lost poem

I wrote you a poem

but I left it on the car seat

I folded it in half

then folded it again

negligently

I placed it here

then there

until it was lost

and I wonder what type of life

it must have

apart from me

without my hands

without my books to read

or pages to be

pressed between

I can remember the words

some phrases really

when I think on you these days

I think mainly of your voice

though I cannot recall

a single word

you said to me

not even goodbye

in moments of stillness

of quiet and calm

I collect myself

and I think to write it down

again

but it stays just that

an unfinished task

time and again

I only think on it

too often

too often we long

for the things that consume us

only to hold them at bay

-as if there were virtue in restraint

as if the river invented the dam

or the tree the saw

i know you

i know who you are

as if you were Jacob arriving at the well

and i

i had just drawn down my jar

what good

you asked me what I had done with your letters

-if I had even opened them-

if I had read them

I might have known then that you left her;

that you were coming in the spring.

and what can I say but that I might have?

I might have but, there were so many other things

-the sky in April seemed endless, cloudless

and I couldn’t stop searching it.

in May I hung the laundry out to dry in the still cool air.

when I made my bed it smelled of wind, of dew.

in June the strawberries bloomed and ripened

just like always in the shelter near the door.

what can I say – your letters

I might have read them, but what good would it have done?

what good would it have done

without you here to speak the words?

lines

I heard that you left her today

and I remembered that she always called you Blue.

I never did.

I remembered your mother standing in our yard

-          June,

June,

                June,

my mother would say, shaking her head

as if the world were falling apart

over apples and picket fences.

I heard you left her today

and I remembered our first day of school.

you called my name

-          over and

over

                and over.

you were in one line

and I was in another.

I never answered.

it seemed the thing to do.

winter love

your kisses were so gentle

that I mistook them

for the snow falling softly,

decorating the branches.

I mistook your touch for the wind

moving through the bare trees.

you were the winter itself

stealing upon me.

how restful it is,

to be in your arms.

how calm it is

like stone.

your heart

is a pale moon.

you aren’t afraid

of the night pressing

on our skin

of silent fields.

you brought me the love

that makes spring possible.

let me confess

let me confess

my humble love

grown of earth

no flower

more practical sustenance

a spear of corn

no red color

(except at the root)

pale yellow

like butter

kernels pressed

tight together, like

baby’s toes

slender body

wrapped in

translucent silk

paper husk

let me confess

my humble love

let me nourish you

like all good things

born green

born of earth

the flight

I made my bed beside the railroad tracks

laying down as the deer

in their wild and grassy places

and folded my hands

as if in prayer.

I made my bed beside the white clay road

banished from your call

as lost as any dog.

who can count the ways

I was unmade that night?

still the wheels of the road

rumbled close

always turning

like mother to child.

the train cried.

I felt its vibration in the earth.

it was no more than

the nighthawks passing over me,

like smoke rising.

the lights of the cars on the highway

to my drowning eyes

seemed globes – spirits

rising to heaven

wait, I cried - wait

can you blame me?

there was nothing left of me but tears

but words whispered in prayer.

the price

others may write about eyes

about glances

what would I know of this?

-my sight extinguished at his touch

his hair running though my hand like water,

his lips like currents

pulling me deeper

drowning me in his breath.

in the morning – departing

buttoning clothes

like children gathering slippery stones

from the riverbank,

shoving sandy, never clean feet into shoes,

trembling, suddenly cold.

 I thought I knew what this would cost me

- I should have known what this would cost me.

I should have known

love isn’t a price you pay only once.

radiant star

they say we are made of earth.

this must be true, because I crumble at your touch.

like dust I scatter on your breath.

they say we are made in the same vein as the stars.

they are our ancestors perched above us,

each in its own silver chair.

this too must be true.

when you hold me close

our hearts together feel composed entirely of light

radiating from your body to mine.

we are nothing more than atoms transmitted

-the sound of a chord being struck.

they say we are immortal beings

each of us possessed of a soul.

how could we not?

the universe is infinite

-that truest note escaping us-

how could we ever stop traveling across it?

the kiss

your kiss is like a torn cloth

it fits against the sky like a church spire

alone in a prairie of winter.

your touch runs like a furrowed field,

line beside line, unbroken

if there had been a moment

for breathing,

for asking,

I would have told you, love

that I’d pay any price

-my heart knows its color

my blood, my being

knows its name.

the return

kiss me, love, and then return
-while you are gone my heart will be
like a furrowed field in winter
dusted in snow
lines of black
lines of white.
kiss me, love, and then return
-until you do, everything will be
as if only in passing,
flocks of birds alighting on a shorn field
for a moment a seed,
a drink, rest
then a cloud ever changing, ever migrating
bird by bird a whole, falling apart.
a kiss my love
-then while you are gone
I’ll imagine only your sweet return.

the compass

they tell me there are directions
– north, west up,
down and left.
but how can this be?
when no matter where I turn
I am always moving toward you.
there are maps that only the heart can read.
it will tell you that sometimes even the shortest distances
are immeasurable, are too much.
no one praises a heart of stone,
but I must confess that mine is granite,
lead and quartz,
weighted, heavy.
my being is always falling in your gravity
toward the earth, your touch
your heart.