Unsettled Estates

Father died the year

her children hunted

eggs in snow on Easter,

blues and greens bleeding

in melted slush, hidden

in splashes of bluebonnets.

The next winter was warm.

Outside geraniums

bloomed until Christmas,

bugs thrived past New Year’s.

Mandated to bring an end

to this end, she begins

the dismantling of his house,

sorting attic junk,

giving Goodwill the goods,

boxing precious books

for a two-bit fundraiser.

Then, touched by dry leather,

yellowed leaves

and brittle spines,

a daughter reads pages

of ancients, history, philosophy,

and his favorite poetry,

finding one more hair

plucked from his brow

deep in the gutter,

left like a breadcrumb

to his presence.

What if...

What if I actually believed

it was finished when he said it was done?

What if I stopped fussing

about casseroles, seating arrangements,

paychecks or job titles, and attended

the one thing needful?

What if I found a mustard seed

hidden under the piles of doubt,

moved mountains, saw oceans

as reasons for a daily stroll?

What if I stopped defending

myself against attacks,

embraced my enemies without plunging

daggers in their backs?

What if I really did the math

Of forgiveness, learned the grace

that makes one greater than seven

or seventy times seven?

What if I stopped explaining

away my gluttony and greed,

my wrath and wrongheadedness,

accepted my ignorance,

and owned the blessing he called down

when he asked his dad to let them off

because they simply didn’t know

what they were doing.

It was finished when he said it was done.

What if I actually believed him?

Triptych

(after O’Keeffe’s Red Hills and Bones)

 

I.          In the beginning

were grand projects—

light, sky, water, earth.

In groundbreaking moments

after oceans parted and

mountains peaked, then

emerged another operation.

The dust settled,

was shaped, was sculpted,

so much dirt and breath,

a ghostly gasp, then the urge

to ascend jagged peaks,

beckon stars come closer,

settle within easy reach.

II.        One man, one woman,

halfway to sublime,

could not resist 

savoring sweet nectar,

and the fall blooms,

flowers into grace

for want of a savior.

Erosion cut to the bone.

Lines weathered deep,

until piles of sediment,

layers of canyon,

buried the bones,

pressed bone to stone,

made dry souls concrete.

 

III.       Rare rain falls, washes the draws,

exposes roots and tender veins.

This spit makes mud,

creates rivers deep in the gorge.

Red clay cakes on the table below,

awaits the hand to unseal

sealed lids and eyes.

Bones in the valley

rattle like castanets,

sing like reeds

as the spirit fans

the fire within,

rumble low and humble

as flesh fleshes anew.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First published in Faraway Nearby, edited by Lon Chaffin.

Gravity

People pretend

science and faith

are at odds

but even Newton, Einstein,

Wittgenstein, Vonnegut

and the Pope

knew the first law

was for Adam, Eve,

and the apple

to fall

at the same

rate

to fall

together

unchanging

until acted

upon

by another.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
First appeared in an Interview with Sorina Higgins at Iambic Admonit (June 2010).

An Old Refrain

The biggest screens of all stood at the drive-in

anchoring the northeast edge of town

to the Dumas highway, double features

for three bucks per car, a coke and popcorn

swimming in pools of butter for a dollar more,

then heroes and villains magnified

on the forty-foot screen, their tinny voices

piped in by metal box speakers that hung

suspended from half-down windows.

And the congregation had to wonder

when the preacher’s four-year old

began to belt out the latest musical,

a singing Clint Eastwood and Lee Marvin

in some odd gold-miner ménage a trois,

this trio pushing aside the rightful trinity

while a little boy sings “who gives a damn”

to the titters of blue-haired ladies

and the chuckles of once-dour deacons.

And when he hit the chorus a second time,

“who gives a damn, who gives a damn

we’re on our way,” they knew they were right

about their suspicion that these pictures

robbed people of their souls,

and they longed for a simpler time

when people knew good clean fun

without sneaking peeks in the rear-view mirror

at the blue movies on screen two.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
First appeared in Faraway Nearby, edited by Lon Chaffin.

New Beginnings

“We die and rise the same…”

John Donne, The Canonization

The night before the fall,

they had no way to know

winter would freeze

the vines, wither the fruit.

In their joy they had no

idea their sin would prompt

birthdays and funerals,

holidays and weddings,

any excuse to turn

water to wine, toast fresh starts.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First appeared in Riffs (November 2009). Reprinted in Thirty-First Bird, volume 1.

The Second Bar

Thin light skips the waves

as he wades out to the second bar,

a guess to find the flounder or reds

as they run into the bay.  Dawn breaks

as a calm surf rolls and swells at intervals

against his stomach, the nascent

pulse of a soul in utero.

Time and flounder pass him by.

The sun climbs high, beats down, and he

reaches for an empty water bottle as it floats off.

A rope stringer leashes three trout to his belt, a swell

morning until the swell of waves laps water at his armpits

with him standing tip-toe on the second bar,

stranded in the ebb and flow of the bay.

And he swims for shore, one arm stroking

the surging sea, the other hand clinging to the reel

he bought for his birthday.  He swims, urging the trout

on the stringer to swim with him, not out to sea. He kicks

off his shoes and bobs toward shore, wondering when to ditch

the rod, the reel, the stringer of fish in his fight

to overcome the suck of the undertow.

Happy hour ends just as he bellies up

to the second bar of the night, orders a beer

and makes jokes about anesthesia while the singer

croons jazzy tunes of life and love, melancholia made

sweet and deep. He hums along as dissonance strikes chords

out of reach, churns under-currents from the deep

rift beneath the surface of numbness.

He gulps another longneck, gasps for air,

spills his story of an unknown son or daughter,

a mother’s breathless cries, fruitless labor, ruthless

waves breaking on shoals of grief, rolling on broken hopes.

Then last call, bright lights, empty stage, cold room.

Sorrow swallows him whole while he drowns

in a sea-sickness of memory and beer.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First appeared in descant, Volume 48, 2009.

Lux Fiat

“Nobody’s in the kitchen,” my baby jokes

while staring at the walls and drilling holes

through the cabinets with eyebeams brighter

than blue halogen lamps. A two-year old

can appreciate the feigned surprise,

the sheer audacity of finding nobody

in empty space. When nobody reappears

in the tired pages of Goodnight Moon

she titters and giggles, indexing the blank page

with a sideways glance back to the kitchen,

fingering the void and making it something,

naming this nothing and becoming a maker,

a goddess on the brink of being the one

she was made to be, a somebody by fiat.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First appeared in Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, Number 29, Fall/Winter 2007.

Sirens in the Desert

                        “Ask not for whom the bell tolls…”

                                                —John Donne

The ambulance calls once or twice each week.

It’s only natural that people at the pool

of the retirement community should ask

for whom the sirens sound.

It’s only inevitable that somebody

makes a joke about Hemingway or Donay,

and for someone else to correct the name

to Donne, which leads to another round

of lame jokes about being done, well done,

or whatever. Still the sirens sound

and people want to know who has fallen,

who won’t be getting up tomorrow.

And when they hear about a drowned grandson

or a lightning strike, they know sirens call us all.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First appeared in Di-Verse-City 2011: Austin International Poetry Festival Anthology. Edited by Barbara Youngblood Carr. April 7, 2011.