Watermark

When Lives Were Saved

 

When you were parched
      with the needs of others
           and I washed up thirsting
                on your rocky beach, you

let me in.  When I raged
      against all fathers, all lovers,
           all men who cast away their
                women, you stayed, still and

deep as a mirror.  When
      you went down as far as
           you could dive, beyond
                love, beyond breathing,

submerged in death and bloated
      with all the drowning violence
           of your own raging father, then
                surfaced shouting at my door,

I let you in.  When I came
      to you weeping, choking on
           demands and accusations,
                hearing only my own gasping
      
fear, you let me in.  When
      you came to me, sodden,
           from another bar or another
                woman, mouth full of seaweed

and booze, I let you in. 
      If there are women who
           ask how you can hold
                to someone so breathless,

so far from shore -- if there
      are men who wonder how
           I can swim in such cold, deep
                water -- well, I say -- let them.

 

 

#poem

 

When you were parched
      with the needs of others
           and I washed up thirsting
                on your rocky beach, you

let me in.  When I raged
      against all fathers, all lovers,
           all men who cast away their
                women, you stayed, still and

deep as a mirror.  When
      you went down as far as
           you could dive, beyond
                love, beyond breathing,

submerged in death and bloated
      with all the drowning violence
           of your own raging father, then
                surfaced shouting at my door,

I let you in.  When I came
      to you weeping, choking on
           demands and accusations,
                hearing only my own gasping
      
fear, you let me in.  When
      you came to me, sodden,
           from another bar or another
                woman, mouth full of seaweed

and booze, I let you in. 
      If there are women who
           ask how you can hold
                to someone so breathless,

so far from shore -- if there
      are men who wonder how
           I can swim in such cold, deep
                water -- well, I say -- let them.

 

 

#poem

Bell

 

   

 

   

once I imagined the bell
all the rest came easily
the young man in the burgundy coat
lilies tolling their scent in the garden
pale moon over narrow streets, it all
dreamt itself into tall dark trees
shivering with sparrows and wind

the wind in the shutters
the nervous courtyard
something sacred at the altar
the pale child in her ghost dress
the book with its gossamer gilded pages
its thin black-pebbled cover
this docile child, butterfly wings

the old man bent into his cane
shuffling, shuffling, the pale moon
it all came quite easily, then
the moon walked into the mountains
the stars fell the old man fell
the lilies dropped their thick petals
the young man became a branch

scratching, scratching the window
the shutters opened their louvers the fan
making its ocean sound it all became
lightness and bright stripes on the wall
morning morning and I step into the garden
thick slow beat of pelican wings
into a cloud of pale moths

  

#poem #collage #digitalcollage

THE BRAID

    

    

    

     Why do you resist me?
the man asks. The woman braids
   her hair.

     He touches her shoulder,
the small of her back. It's good
   for you

     to trust me, he says.
The woman frowns at her
   reflection.

     Slowly she unweaves
the braid, lifts her hair,
   begins again.

 

 

#poem #digitalcollage 

BREAKING NEWS

   

Once again my representative tops
the list of the most corrupt. Who will we
be, without the Bill of Rights? What will stop
this erosion of our character, the sea

eating at our coastlines; greed and lust
overpowering the powerful? Needless
wars and careless heat, the coming dust
of devastated forests -- heedless,

we entertain ourselves, evening after
evening, stories of murder, rage and
retribution -- diversions from disaster,
actual and impending -- this sacred land

and others, no less beautiful, alive --
who will we be, should we survive?

     

I have no recollection of writing this poem. A sonnet, yet! And I have no idea how long ago I did it; years, though.    

 

#poem   #sonnet

 

All Fall Down

    

A woman dreams of a house of cedar
and glass. The clocks in this house
all strike a different hour. She hangs
her feathered mask on the wall.

A man stands on a crumbling bridge,
looking down at the river and its city
of stones. He moves toward, then away
from a decision.

The woman no longer eats sugar or salt.
She has carefully folded her pleasures
and stored them away in her dome-topped
trunk. The man knows there are unlucky

places, corners where cars collide and business
follows business into failure. The rainforest,
breathing green, creeps toward the clearing
and the red-roofed house.

 

#poem