The dirty window
wears a story in fly specks
and spatter-stains from
soil tossed there by heavy rain.
Read the story
before you wash the window
as you seek transparency
and light.
Some stories
are a mess by nature
and design. Some stories
only exist in filth.
The next time you see me,
remember this.
How much there is still held inside me
after all these decades of allowing
my supposed best and worst out to be
criticized and praised out loud.
People say self-care
is more important
than the Work. Rest and be well,
they say. What you’ve done,
what you could do, matter less
than the resistance you offer
by being healthy and secure.
Teach the demons, inner and outer,
that they cannot win. Somehow
they ignore the fact
that any battle has casualties.
If I do not survive in body and spirit
because I’ve put body and spirit
into the Work, who dares to say I was wrong?
Even if no one knows who I am
a year after I’m gone, I will have done my part,
and the part I leave behind
ought to be enough for all who remain here
to say I did what I had no choice but to do,
and that is how I will be fulfilled.
Watching the Red Sox at the Blue Jays on a Saturday night,
although I don’t care much for baseball.
That’s not true: I enjoy games, not fandom.
I have never cared much about who wins in baseball.
Just now Hernandez stretched full out, leaping from the warning track
to rob Guerrero of the walk off run; the crowd groans. That’s baseball.
Earlier, the crowd cheered bonehead base running as the Sox gave away
an easy win. I saw it as hysterical, not criminal. That’s baseball.
Any good play’s a triumph, any bad one’s a tragedy.
Any underdog rising, any big dog falling: that’s why I watch baseball.
I care for the story of the game, not for the score. I loathe the blowout,
adore the nailbiter and the unexpected win: that’s my baseball.
I watch this one to the end, first time in a while, then go to bed; like not wanting
a book to end, then forgetting it once the cover’s closed. For me, that’s baseball.
Another game tomorrow, another winner, another loser.
Another story to watch and then forget. That’s baseball.
Revised, from 1999.
he died silent on a Monday
looking into that last camera
without a smile
eyes rolling up
like a tail gunner
during a spiral
still doing his job
the reporters on hand
either saw him blink
or didn’t see him blink
said he was either resigned
or defiant
confident
or arrogant
not one said remorseful
not one said scared
the Friday after he died
a jogger in Kansas City
found a 4 year old girl
another one found
her head a day later
when several days had passed
and no one had reported
a four year old girl missing
a local church group
began going door to door
to identify her
refusing to call her
by the police procedural name
of baby jane doe
they renamed her “precious”
because “someone must have known her
someone must have thought her precious”
last night
for the first time in years
I recalled the night I sang with Minor Threat
flying on crystal
maintaining barely well enough
to pass for straight edge
in a crowd militant for sobriety
the night irony was invented
when MacKaye handed off the mike
to what must have looked like
just another shaven runt in the crowd
I was so thrilled to be just straight enough
to remember the words
and that was the first one I remember
the first of those all-American moments
when
faced with something dangerous
and contradictory
I lunged for a safety net and tried to
simplify
to boil it all down
to a head shake
and a slogan
simplify
to stick a fist in the air
and shout along
with the long national hunger
for swift closure
simplify
because
if we can find a way to call her precious and insist
that she must have been beloved
if we can forget that in spite of that
no one seems to have missed her
if we can forget that it is likely
that her killer knew (or even gave her) her real name
if we can find a way to call the truck bomber
a madman and insist that he is an aberration
if we can forget that he cried
when he saw children burned in Waco
if we can forget that he nonetheless
meant to burn the kids he burned
if we can forget that they are not just any monsters
but our very own
looking for their own versions
of the easy answers
if we can get by those sticking points fast enough
we can return to the luxury of certainty
simplify
safely tuck it all away
and say
only a minor threat
only a minor threat
Remarkable —
the sunflower leaf
holding water
after a night
without rain.
Remarkable —
all I need to do
is describe it this simply
and someone
will call this description
art, someone
who never notices
remarkable things
happening so routinely,
who might have been
profoundly changed
if they had just looked up
from a book
and seen it for themselves.
I’ve compiled and posted a new eBook, “The Old Poet’s Handbook,” for my $15/month patrons on my Patreon site.
Just in case you were, y’know, interested….
up by five am daily unless there’s
illness or rare refusal. the Work begins
before coffee, breakfast, or inspiration.
first it’s just me and a shimmer, a pang.
then it’s just me, my pang and/or shimmer,
and blank space, waiting.
inspiration is for amateurs.
the pang is the pain of not writing,
the shimmer? anticipation, joy.
then the poem comes up out of the Work.
no effort is needed until it shows up.
our work only begins after the words punch in.
we wrestle and chip. we form and reform,
seeking the poem the poem insists
on becoming. seeking the writer the poem demands.
do this long enough, often enough, and you become
immeasurable to others unless you are measured
against your last poem. it has not been long enough
for me. tomorrow it’s back to sunrise
and no inspiration; just
shimmer, pang, and blank space.
as for satisfaction in the Work? an artist’s statement?
ask me later. ask me later tomorrow, in fact.
prepare yourself for a lie. assume everything said
that is not in the Work
is somehow a lie, just one of those things
left behind after the Work is done.
Dark Matter 