They wore out the a
in the letterpress case only after
a few thousand hits under the inked rollers,
pulling the crank, turning
the giant wheel.
Must have been 1820. Thereabouts.
Wanderer, glory-run of letters: thereabouts.
Hunger took its due from
the belly of the a.
So? All kept reading it
as a — those who could read — and anyway,
a bite out of that apple proves
our kind mortal. Rare good paper
into page until most everything about the a
was shot. Practically prayer, humility,
a great foreboding not just
bare-bones frugal.
Simple aaaa from that a —
first letter loved, to hear it ache and fill
even at half-breath.
Look, it’s standard. No one but
a divine being or two makes perfect copy.
Real case in point: my now-and-again body so
poorly echoed off my mother, my father
out of a broken skull simmering
in a bog, BC probably, long before AD
pretended anything in order. Earlier, our whole
dark hole of a planet copied
unto itself via earthquake, flood, star shard,
raging molten ball in the middle, some
big bang’s idea
of a flawed, proper start.
For a while there, the tiny a
wounded. What it does.
Doing, to herald
every human sentence.
Aubade with Grass, Some Trees
Water on the ground and whatever will stay put
but I can’t see that well. Or far.
What for, the deer out there. Not now. Not
with the rain. But two of them yesterday.
Even here, the sound of cars and their distance.
No song is complete without
some straying into the minor key but
what does such happiness mean. And who said
why first. And to whom, looking sideways
at what. Grass. Some trees. The furious shrill
of the legendary largest woodpecker
you almost never spot. I don’t listen. I’m like
before I was. A stone. Or fish.
If a fish, how do I know the life in the pond
any different than the life in me. Mindlessness
is sweet. Oh this in-spite-of in the morning.
Because they forget. In captivity, round and round
the fishbowl radiant, willing.
In June
I can’t help but
think about the dead. Everywhere
their flowers burn bright.
Roses lift the trellis, lie
about their thorns. Then the feather-like
lavender I can sweep
with my hand — that scent
wakes anyone. Oldest question,
oldest answer: so the dead
go where? A shrug,
a blank look. Or the stories
we’ve heard and heard,
nodded off hearing. There’s a place.
There are angels, good
and bad, right? And we all —
Some of us fly. Fly!
I’d climb into the drawing
Leonardo made and be the figure
bent to gears
and levers and ropes pulling up wings
of tanned hide sewn
with raw silk. And fail. And never
get anywhere for years
and years. Talk to us,
the dead say, our
deep blues set the garden adrift,
our leafy fronds do the shade right.
Still one of the living, I walk there
twice a day, early morning,
evening. Because once
you made me lie down
in that dream, telling me
it’s easy, it’s all
in the small of the back, subtle,
most delicate angle. And you lift
like this, you said.
We’re Not Insects
though
