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Under a ceiling-high Christmas tree I pose in my Japanese kimono My mother hands me a Dale Evans cowgirl skirt and baby cowgirl boots Mommy and daddy split No one else is home I take some rusty scissors and cut the skirt up in little pieces (don't give me no bullshit fringe, Mama) Mommy and daddy split No one else is home I take my baby cowgirl boots and flush them down the toilet (don't hand me no bullshit fringe, Papa) I seen the Indian Fighter Too many times dug on Sitting Bull before Donald Duck In my infant dream These warriors weaved a magic spell more blessed than Tinker Bell (Kirk Douglas rubs his chin and slays Minnehaha by the campfire) Mommy and daddy split There ain't no one else home I climb a mango tree and wait for Mohawk drums (Mama—World War II is over . . . why you cryin'?) Is this San Francisco? Is this San Francisco? Is this Amerika? buy me Nestle's Crunch buy me Pepsi in a can Ladies' Home Journal and Bonanza I seen Little Joe in Tokyo I seen Little Joe in Manila I seen Laramie in Hong Kong I seen Yul Brynner in San Diego and the bloated ghost of Desi Arnaz dancing in Tijuana Rip-off synthetic ivory to send the natives back home and North Beach boredom escapes the barber shops on Kearny street where they spit out red tobacco patiently waiting in 1930s suits and in another dream I climb a mango tree and Saturday afternoon Jack Palance bazookas the krauts and the YELLOW PERIL bombs Pearl Harbor

Cloiseann sé fós é: díoscán an oighir, tormáil i bhfad uaidh, ciúnas an tsneachta. Is cuimhin leis go fóill an t-aer úr a shlogadh, an dá scamhóg aige glanta, fuacht naofa ag beannú a chnis. Thug sé grá a chroí don ghoimh gheal, don díseart tostach don tírdhreach glan. Ach b’éigean dó filleadh ar an taiseacht is ar an mbaile. Bhí air cúl a thabhairt don mbáine. Is iomaí oíche a iarrann a bhean air go caoin an chistin a fhágaint is dul léi a luí. Is aoibhinn leis uaigneas an tsileáin ón sconna. Is ceol aige srannán an reoiteora: Nótaí doimhne á seimint go mall, Gliúscáil ochlánach a labhair le gach ball dá bheo. He can still hear it: the glaciers rasping, their ratcheting in the distance, the snow-quiet. And still he remembers gulping unsullied freshness to clarify his lungs, the holy coldness blessing his skin. He gave his heart to that stinging brightness, that taciturn redoubt, that uncluttered country. But no choice except a return to dampness and home. He had to turn his back on blankness. On so many nights his wife asks him tentatively to abandon the kitchen and join her upstairs. He loves the irregular loneliness of each tap-drip and it’s music to him the refrigerator’s drone: basso profundo slow in the recital, grinding sighs that call out to his being’s every melting element. Translated from the Irish

Oh, but it is dirty! —this little filling station, oil-soaked, oil-permeated to a disturbing, over-all black translucency. Be careful with that match! Father wears a dirty, oil-soaked monkey suit that cuts him under the arms, and several quick and saucy and greasy sons assist him (it’s a family filling station), all quite thoroughly dirty. Do they live in the station? It has a cement porch behind the pumps, and on it a set of crushed and grease- impregnated wickerwork; on the wicker sofa a dirty dog, quite comfy. Some comic books provide the only note of color— of certain color. They lie upon a big dim doily draping a taboret (part of the set), beside a big hirsute begonia. Why the extraneous plant? Why the taboret? Why, oh why, the doily? (Embroidered in daisy stitch with marguerites, I think, and heavy with gray crochet.) Somebody embroidered the doily. Somebody waters the plant, or oils it, maybe. Somebody arranges the rows of cans so that they softly say: esso—so—so—so to high-strung automobiles. Somebody loves us all.

He was too excited to fall asleep. The little dog wouldn’t stop barking. He took out his gun. He took out his handkerchief. He took out his notebook. He drank his coffee and left a dime. He walked into the room. He took her in his arms. She let him in and walked out of the room. He ran down the escalator. He left the motor running. He waited in the rain. He needed something to tell the police. He went down unconscious. The blood drained from his face. His eyes melted into a smile. He dialed and waited, looking around. He took off his hat in the elevator. He rang the doorbell and waited. He poured the cereal and added milk. He opened the refrigerator and looked in. He turned the page and continued reading. He shut the door and switched the light on. He looked up at a plane in the sky. He put three pennies one on top of another. He squeezed onto the elevator. He took out his key. He helped her into her coat. He crossed the room and picked up the phone. He drove on through the heavy rain. He whistled for a cab. He turned the corner and bumped into her. She gradually surrendered to his kiss. He drove past the wrought-iron gates. He lit a cigarette and waited. He lied to the police. He threw the dice and won. He folded the newspaper and crossed his legs. He sat down in the lobby. He tied his shoes and stood up. He put on his hat but didn’t get up. He thought about her until he fell asleep. He said “Goodbye” and hung up. He threw the dice and lost. He dialed and waited for her to answer. He left some money for her. He looked for her door number. The police arrived late. He walked into her building. He let her do the explaining. He gave up hope and begged. He locked his car and walked. She gave him that look of hers. He put a finger to his lips. He wiped his mouth and left. He slapped her across the face hard. He lit a cigarette in the dark. The police wouldn’t understand. Her little dog slept. Her voice had an edge to it. Her hands were wonderful when she touched him. His mind might be playing tricks on him. The low hills reminded him of her. There was no way to cut his losses. He needed a shave and a haircut. The coffee did nothing for him. She was somewhere else when he called. Pain stabbed him as he reached toward the glove compartment. He needed a little time in the desert. He decided to head for the beach and then thought better. He needed about $5,000. He ran out of Luckies and crumpled the pack. He left his hat on in the car. Maybe he was ready to die. He checked his wallet pocket. All of his friends had disappeared. He remembered her naked body. He had almost no savings. He was at least ten pounds overweight. He realized he was in love with her.

Come, let’s go in. The ticket-taker has shyly grinned and it’s almost time, Lovely One. Let’s go in. The wind tonight’s too wild. The sky too deep, too thin. Already it’s time. The lights have dimmed. Come, Loveliest. Let’s go in and know these bodies we do not have to own, passing quietly as dreams, as snow. Already leaves are falling and music begins. Lovely One, it’s time. Let’s go in.

Sweetheart, for such a day One mustn’t grudge the score; Here, then, it’s all to pay, It’s Good-night at the door. Good-night and good dreams to you,— Do you remember the picture-book thieves Who left two children sleeping in a wood the long night through, And how the birds came down and covered them with leaves? So you and I should have slept,—But now, Oh, what a lonely head! With just the shadow of a waving bough In the moonlight over your bed.

Maple leaves turn black in the courtyard. Light drives lower and one bluejay crams our cold memories out past the sun, each time your traces come past the shadows and visit under my looking-glass fingers that lift and block out the sun. Come—I’ll trace you one final autumn, and you can trace your last homecoming into the snow or the sun.

Our loons still scull on the pewter calm of the lake, the chick having dodged the eagle one more day. The valorous drake and hen both held it between their bodies while the raptor circled. Reprieve. And here I am, old. I stooped an hour ago to dump the pail of dace I'd trapped, then watched them scatter, the ones we hadn't hooked through their dorsals for bait. Twenty or so now swim at large— still prey, but not to us, Who are headed home in the morning. I’m poised to throw away this clutch of wilting black-eyed Susans picked wild by my wife of all these years to grace our painted metal table, where we lifted ladders of spine from fat white perch, last supper. So here I am, this aging man who wants somehow to write only one love song after another. I pause at dusk, I blink, I toss Our dim bouquet into late summer’s woods.

It may seem morbid of an embezzler to keep a memorandum, yet many of them do. It may be mere neatness. -Wallace Stevens, "Surety and Fidelity Claims" I've made a little sluice-gate in the flow of cash across the spreadsheet on my screen. Amid torrential chaos and foreseen disasters it maintains its small and slow on-off diversions, so my work can show the delicacy of difference between the beans I count and one uncounted bean, and where the latter might invisibly go. The hollowed shoe-tree, the hermetic jar are gadgetry I might revert to yet. There is the money of the thing, the far secure retirement years, the deep-hedged bet, but I love working where the unknowns are, and writing down what I need to forget.

After my father died, my mother and my sisters picked the shirt, the tie; he had just the one suit. I left them to it, I didn't want to choose, I loved him all those years. They took a shirt from the closet, I don't remember which one, I'm sure he had worn it to church and hung it up again. They held a tie against the cloth of the shirt. They decided, finally. It's like that. Things come down to the pale blue or the white, or some other. Someone buttoned it over him, those buttons he had unbuttoned.