wine and we spilled
you? When a penny we spent?
He replied, do you remember
the time I was in the desert
and you were a date tree? When
we slid the merman back over
the bow? Surely, I tell you now,
whenever you have hewn
a forest of weak trees,
whenever outfoxed a sphinx,
whenever walked on a pond
that’s frozen there you have
stood on the sea.
The people were amazed.
And sore. And afraid.
The Help
Since the angel offered
the bowl of holy
water like a tray of sweet-
meats at a cocktail gathering
she was—ahem—hosting,
I took one, by which I mean some,
like chestnuts were a-roasting
and it was Christmas, which,
in the way that all masses
are feasts of Christ, I sup-
pose it was.
Since she seemed easy
bearing its scalloped shell,
pleased even to hold
the half-ton marble well,
I didn’t feel bad for her,
standing at the entrance
these many centuries, still as stone,
like an attendant at a washroom,
which it also was.
On Dante
I thought about those green
beans and onions all day
after having rejected them
for more orange chicken
on my weekend trip to the mall.
The regret eats me indelicately.
How differently. . .
Now I’ll blow around
like street trees: pretty, but
roots not deep enough to reach
the good water.
I rerun the movie
of you driving through
the night alone, and all
night long.
The Greek Word for Want
Though I’ve been to Penshurst,
and Versailles, the house Shakespeare
was supposedly born in (or was it
his wife?) this is my favorite—
apart from the cats, I mean—
I’d get rid of those, and most of
the owners’ things, P.G. Wodehouse
collection notwithstanding. They’re vacationing
in Paris, and while I house sit,
imagining the dinners and dances
(dances!) I’d host if this little palace
were mine, they’re having a painter
do the ceiling of the nursery with Greek
constellations in blue and gold.
How are Greek constellations different
than anyone else’s you ask?
That’s easy.
They have gods in them.
Artifact
Pot shard in a frame:
the same as holding one’s breath
to remember the air, keeping
a lock of his hair. You weren’t there,
or, if you were, you’re not there
now, and this remembering doesn’t
put you back there somehow.
It’s a dream of having what
you don’t: a postcard from Rome,
talking on the phone.
I think to pocket maybe some small
piece that will call it all up for me.
Standing in the museum,
I’m trying to think how it will be
to be back. I won’t be the same,
and it won’t be anything like here,
but, having nothing to show,
I won’t be able to give you
the difference I want you to know.
With Reckless
Just in time to catch the winter
wind, the willow prematurely
leaves, stringing wild
hair behind—not like a child
running, whose speed won’t lift
even the lightest
