Wet Grass, Weeds
A lone raven
circling the neighbor’s oak,
an oddity in this neighborhood,
lending mystery to the afternoon,
a gateway through dandelion
fluff and the blue seeping through clouds.
A car rumbles by,
stereo hammering the air,
warnings everywhere for the wary.
Autumn Winds (after Li Po)
Clear autumn winds swirl
below the moon’s glow,
scattering the gathered leaves.
The startled crows return.
When will we see each other again?
This hour, this lonely night, my feelings grow brittle.
The transliteration on Chinese-poems.com reads:
Autumn wind clear
Autumn moon bright
Fall leaves gather and scatter
Jackdaw perch again startle
Each think each see know what day
This hour this night hard be feeling
“Autumn Winds” first appeared in September, 2014. I started the adaptation in the heart of summer, hoping that it would offer a respite from the unrelenting Texas heat…
Cedar Grove (after Wang Wei)
I sit alone among the cedars,
play my guitar and hum.
In this dark forest
no eye spies me but the moon’s.
My take on Wang Wei’s “Bamboo Grove,” from this transliteration copied somewhere along the way:
alone sit dark bamboo among
strum lute again long whistle
deep forest man not know
bright moon come mutual shine
“Cedar Grove” made its first appearance in March 2014. I adapted it to fit my circumstances…
You might find the Wikipedia entry on Wang Wei of interest.
Lament for Five White Cat (after Mei Yao-ch’en)
Five White cat always made sure
no rats gnawed my books,
but this morning Five White died.
On the river I offered up rice and fish,
and buried you in its lazy currents,
chanting my lament. I could never neglect you.
One time you caught a rat
and carried it squealing around the yard
to frighten all the other rats
and keep my cottage clear of them.
We’ve shared space aboard this boat,
and although the food is meager
it’s free of rat piss and droppings
because you were so diligent,
more so than any chicken or pig.
Some people speak highly of horses,
saying nothing compares to them or donkeys.
But we’re done with that discussion!
My tears prove it so.
The transliteration from Chinese-poems.com:
Self have 5 white cat
Rat not invade my books
Today morning 5 white die
Sacrifice with rice and fish
See off it at middle river
Incantation you not you neglect
Before you bite one rat
Hold in mouth cry around yard remove
Want cause crowd rat frightened
Thought will clear my cottage
From board boat come
Boat in together room live
Dry grain although its thin
Evade eat drip steal from
This real you have industriousness
Have industriousness surpass chicken pig
Ordinary person stress spur horse drive
Say not like horse donkey
Already finish not again discuss
For you somewhat cry
A Song Dynasty poet, Mei Yao-ch’en (or Mei Yaochen) died in 1060. His great poems live on.
This adaptation first appeared in November 2014, and is for one of my favorite poets, Jeff Schwaner, whose Mei Yao-ch’en sequence has entertained, inspired and enlightened me. You can find the sequence here: http://jeffschwaner.com/mei-yao-chen-sequence/
Left to right: Christine Beck, Katy Chrisler, Robert Okaji, D.G. Geis, Pamela Paek, Ronnie K. Stephens, d. ellis phelps
I was so pleased to read with this group of incredible poets, and to meet in person Kirsten Miles, the Tupelo Press National Director for the 30-30 Project. She is an insightful, multi-talented and absolutely delightful person. I wish we’d had more time to chat. My portion starts about four minutes in, but please take the time to hear Kirsten’s introduction. There are six other videos (poets have their own videos), and I urge you to watch them all.
Tupelo Press 30/30 Reading, Austin
Thank you to the staff at Malvern Books, and to Jeff, Cate and Plain Jane for sponsoring these poems last August.
For more information on the Tupelo Press 30-30 Project, go to the 30/30 site, or feel free to contact me for a participant’s viewpoint.
In Praise of Rain
Which is not to say lightning or hail.
Sometimes I forget to open the umbrella
until my glasses remind me: Wake up, you’re
wet! If scarcity breeds
value, what is a thunderhead worth
in July? A light shower in August?
Even spreadsheets can’t tell us.
***
“In Praise of Rain” made its first appearance in September 2014.
Chill (Cento)
I shiver a little, with the evening,
and you print a shadow like a thin twig.
Wait for my death, then hear me again.
He believes a pomegranate is a thesaurus,
the thundercloud, tomorrow’s puddle. Is
this hunger unlike that of others?
When a drowning man calls out,
his voice follows him downstream.
Why am I grown so cold?
A cento is composed of lines borrowed from other poets. “Chill” owes its existence to: James Wright, H.D., Ingeborg Bachmann, Eduardo C. Corral, Blaga Dimitrova, Forrest Gander, Yusuf Komunyakaa, and Adelaide Crapsey.
Laocoön
This figure of complexity
persuades a lingering
glance, the two-fold
inclination entwined,
horror expressed
in tandem, the sons’
limbs compressed
as the father struggles,
realizing true
sacrifice, the inward
grasp of storm and
wrath and serpent,
his face
echoing those yet
to come, breached
walls, a city in
flames, the cries
of warnings unheeded.
Laocoön, through Virgil’s Aeneid, is the source of the phrase “Beware of Greeks bearing gifts.” The poem, which first appeared in The Blue Hour Magazine, was inspired by the sculpture “Laocoön and His Sons,” which resides at the Vatican. You might find Wikipedia’s entry of interest.
Earth’s Damp Mound
for P.M.
I. February 1998.
That week it rained white petals
and loss completed its
turn, the words finding themselves
alone, without measure,
without force, and no body to compare.
Though strangers spoke I could not.
Is this destiny, an unopened
mouth filled with
pebbles, a pear tree
deflowered by the wind? The earth’s
damp mound settles among your bones.
II. Count the Almonds
What bitterness
preserves your sleep,
reflects the eye’s
task along the inward thread?
Not the unspoken, but the unsayable.
Curious path, curious seed.
A shadow separates
to join another, and in the darker
frame carries the uncertain
further, past silence, past touch,
leaving its hunger alert and unfed,
allowing us our own protections.
III. The Bowl of Flowering Shadows
Reconciled, and of particular
grace, they lean, placing emphasis on balance,
on layer and focus, on depth of angle
absorbing the elegant darkness,
a lip, an upturned glance, the mirror.
What light caresses, it may destroy.
Even the frailest may alter intent.
So which, of all those you might recall,
if your matter could reform
and place you back into yourself,
would you choose? Forgive me
my selfishness, but I must know.
IV. Requiem
Then, you said, the art of nothingness
requires nothing more
than your greatest effort.
And how, seeing yours, could we,
the remaining, reclaim our
space without encroaching on what
you’ve left? One eye closes, then
the other. One mouth moves and another
speaks. One hears, one listens, the eternal
continuation. Rest, my friend. After.
Prentiss Moore influenced my reading and writing more than he ever realized. We spent many hours talking, eating, arguing, drinking, laughing. Always laughing – he had one of those all-encompassing laughs that invited the world to join in. And it frequently did. Through Prentiss I met in person one of my literary heroes, Gustaf Sobin, whose work Prentiss had of course introduced me to. Those few hours spent with the two of them driving around in my pickup truck, discussing poetry, the Texas landscape, horticulture and the vagaries of the publishing world, are hours I’ll always hold close.
Earth’s Damp Mound first appeared in the anthology Terra Firma, and is included in my chapbook, If Your Matter Could Reform.
Balance
Navigating
by stars,
one ball
buried,
another
gathering,
the dung
beetle
straight-lines,
maintains
position,
forever
looking forward
and up.
O at the Edges 