He rarely listened to what I taught
but that is the way. A true teacher learns
early that insisting the student listen
is the surest way to uninsure it.
I would be deep into Lao Tze’s treatise
on warfare, and he would be drawing crude
pictures of what he imagined women dreamt he
might do to them. Fart jokes besides Poetics,
impromptu themes justifying the ways of God
to amoeba in terms only amoeba would understand. Continue reading
Category Archives: Poems
The Necessary
When I was a little girl,
We had houses of shade
Spaced along the road
Where the sycamores
And elms waved to us,
Their branches longer
Than time, leaves wider
Than space, our hearts
Scary with sunshine
Too explosive to contain. Continue reading
Elaine
As a girl I gathered the gooseberries
effortlessly and helped my mother bake the pies.
I knew just how much sugar was needed
for the berries—and I could sense
their taste by lightly squeezing them
and measure the tautness or softness
against the sugar. I was always right.
Women paid my mother to have me
make the pies for their festival
offerings or weddings or homecoming feasts. Continue reading
Morgeuse Without Silence
Stone walls and the shouting of men
Flibberty flibberty flibberty
Into this starved air
Bells thudding hollow cracking
He is waiting
She is sure
Low rumbling dogs unsure
Paws clicking fish bones
Flibberty
Coming back
Place of never was Continue reading
Listen to May
The cruelty of April which lingers
In a late deadening frost, in the fragile
Breaking of stem, the flood that uproots,
Is finally no match for that herald
Of warm wildflower season—May.
May says to you, Wind this bright ribbon
Around the pole, hang this flower basket
From your neighbor’s doorknob, toast
Your mother’s life and remember the dead,
Celebrate cinco-style all birth and burial. Continue reading
After the Storm
Crooked driftwood in the skinny tree,
Debris like veils shrouding broken branches,
Small ground gourds from the previous summer
Tumbling to artful rest on piles of small trees,
Spring Creek after the seasonal storm. Continue reading
Moving
The spoonbill were running at low water dam,
But the shirtless and shifty left little room
To cast a line. We took the advice
Of the bait shop clerk and a one-legged war veteran
On a scooter and headed across corps land
To a sand bass creek. Crossing a low area, Continue reading
Exploding Seashells
“CIA assassination plots included poisoning a box of Castro’s favorite cigars with botulinus toxin and placing explosive seashells in his favorite diving spots.”
The box of oatmeal broke apart
In my hands, the Quaker man
Decapitated, his smile
An unreturned greeting
Forever.
One wonders how chance
And plan intersect. I found
A missing earring when I bent
To scoop up the oats.
What if he had not been drawn
To the purple drupa
And instead reached
For the virgin murex? Continue reading
Flamingo in Forsythia
Cannot be content with cardinal,
With chickadee, mockingbird, and woodpecker,
Cannot be content with what naturally seeks you
Or at least what appears naturally around you. Continue reading
Sale Barn
When we moved to town, we were in walking distance
Of the sale barn, the place of cardboard boxes
Full of stuffed animals, cattle for auction, popsicles,
Rows of tin sheds full of okra, corn and blackberries, overalls,
Blackened cooking pots and strange tools like rusted weapons. Continue reading
