Ship's Clock Bells

On the mantel a ship’s clock

bells each watch —a single chime

marks half past midnight

six chimes three. By six
the backyard young men

partying all night are gone —

no, they’re still at it though

the baby’s no longer screaming —

is it sick? or worse, alone?
The bullfrog, knowing I watch

from the window above its head

doesn’t answer calls from another
bullfrog deep in the reeds.
Nuthatch is waiting

for feeders I carried inside

the night before — rain be damned

I sandal up to hang them

— hummingbird wheels.
The washer spins, the dining
room table shakes, my tea trembles
at such fearful asymmetry.

Claw prints on deck boards

chattering & screaming —

how can raccoons afford
to mate in the night?
And what’s a kitten’s secret?

No, I can’t say secret

or heart or frozen ice or melt —
simply care for, welcome inside.

— 20 July 2013

Losing Argentina

when I disappeared

malbec swamped my throat

like Andean snow melt surging the acequia

how I chose passionfruit ice cream

wishing it were opuntia

how I pretended I never wanted a screen porch

& a cat door she’d lever bats through

moth wings in shower drains

cactus spines trepanning my hat brim

triple-thorn scar bursts

tattooing escape routes onto my arms

hue & cry of zorros every night

when i disappeared

an out-of-mind fissure wolfed

my household down to the nutcracker

i fled with Chinese zapatos & a shooting blind

the burrowing owls agreed with me

parrot flocks burned blue

I felt like a wasp hive in

the air conditioner after a swarm

I ate no more grass-fed bife

my wallet was plumbed for identification

I couldn’t bicycle

when I disappeared

the desert morphed into pan casero
went crumbling off to where llamas stampeded

acequia, irrigation ditch

opuntia, prickly pear cactus

zorros, foxes

zapatos, shoes

bife, beef

pan casero, homemade bread

— 31 July 2013

Suet

The gray squirrel

hangs from her back paws

from the two-sided feeder

furls her torso inward to raise

front paws & mouth, snares

a chunk, floats full length —

meal in paws — to eat it.

Now from front paws

she lolls, her tail a body length

below. I suppose she’ll eat

one whole slab if no one stops her —

not the blue jay watching

from the cast-iron swoop holding

the hummingbird feeder

not two doves pacing the deck

for loot she drops

not even two blue jays, a red
squirrel, more doves.

— 30 June 2013

Stanley & Adrienne

The street I live and write in

was not a left-wing poet.

I also think of Bernstein,

wild and metaphysic heart —

the risk-taking of one who

makes my poems and lives my life

heavy as the white-lipped boy

from my whole erotic self.

My mother never forgave

your life for the privilege.

My themes and the use I have

dream of a common language.

Images glimpses questions,

art with economic power

are mindful of your garden —

the poet-scholar-martyr.

Bowels of the hippodrome,

great crashing alexandrines,

comets trailing tender spume —

edge of meaning yet can mean.

My mother’s breast was thorny —

think the art of translation,

if anything, makes poetry

your turn. Grass of confusion

is something more powerful —

the cry of writhing nerve-ends,

impaired intellectual.

You are, in a word, avid.

[this poem of 7-syllable line, abab rhyming quatrains is a cento; each line is an unaltered excerpt from two books: Stanley Kunitz's Collected Poems & Adrienne Rich's Arts of the Possible: Essays & Conversations]

— 6 July 2013

Mrs. X

The woman pulls her wealth behind her
in a wheeled cart. If she’s my mother
it’s because between our last visit
& the day my family told me she died —
alone in her sleep — she escaped,
queened herself onto a plane
to San Francisco, a bus to Santa Cruz,
her white blouse tucked into frayed slacks,
permanent curls though she’s transient —
she’s taller now, seems thinner
but bustier, if foundered swells signify —
cratered-moon face, moth-wing hands,
bandaged flats.
                       When I look into her eyes
she looks away, she doesn’t keep a pet
or croon for bills in a hat, she hasn’t asked
but if I gave her my wallet, what would it buy?

— 9 September 2013

Poetry

poetry cooks my goose

chops me up, spits me out
stomps on my fingers
kicks me in the head

poetry saves me from the news
from women who lunch
from duplicate bridge, hairdos
celebrities, fashion

poetry authorizes me to ignore
polite conversation
to poke at roadkill, to talk
to children instead of adults

poetry explains my moods
my madcop technicolor dreams
my lack of tact, my failure
to tell the truth or make sense

poetry acknowledges
my hatred for patriarchy
my disdain for your opinion
your politics, your religion

poetry makes me a poor
risk for the guest list
of your dinner party

but a good pal for your cat

— 30 April 2013

It Hit Me on Vacation in Chile

Tipoffs —
llama lips rearing, teeth leering —

trailered the email crafted in Spanglish legalese

ginned by the Argentine caudillo punk

ready & able to kill me.

Reader, I bailed —

house, garden, gear, cat, husband Mike if need be —

flew like a budding leukocyte

to Esther’s aid, her latest breast cancer bleeped

but her future vague.

Grandmother now

I housekeep a toddler, sleep in a doublewide.

Andean weather frescoes a turned page.