Molly

 Raking leaves--walnut, maple, mulberry, ailanthus--

I saw how it was.

My dog Molly--sweet, skittish, a rescue--

knew the Aussie was the favorite.

She hid his favorite toy in a pile of leaves,

but not well enough--I saved it.

When we were finished, all the leaves at the curb,

the toy was gone, second time the wicked charm.

When you lose something, you lose the place you were

when you first saw it, who you were with, what you were doing.

Fragile things can fall and shatter and when you see them broken

your heart can break a little too--and there's nothing you can do.

I am thinking about broken things, lost things, hidden things,

The leaves have fallen, grown again, fallen again.

My Aussie is gone and the clear pure blue of September sky,

the lofted toy, and Molly too, have all passed.

Today I sit outside, careful with the mug on the chair arm,

even knowing that everything--and I as well--will fall in time.

___

Sunny

 When I met you, you were day-sleeping in somebody else's car

and running around scrapping all night.

With your shaggy hair and that roll of your shoulders,

you made me jelly-kneed right from the start.

Sunny, you kept your loneliness hidden from your running buddies,

your feet on the ground and your eyes on the stars in the Texas night.

I kept you coming back by feeding you, like some Italian mother

with a full pantry and a real bad crush. Come onna my house, birichino. 

You had nothing, expected nothing, and were fearless, so fearless,

but when I fussed over some new cut you turned boneless as butter.

When I drank you turned to a rumor, gone like smoke, hating the stuff

yourself, and somehow above it. You made me want to kick loose of it, like you.

How did I charm you into staying, my gorgeous one? 

How did we teach other what love was, with your silence and my words?

Til the day I die I know my heart is full of you, and all that you gave me.

I held you in my arms as you gasped and ran free, in the black hour of your end.

Oh, I learned to care again, about life, about myself, about it all,

but it took a long terrible while. and it was the hardest thing I have ever done.

Girls always fell for you like autumn leaves, light as sighs, stars of a moment.

I know how lucky I was to be the one you gave your heart to. 

It's been thirty-two years and I still say your name and picture your face

every day. Even the angels won't be able to tame you--I won't let them.

Wait for me. When my hours are over I will find you. I will come running.

_____

Girl Lindbergh

 oh that.

that's just my habitat.

some women

take up counted cross stitch,

others

--with scorched souls--

even like golf

as if the order and pointlessness

were balm

for their frightening wounds.

me,

I have my habitat.

it's filled with

a green growy tangle

and those cries

like animated bells

that made you open the door

in the first place.

every night

I go in there.

most mornings

I come out again

either elevated

or barely alive.

either way, it keeps me fresh

like tennis

except

my medical bills are enormous

and my poetry

keeps getting sharper and more feral.

now that you've seen it

I know you won't be back anymore

or else you'll want a piece of all of this

mistakenly thinking it, 

and me, 

exciting.

people want

to spend time in my habitat

like wanting to space walk

without gear

or training

or

a Houston to rely on.

my habitat

is my own private

supermax

funhouse

and I am just Bluebeard's wife

glad he's gone off to sea

while I

merrily 

open the door

to my habitat

and disappear into it

flying solo

like Girl Lindbergh.

Mountain Climbing For Morons

 do a checklist before beginning:

helmet

harness

shoes

carabiners

webbing

cords

oxygen canisters

fuel food

etc.

check weather reports.

set up a base camp.

in the helicopter

the blades reminded you

od the ceiling fan

in the hotel

in Bangkok

last year.

all right

up you go

(as your father once said

handing small you

onto the monkey bars)

this is it.

the world now boils down

to snow

ice

crevasses

ridges

storms

whiteness.

at the summit,

you're as winded as you were

when she left you.

you needed a challenge

and here it is, so

pose

for a picture

plant

a flag.

be Sir Edmund for a minute.

but

Tenzig Norgay knew

that everything

worth having

was

back in Lukla

Kathmandu

Casablanca

or Hometown, USA.

even the cat

knew that.

why didn't you?

2 New Short Poems

IN THE TIME OF SHORTENING DAYS

The crickets have come

to sing summer out,

smooth black invisible chirring

like planets spinning.

I have fed the little rat

who tips the tray--

each of us awake in differing skins,

on a yellow-leaf evening

under white stars

_________________

EMAIL FROM MY BROTHER

Hearing from you is like being operated on

by a blind doctor

trained in church

by the deaf dead.

_________ 

They Always Get Jesus In Prison

 

I see where David Berkowitz got Jesus in prison

like they always do.

Now he runs a ministry, adept as he always was

at delivering

succinct

sermonettes

delivering people to God.

He was a postal clerk, always involved

with the Message.

Such converts always have a carnival of explanations--

the Devil

the neighbor's dog

and other invented booshwah.

Susan Atkins got Jesus in prison too

and wrote a memoir

about her redemption, her will turned over

from Charlie

to Christ

but it could have been Moonies or Ekankar.

There is a rat who lives in my garage.

He hasn't heard the Good News

but he never

hurts anyone.

He has published no book, leads no prayers.

He likes to hang out behind a shovel

that has never dug a grave.

The authorities let Leslie Van Houton, Caril Ann Fugate,

and Nathan Leopold out.

Karla Homolka changed her name and might be anywhere,

at services maybe,

holding a bible and smiling.

________

Conspicuous Christians

 

The conspicuous Christians

fill 4 booths and keep the waitress hopping.

12 adults

5 young children needing highchairs in the aisle

17 orders, all different

5 special requests

2 plates sent back

1 spilled coffee

separate checks. please.

After an hour, they leave

dishes, napkins, crayons, sticky syrup spots,

and

1 tract

with

2 crisp 1 dollar bills tucked neatly inside. 

_____

Dreams of Shiva

 

There is a thing I wanted so much--

a thing always denied.

The evil and the angelic made a pact

and placed this desire in my heart

like a ticket hidden in a boot

worn by someone desperate in a station.

I tell people this desire is over--

that I visit its grave on holy days

to leave woven weeds,

but there is no grave because it is not dead--

only paralyzed like an aster when there is no wind,

no sun, no moon, no garden.

There is someone coming up the stairs

to hurt my heart, and they are so lit with beauty,

such an ordinary marvel.

The hallway floor is wood, the light there yellow in autumn.

It is morning, but the birds are mute.

My heart stops, the visitor walks past, the world ends,

but no one notices. There is no fool like an old fool,

no desire that cannot exalt or destroy,

over and over, in silence, like Shiva in a recurring dream. 

______

Detroit

The muscle cars have aged out

of high school hamburger stands

and live in landfills

or junkyards

but some survive.

The codger across the street in the end house

keeps his in pristine condition,

replacing its parts, babying its body

in ways he can't do for himself.

I see him rolling out down the street,

into youth,

joy,

music,

health,

until he rounds the corner

and disappears.

_____

Oriental Bittersweet

Oriental Bittersweet

her arms full of swans

never meant, no really never

meant you any harm.

Oriental Bittersweet

cuts her body with a blade

and never sees, no never really

sees the mess she's made.

Oriental Bittersweet

has horse blanket hair--

blacktop eyes and blackstrap tongue

and promises she cares.

Oriental Bittersweet

knows EMT's by name--

she'll take you with her, with her taken

here she comes again.

______

At 23 (for Bob Green--not the famous one)

Our mutual friend

had told you

how I used to be Queen of a very small tribe.

"It seems almost..." I said, hesitating.

"Like it really happened?" he asked, eyebrow raised.

"It did happen, but now

things are so different that it seems

ridiculous."

I sat there,

shot full of arrows like Saint Sebastian--

like him, not dying

but split and empty like a dead pew.

There are more gospels than they let on, you know.

This man loaned me two records--

Joni Mitchell

and It's a Beautiful Day.

Like poetry, it was love for life for me--

Hot Summer Day and Sweet Fire.

I left Illinois not long after

to Gypsy it in a small car with two teachers

off for the summer.

We read Richard Brautigan,

and wandered the bars in New Orleans, then Galveston

where I left both my crown and my grave in a coin laundry

on a Sunday morning.

______

Ooga Booga

 

Ooga booga, darling.

It's me, sunflower face

the fox-hearted misdirected letter of your dreams.

I live in the space between the walls.

I play Candyland with brain-injured devils

for a pot of chilly blue dawns.

I raid your fridge while you dream of dolphins.

I tip-toe around your place, judging the art,

boiling the pasta, making a mess.

That's me saying, "love me" from the heat vents.

That's my voice on the tv during your ballgame,

making you fuck with the settings.

Give in, please. I haven't got all day.

Once, I was an Egyptian queen.

Once, I was a Dutch laundress.

Now I live inside your Jiffy-Pop, getting hot, expanding suddenly.

It's me, sunflower face,

the fox-hearted misdirected letter of your dreams.

You'll wake up in love with me.

You'll wake up as a black horse wearing a feather plume.

You'll wake up to find me in bed next to you, staring.

I've put my stamp, my kiss, my spell on you.

Easy, my high stepping Friesian, shh shh...

It's all right, I'm a specter and I've got the cure

for all your missteps, I'm an oval track, fresh spring clover,

a pinch of salt, and a lot of black cat. 

______