POEM FOR THE FIRE SEASON
early in the morning
when it was dark
the electric wires
cut weird black shapes
across the sky
the little silver fox
came to our lawn
his ears kept swiveling
he looked away into the trees
little fox
with silver ears
I watched you
so long I forgot
the spider god
was angry
I had crushed
its child
under a box of expensive water
last October a wire fell
and everything burned
so this year from the bare hills
down the foxes came
with silver ears
I know those crows
will eat
my stupid hopeful sunflowers
their big green leaves
in rare pure sorrow
plunge up
toward their mother
in the night
whatever they dream
is part of some solution
people of the enclave
do more than listen
to the tired ones
straggling up the hill
to the police station
chanting the names
listen to the cave
off in the distance
say to the hammers:
when I am sleeping
I am working
on understanding
what we must do
GENTLE DEATH POEM
is what I had written in my sleep
with that hand that belongs to no one
I wish I could remember that world
it probably had some birds in it
alien punctuation marks
clarifying the sky
here in this one
we stare and stare
a blank grey that is basically
a color that isn’t even one
bouncing off the leaves in the yard
making everything lunar
my waking hand doesn’t believe
my dream hand
it says death can be gentle
I’m out of time to argue
it’s easier just to stay inside
the idea that I get to choose
which one of us will go first
and which one will stay
here to take care of the little leaf
that fell into our house and now hides
from the darkness of the actual
from the wind’s eternal certainty
POEM FOR WITOLD GOMBROWICZ
I’m reading your diary
is a weird thing to say
even to someone dead
who lived in Argentina
furious at Europe
for all its stupid museums
full of poor people crying
for the amusement of strangers
I can vacuum all day
and the book will be waiting
open all the wrong doors
and your voice will be there
saying poets are enemies
of anything real
they think flowers love them
and every pastry
deserves an elegy
I took a train to Poland
and breathed in
so much black smoke
near to the odd rust colored
monument to your birth
made of local stone
the train hurtled through
vast forests whose names
sound like monsters
I took so many notes
about vital matters
of the heart and mind
it’s a kind of discipline
not to remember
who I was in the past
I hoard all my energy
for future atoning
on your birthday
to honor you
I will pull down my trousers
with total disrespect
and pee on a very old tree
