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well, it's almost over
another year. and what have you learned? again the death of people the extinction of a few more species. maniacs in places of power are at last, fittingly, speaking like maniacs. I miss my grandfather and the sea, and the loneliness hasn't killed me yet. still: the birds leave in the fall the birds return in the spring. the river will tear the ice out of its heart. the moon will glow like a melting coin the moon will sleep on her velvet pillow. someone will try to sell me a thousand things I don't need. what I need: a place to come home to. a heart, or a smashing wave to break one. when I linger on a mountaintop amisdt the lengthening rime and gnomed spruce it isn't nostalgia; I'm trying to empty the pitcher entirely to erase the wall between memory and forgetfulness, heaven and earth. drive by the man
with the cardboard sign at the entrance of Wal-Mart and think: "nothing will break me like that--nothing" then someday you're alone. maybe at the top of a mountain in winter, half buried with zeroes, or maybe in a hospital bed, grey, awaiting the mask you imagine our little world twinkling in the valley a mouse's postcard. or dwell on your gallbladderless friends, those who are left-- not many these days. the snow crawls up you like bedsheets or visa versa. time is heavy. time is also feathered. "am I brave," you ask as the nurse takes off your shoes. as the cold slides it's envelope-openers through them. it's a good question. good as asking "who am I, really." the wind wants to answer. as does your heartbeat tangible to you at last a little line of mountains beeping on the tiniest screen. it is hard to be
here now. the heart wants to check out of its personal crucifixions let them keep piling behind the mail-slot until they barricade the door and the only cure is to burn down the house. Ram Dass died today, and I am still a fool in a nation of fools. Ram, I am still waiting for some one to walk me home. I wish it were my grandfather, in the kindness of old age looking like Mr. Magoo in his floppy cotton fisherman's hat. I wish I were fit to offer someone an arm through these long-icicled nights but all I have worth holding: the index finger that taps out these lines and pokes through the fourth wall of the heart. Ram, like you, I do not care if it is one thousand gods or one god. putting the word to lips is a step. it's a hard path, and the heart is a tender organ. remind me again to be of some use, to step out on the road and walk somewhere here. friend, they say
we are born with one heart, but I tell you I've gone through dozens, each redder than the last & the last bigger than a piano. I don't know where they come from find them under the couch, stuffed into mail slots served on my bagels. throw a bushel out the window next morning they dangle from the utility lines like electric apples. it's as if life won't tire of killing me. there are days I envy Jesus with the shroud burned onto his face, the tomb silent as old mice. he waits for the sun that revolves once in a million years. but the angels come for me yearly with sharpened spoons bloody buckets. the sun goes away. I write one of these poems, and the sun comes back. across outer space rolls it's red carpet tongue. presto. this great magic, friend, isn't derived from protecting the heart I now have. when the dust has settled
when you've reached the end of the fence your rope the string the line your heart when you've worn your shoes through then your socks and the bottom falls out in a freefall when time is up out and time is a river you're cast into, when the moon bears down on you like a stone and you've got no candle to light your way or map to show you the road which refuses to rise to meet you listen: others have gone here before their bones are the trail you travel their blood is the water you drink their words are the hands you hold onto; be still in the dark in the cell you've been cast, lost in the desert your thirst has made for you, take heart shed a tear, and even if it kills you follow the sun the bright orange sun toward the dawn even if it may not dawn on you. the turkey is dead
the surplus pumpkins sag like defeated heads into the chin of the field. and now come the pointy elves to decorate the earth with their plastic junk, their artificial snow. the real Saint Nick was the patron saint of thieves. the phony one we now worship is also. but don't let me rain on your tinsil parade or speak of the starving or the Beautitudes. that we need so many holidays and so much obligatory giving cheapens these hands. I have always wanted to be useful to the world to dirty myself with it. not wander from sidewalk to sidewalk spilling my breath out for the cold stars. snow lays its long white
sheet over the earth. silence explains its math of zeroes; the memory I had of you singing is finally lost. I have never heard my heart so clearly, felt the cold so keenly. who knows which will break me first. |
Poetry LogPoems are posted here when I'm ready to share them. I often don't title my poems. The date you see above the poem may be the date it was posted here and not necessarily the date it was created. To see more, click on the Archives below. Archives
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Unless otherwise noted, all content ©Paul-William Gagnon, Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-NoDerivs license.
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