Dark Matter

You wouldn’t know it
to look at her
but on Sunday nights,
whenever the local TV station
put aside its day’s programming
and broadcast something light
and frothy and nearly, neatly
lightly blasphemous, she
would turn it off, turn
the radio off, turn the lights
off too, and she’d get down
on her knees and ask for
something — forgiveness
possibly, peace definitely;
the TV would have to wait
and her weary bones would
certainly needed that rest.

You wouldn’t know about
the next event, either;
how she would get up
from her knee stance
and go from wherever
she’d found herself
to the fridge; how
she’d pour herself a beer
and try to forget it all
for one minute or maybe ten
while drinking it down
slowly, steadily.

What she was trying to forget,
to let go into the dark,
she doesn’t recall — and that
is a blessing she created,
a hallelujah in the dark —
muted, almost nonexistent now,
but so vital to her being.
She would tell you about it,
if only she remembered.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

It is just a small thing,
a remark made
a long time ago,
but friends remembered:
“No time like the present.”
They laughed, not unkindly;
in the laugh you see a door
and the door opens and
then, you recall it yourself:
the moment when you realized
that while at that time
the moment seemed unique,
it was not —
it was a time like all the others —
another day in the books,
another day, another dollar;
all the chestnuts of speech
and memory lying fallow
under your feet. Once again,
you close your eyes and
time passes to
the next moment which feels
like all the others.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

What could be added to this?
If it isn’t already a perfect moment,
then nothing is — and that would be
perfect, wouldn’t it? And there you are.
If in speaking of perfection

you are trying to top yourself,
trying not to fall to a base level,
a sub-base level, it’s not working;
someone can always go one up on you —
say, “hold my beer” or “oh yeah…get this,”

and there you are, trivial and all alone.
So: what could you add and what could vanish?
It’s a perfect day for this type of exercise.
It’s a perfect day all around, except for
that nagging feeling that something’s not right.

Except — it never is? No matter the sunrise
and no matter the rain after dark, no matter
the single moment of perfection, the day is
spoiled and it’s probably your fault — and,
inevitably, the moment belongs to you.

What do you do next?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

Biting the back of my index finger
on my left, less prominent hand.

Feeling the tension, feeling the wet
of the little spit leaking out.

My eyes close and I hold the pose
for a few seconds, then stop.

Maybe it will matter someday
what I say here about what I did?

I doubt it will make much difference
to anyone, anyone at all.

The moment will pass by almost all
like a dolphin just offshore —

a pretty sight, yes, but so common.
Still, it might cause a thrill; so might this

poem, or whatever it is. I can’t call it that.
Isn’t it too small to hold such a large weight?

Anything I write holds so little and yet
so much. Like a dolphin hurtling

through gray waves — alone or with
others — doesn’t concern itself

with what the watchers think.
It’s too large to hold such small thoughts.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

Radio guest: she is somewhat
sharply dressed; hair
combed, etc. She wears
casual but neat clothes.

She speaks in a voice
that is a matter of big truth
and minute fact of her dead son
who died of an overdose
ten years ago but she’s
grateful now that
she had him and all that.

My parents
are both gone and I’m
straight-edge so neither
will ever have to speak
of me in the way
that she speaks
of him:
a matter of fact —

skeleton of rhythm
and music he once loved;
his bones tapping him out of
the picture.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

Rise to see one soul
has seen and marked my last text
with a “thumbs up”

and thus I have found
the strength to go on for a while —
just a little while.

You’re laughing right now
at this one, aren’t you?
This broken haiku?

Take what they give you,
my parents said, early on.
Take it and go on.

So — I will take it,
I will take it in to my home.
I don’t laugh like you;

instead, I fold it.
Sits in my pocket like lint.
sits there till it’s gone.

When I wake up, I’ll laugh
at it — if I recall it,
that is. I may not.

But waiting for it
to be gone or to come back?
It is beyond me

to have not wondered
who had my back out there.
To think about them

randomly. Wonder —
he or she, tall or short,
still alive, or gone?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

a sudden shower
when you want to dance
means the gods
don’t like you. do not
listen to the optimists
who will say the glass
is half-full. so what —
every glass
is going to be emptied
over you and you will be
cold and wet. even if
you happen to be nude
and are dancing and skipping
between the raindrops
you’re going to get drenched.
you are a damn fool
to believe in any of
that old-time crap about
the gods waiting to delight
in you. the gods
don’t care, not one iota.
the gods are for the gods.
you need to be for yourself.
the gods are serenely unconcerned
with you and your whims and
your big importance. you are
out here, dancing naked
in the last rain of summer,
smiling at the neighbors,
unshocked when they close
the windows and say it’s
not for them. what do you care
if the gods and the neighbors
have turned away — you’re
still dancing — toss a pirouette
at them now, fling your right leg
up behind you now, fall down
in hysterics now — screw the gods
and the neighbors. dance
like they’re all watching. dance
like it’s the last time you’ll do it,
ever. they all will sigh and turn
away, shaking their heads.
you keep on doing you.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

There’s a yard sale
this morning
on a side street.
There’s an unhoused person
on the main street leading to that
and on the highway
that you can reach
easily from there, there are
a dozen cars spread out
going one way, another dozen
going the other,
and not one person
in any car knows
anyone going the other way;
of course, this is
how the place runs —
one person selling,
another person begging,
twenty-four
or more taking no interest in either,
all going on their own errands
in the morning sunlight.
Some of these people are happy, others
less so; some were drained
of any un-based emotion
ages ago; some people
live in a glass house and
some people put their trust
in hard wood, in brick, in stone;
there are some
who don’t have anywhere
to put it
but we don’t really talk
about anyone
any more than we have to —
after all, it’s a gorgeous
Saturday morning
and why waste breath on those
who don’t come into our lives?
They walk by the street
where we live, drive by
on the highway uncaring
until they do. It’s
a beautiful day today,
after all. So lovely
you don’t feel you need
to notice anyone,
anyone at all.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

As if there was a great storm and
we all did not survive it —
instead those who remained here
stopped and considered and then
plunged ahead barely thinking
of those who left us, those
who fell aside; as if we had set aside
their endings, preferred to think
they were gone and would return
someday, perhaps suddenly;
as if they’d never left —
so shall it be with us all.

One day, one year
after we are gone, we will return
in the most unexpected places —
amid flowers in yards of jungly weeds or
set up in trash bags on the curbs;
those who remained, who outlasted us,
will catch one glimpse of us among rubbish
and somehow, transfixed by the sight,
will see us as beautiful, filled with light;
as if our presence changes everything;
as if in that moment this world
would be cleaner, shinier,
and thus repaired.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

Sit still for a hour or two on Monday
and nothing is happening to disrupt it.

Sit still listening for a disruption
or another sort of wrinkle in the universe

and still nothing is happening. Trees
and other plants seem to have lost their way.

No sound of wind in them; not a single bud
scratches at the window. Distant cars pass by below

on the connecting road; otherwise, that’s all.
That and the clicking of computer keys

which I turned to just to make a sound,
any sound at all. Prove I am alive

this way: I can hear clicking, can make
my fingers wriggle. Earlier, I played the guitar

badly, trying to recall how I once moved.
Once upon a long ago I could play.

I doubt I played well but I didn’t care as much
back then. So I set the guitar back on the stand

and try not to care again. I am very different now.
Not the same person, I think; wrapped in the same skin

and the same bones but so changed — I never could
have spent as much time as this doing this —

clicking on keys, setting a guitar back after playing
for five minutes, sitting still and listening to what seems

like nothing that keeps happening so many times
it feels continuous, smoothing out

the depths of being into a bland stream.
Did you hear the water changing the earth? Of course not.

You didn’t hear anything, old body, dear friend.
Try as I might, what I hear vanishes outside me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T