Monthly Archives: February 2018

Spring Night (after Wang Wei)

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Spring Night (after Wang Wei)

Among falling devilwood blossoms, I lie
on an empty hill this calm spring night.
The moon lunges above the hill, scaring the birds,
but they’re never quiet in this spring canyon.

Another try at an old favorite…

I consider this adaptation rather than translation, but perhaps appropriation or even remaking might be more accurate.

Here’s the transliteration from chinese-poems.com:

Person idle osmanthus flower fall
Night quiet spring hill empty
Moon out startle hill birds
Constant call spring ravine in

So many choices, none of them exactly right, none of them entirely wrong. How does one imply idleness, what words to use for “flower” (blossom? petal?), or for that matter, “fall” (descend, flutter, spiral)? And how to describe a moonrise that scares the constantly calling birds? My first attempt began:

“I lie among the falling petals”

but it seemed vague. The word “osmanthus” fattened my tongue, or so it felt, but the osmanthus americanus, otherwise known as devilwood or wild olive, grows in parts of Texas. So I brought the poem closer to home.

I considered naming the birds (quail came to mind) but decided against. In this case the specificity felt somehow intrusive.

My hope is that I’ve managed to amplify, in some small way, previous iterations, and that while the edges are still a bit blurred in morning’s first light, perhaps they’ll become slightly crisper by the evening.

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“Spring Night” last appeared here in May 2016.

Missing Loved Ones

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Missing Loved Ones

You marvel that a simple garment retains so much of a person’s
being. I watch the worm swinging on its long thread

from one side of the door’s frame to the other,
wondering how to avoid it should I go out, but a sparrow

solves that problem. In 365 BC, Gan De detected what was likely
Ganymede, but history records no other sightings until Galileo

in January, 1610. Thus an entity with twice the mass of our
moon went missing for 1,900 years, which helps explain

the parameters of oblivion. But nothing equals the heft
and gravitational pull of those we miss – the dead, the gone,

the lost, the never-coming-back – a friend’s laughter
still echoing twenty years later, a lover’s taste and smell

rekindled with each autumn’s first fire, or the dog’s warmth.
Small wonder that we ever exit the house, leaving these

companions behind. I watch the sparrow snatch another
snack, and consider the mechanics of loss. Ubiquitous, but

generated anew. Unique yet common, unfelt and devastating.
Late at night, you say, I draw comfort from cloth, stroke

the once inhabited trousers or the flannel sheets resting
in the drawer. This scarf, her love. That shirt, my heart.

“Missing Loved Ones” was drafted during the August 2016 Tupelo Press 30-30 challenge, and was subsequently published in Eclectica in summer 2017. Many thanks to editor Jen Finstrom for accepting the poem, and to Emily Bailey, good friend of many years and former office mate, for sponsoring the poem and suggesting the title.

Poem Swallowing Itself

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Poem Swallowing Itself

Reading aloud—
people turn their heads
and step back, never

imagining what lies behind,
expecting neither snakes
nor bear traps nor other ambush.

Beginning where one ends, or
continuing a conversation
over decades, the truth

rises then subsides,
like soaring vultures or
cubes in scotch whiskey.

Measuring volume by
glance, the poem shivers,
opens its mouth wide.

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“Poem Swallowing Itself” first appeared here in April 2016.

Heroes

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Heroes

And the rain, again, takes up our day,
folds it into threes, and watches
as the world wraps up its gift,
first at the edges, then centered,
with more confidence and force
than justified. Who will forget
the hollow horse and its stifled
coughs, the stench of men too
long unbathed and drenched
in fear. Or the small girl running
naked, arms outstretched, skin
peeling, her life become a litany
of pain embroidered across
the unfeeling sky. Do not thank me
for your freedom, the mortgage
and its tax breaks, your designer
shoes. We didn’t bleed for you.

“Heroes” first appeared in Blue Fifth Review. Many thanks to editor Sam Rasnake for accepting this piece.

You Are the Wind That Trusted

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You Are the Wind That Trusted

The barriers I could not place, the incomplete lines and unmouthed
verbs registered in stone, saying I am here,

as if taw were born in evil, and not the fruit of the need to mark.

At what velocity must sand scour these walls to obliterate the hand’s
intent? How may we gauge design? Galileo’s thermoscope

crudely measured temperature variation, but in 1612 Santorio added a numerical scale.

For centuries, T did not produce a miniscule and stood tall in its singular representation.

Hydrated iron oxide, mixed with bone marrow and charcoal, yields
ochre, a formula that predates writing.

Development, not invention.

T’s varying structure may be one of sequence and slippage.

Thermoscopes were open ended tubes dependent upon air pressure.
Celsius originally proposed a scale with 0 at the boiling point.

A cruciform. The capped spike. Blended tongues.

Complexity intrudes with every step: smoke-darkened ceiling.

***

This appeared on the blog in February 2016. A slightly different version appeared in Otolith in fall 2013.

thermo

Never Drink Anything Blue

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blue drink

Never Drink Anything Blue

But always keep your options unzipped and
available to whatever slips in; the snake

lives in the attic for the rodents,
but occasionally takes a fledgling peewee

from a nest near its exit, while the scorpion
generally avoids light except for those nights

when moths seem too delectable to pass up.
Our governor whistles Beethoven but switches to

the hymnal when campaigning, and I’ve announced
a need for organic zucchini when craving a craft

beer. Confession is good for the soul, except
when it’s bad for the body. “Think with words,

not with ideas,” Sontag wrote, and Williams said
“no idea but in things.” Of course he was just writing

a poem. Baking is chemistry – measure carefully –
but cook with abandon! Whoever said “keep your

friends close but your enemies closer,” slept
alone most nights, or not at all. Born in Louisiana,

I am the product of an illegal union, but which
half should be interred where? Both sun and

moon rise and set. Is anything incorruptible?
Drink everything blue. Everything.

hymnal

“Never Drink Anything Blue” was drafted during the August 2015 Tupelo Press 30/30 Project, and appeared here in March 2016. Many thanks to Stop Dragging the Panda, who sponsored and provided the title.

This is Not Just to Say

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This is Not Just to Say

Okay. I ate the damned
plums. But it’s not my

fault you left them
sitting there on the top

shelf, so sweet, so cold,
enticing me, as only

you, or perhaps a ripe
peach, or strawberries,

or Asian pears or even
pomegranates, can do.

Besides, you need
something substantial

for breakfast. How about
donuts, or bacon, instead?

* * *

My apologies to WCW, but I couldn’t resist. You can find the original Williams poem here. The poem first appeared here in September 2015.

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If We Burn

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If We Burn

What flares instead to replace our
privileged nights? And which

assemblage of words could reorder these
deaths into comprehension,

change I can’t breathe from epitaph
to actuated plea for help?

Are words ever enough?
Can we stack our indifference and fear

into a mile-high pyre, and torching it
watch them rise to nothingness,

disappearing through the clouds
into the streaming light of cold, dark stars?

Raise your hands and sing. Blow softly
upon the ember. Inhale and recall.

Do you still feel? Will you breathe?
Every fire needs oxygen.

* * *

“If We Burn” first appeared on this blog in December, 2014. It’s also included in my chapbook, If Your Matter Could Reform.

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Mockingbird

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Mockingbird

Withdrawn, it unfolds
to another
voice, like that

of a child lost in the wind.
Or, lonely, it rises from its place

and sings, only
to return and start again.
The pleasure we accept derives from

the knowledge that we are not alone.
Each morning we walk out and sit
by the stones, hoping to observe some

new patterns in his life. What we
see is an answer. What we hear is no song.

* * *

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“Mockingbird” made its first appearance here in January 2015. It was written
in the 1980s, probably around 1987-1989.

Shadow

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Shadow

walking,
crushing juniper berries
at dusk

the dog shadows me
in his absence

* * *

“Shadow” first appeared here in April, 2015. It could be considered a companion piece to “Mother’s Day,” which is included in the July 2016 edition of The Lake.

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