz

is weaponized.

I slap at them angrily

and the dogs snap haphazardly

futile as it is.

But they also scoot through the underbrush

cleverly sweeping them off.

Good dog, I think to myself

a little envious.


They say a walk in the woods

does a man good.

That getting out of your head

is therapeutic.

That adversity

builds character.


So I walk

trying not fall

ignoring the bugs.

But the moment doesn’t come;

there is no transcendence

revelation

inner calm.


Just gratitude

to have it done with.

And for some reason I can’t explain

determination

to do it again.