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My bonsai teacher says to quit doing it like a girl. I’m pruning the root-ball of a Podocarpus, or Buddhist pine, trained semicascade. The first time Dad fell, the femur broke in eleven places due to his artificial knee (titanium and steel). A rod screwed to the bones in thirteen places didn’t work, and the graft stayed weak. For two years he fought his wheelchair into near submission. The grand finale was him riding it down two flights of stairs without tipping over or falling out. The nurses loved him. The last time I called tech help I got George in Salt Lake, at work at six in the morning their time. He was very helpful. I offered to write a note for his file, but he said,It’s OK, Chase. Your compliment is enough.

Catullus is my master and I mix a little acid and a bit of honey in his bowl love is my subject & the lack of love which lack is what makes evil a poet must strike Catullus could rub words so hard together their friction burned a heat that warms us now 2000 years away I roll the words around my mouth & count the letters in each line thus eye and ear contend in- side the poem and draw its move- ment tight Milton thought rhyme was vulgar I agree yet sometimes if it’s hidden in the line a rhyme will richen tone the thing I most despise is quote poetic unquote diction I prefer to build with plain brown bricks of common talk American talk then set 1 Roman stone among them for a key I know Ca- tullus knew a poem is like a blow an impact strik- ing where you least expect this I believe and yet with me a poem is finally just a natural thing.

All of us were boys only some were taller or already in high school, and almost nothing else mattered but to learn some new trick, to pull off something we saw in a skate video, wind cutting around our bodies when we flew off the lip of a ramp, grabbed the board and twisted into a 180, kicking a leg out and landing it, the only way to run through the neighborhood was to run through it together, flipping off cops and skinheads, I almost don't even remember girls but a vague sense of the taste of bubble gum and how they smelled so different from us, sitting in some kid's basement drinking his parents' vodka, we grew out our bangs, moved in a pack, jumped in when some one of us got jumped, so when a man we had never seen before came up and started beating on Simon, one of us dropped his skateboard, walked over to the man like someone walking into a bank and stabbed him. The man, startled, sat down, right there on the asphalt, right in the middle of his new consciousness, kind of looking around.

For knowledge, says the Old Sage, add; for wisdom, subtract. My head in a surgeon’s chair, checking Lao Tsu’s math as these teeth I barely knew I had (mumbled of as wisdom) introduced themselves—rude party guests—right as they had to go, their pinched

I will not wash my face; I will not brush my hair; I "pig" around the place — There's nobody to care. Nothing but rock and tree; Nothing but wood and stone; Oh God, it's hell to be Alone, alone, alone. Snow-peaks and deep-gashed draws Corral me in a ring. I feel as if I was The only living thing On all this blighted earth; And so I frowst and shrink, And crouching by my hearth, I hear the thoughts I think. I think of all I miss — The boys I used to know; The girls I used to kiss; The coin I used to blow: The bars I used to haunt; The racket and the row; The beers I didn't want (I wish I had 'em now). Day after day the same, Only a little worse; No one to grouch or blame — Oh, for a loving curse! Oh, in the night I fear, Haunted by nameless things, Just for a voice to cheer, Just for a hand that clings! Faintly as from a star Voices come o'er the line; Voices of ghosts afar, Not in this world of mine. Lives in whose loom I grope; Words in whose weft I hear Eager the thrill of hope, Awful the chill of fear. I'm thinking out aloud; I reckon that is bad; (The snow is like a shroud) — Maybe I'm going mad. Say! wouldn't that be tough? This awful hush that hugs And chokes one is enough To make a man go "bugs". There's not a thing to do; I cannot sleep at night; No wonder I'm so blue; Oh, for a friendly fight! The din and rush of strife; A music-hall aglow; A crowd, a city, life — Dear God, I miss it so! Here, you have moped enough! Brace up and play the game! But say, it's awful tough — Day after day the same (I've said that twice, I bet). Well, there's not much to say. I wish I had a pet, Or something I could play. Cheer up! don't get so glum And sick of everything; The worst is yet to come; God help you till the Spring. God shield you from the Fear; Teach you to laugh, not moan. Ha! ha! it sounds so queer — Alone, alone, alone.

woke up this morning feeling excellent, picked up the telephone dialed the number of my equal opportunity employer to inform him I will not be into work today Are you feeling sick? the boss asked me No Sir I replied: I am feeling too good to report to work today, if I feel sick tomorrow I will come in early

Tell all the truth but tell it slant — Success in Circuit lies Too bright for our infirm Delight The Truth's superb surprise As Lightning to the Children eased With explanation kind The Truth must dazzle gradually Or every man be blind —

For Ghassan Zaqtan 1 I now release from my blood                the bird of   thirty she wasted that’s how wars                                        crumble us I now tell those                                        who are exhausted from the expense of children the secret                              of   happiness and happiness itself from what is arrived at                          but doesn’t come from the language                                  of   balance defeat                                                        has the taste of    being shrouded                                 with another’s banner while your enemies                                chant your names Some music                                              some shelling will strike our dead                                 who flew off in the early raids have you seen them                                return from their flying? They stayed behind                                 hanging by the thread of their surprise                                       and by their women’s hair We will dance                                           in the wreckage drink the coffee our dead left brewing                             we will open our tombs to windows for the sea                            in order for the sea to remain                               besieged Right here                                                 right here a corpse shook its trunk                         in the earth a corpse snapped God’s ropes                                               houses gathered then hid what’s easy to interpret                          of   people’s speech Which mourners ebbed                         and turned the sea to tombstones for our dead which poem                      was said and revived us? And that huge rose of ours                    our only bewilderment our offense                                                on earth our balcony on the kingdom of   heaven                    the grandfather’s house a hand that gestures                               farewell in the roar of   the massacre                   a white hand like old time a free hand like death                             after death Tell my love                                              space has been plucked tell her to sleep                                        on disaffection’s stone 2 Two raids three raids                             a whole morning a year of   long                                           bombardment over your going Did you forget                                          a newspaper of   palm fronds a time of   white dawn                             some hay from last season’s siege a brief greeting                                        like a mumbling on mornings                                            of   slow advance a suitcase a rug a palm                          with which you touched the evening of shelling                                                 into a meaning for a people                                              kind and assured and silent? Whenever glass shook                           you would shriek kid                                                              I pluck your death’s anemone                           and eat it Each land                                                  has its people each time                                                  has its folks and time for a while now                                        has been standing on our throats As if   we don’t love                                  or hate as if we’ve seen the land only as a bracelet                                    a house a dress a poem left filled with those who were killed                   without war 3 Memory shrinks                                      until it fits in a fist memory shrinks                                      without forgetting a boy in a farm                                         a chicken on a roof a dot on the planet                                  mysterious and intuitive like parents or a tree for a hat                                     with prairies for a dictionary                                         and days like sleeves short in summer                                      cotton in winter they resist when squeezed                     between our knees A not so First World                               rains on a calm boy torn apart                                                  like a tattered tent The lily of words                                      enters his heart takes a wedding by the horns                                              a well-trained bulbul by the scandalous                                    fruit rush of the river His return                                                 will be washed shrouded a field’s first flower                                 guarded by dirt Coffee coffee                                            for the beautiful one whose heart’s                                           a tambourine this morning while war                                                  shouts cold on slopes 4 In the saddles                                          grass grows warmth matures                                     in oleander the river pours                                        in your absence everything                                                will happen I exchanged                                             half of my books to sit near you flung my hand                                         so that it may see you then retrieved it                                      to touch what it saw We slept like sponges                            near the river butterflies descended from the ribs of shadow                        then left behind a mirror pitched                                     like a house of   jinn 5 It’ll be difficult                                          that you go before you choose a grave                      fit for sleep It’ll be difficult                                         that you die before you choose a grave                     fit for running for flood swimming                                for dense reeds by irrigation channels for bird snares                                         for the lettuce garden in the backyard for old dry thatch                                    on mud roofs for jujube shrubs                                     for climbing on trucks and holding on to vegetable boxes                                   for the diffusion of secrets loading and unloading                           in the big market A grave fit for you                                    to see Jericho light up through the windows                              as a neon garden the refugee camps                                    by the marshes touch A grave fit for you                                    to see Jericho’s convent toss grass liquor our way                                fir for some arches where oleander wilts                               near Bedouin tents And their watchdogs                               will dig and dig and dig and dig                                        and you won’t come 6 And the mules                                           in the junkyards does anyone feed                                      their loneliness when they cry? Or has anyone quenched                        their oneness or washed their dead necks                                       or visited them to remember how they blackened                                          in their sleep? The mules the movie                               extras who fold their torsos in the packed air                                       as lineage floats on light                                            an icon of wondrous dust                                     and riddles 7 And our neighbor                                    the one whose voice fenced us with reeds                               all day and all night She would forget                                      her rings in our hands two boys                                                    who used to dance for her

Tell the bees. They require news of the house; they must know, lest they sicken from the gap between their ignorance and our grief. Speak in a whisper. Tie a black swatch to a stick and attach the stick to their hive. From the fortress of casseroles and desserts built in the kitchen these past few weeks as though hunger were the enemy, remove a slice of cake and lay it where they can slowly draw it in, making a mournful sound. And tell the fly that has knocked on the window all day. Tell the redbird that rammed the glass from outside and stands too dazed to go. Tell the grass, though it's already guessed, and the ground clenched in furrows; tell the water you spill on the ground, then all the water will know. And the last shrunken pearl of snow in its hiding place. Tell the blighted elms, and the young oaks we plant instead. The water bug, while it scribbles a hundred lines that dissolve behind it. The lichen, while it etches deeper its single rune. The boulders, letting their fissures widen, the pebbles, which have no more to lose, the hills—they will be slightly smaller, as always, when the bees fly out tomorrow to look for sweetness and find their way because nothing else has changed.

‘Be not among wine-bibbers; among riotous eaters of flesh; for the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty; and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags.’ Proverbs, 23: 20, 21 I’ll tell you two fortunes, my fine little lad, For you to accept or refuse. The one of them good, and the other one bad; Now hear them, and say which you choose! I see by my gift, within reach of your hand, A fortune right fair to behold; A house and a hundred good acres of land, With harvest fields yellow as gold. I see a great orchard, the boughs hanging down With apples of russet and red; I see droves of cattle, some white and brown, But all of them sleek and well-fed. I see doves and swallows about the barn doors, See the fanning-mill whirling so fast, See men that are threshing the wheat on the floors; And now the bright picture is past! And I see, rising dismally up in the place Of the beautiful house and the land, A man with a fire-red nose on his face, And a little brown jug in his hand! Oh! if you beheld him, my lad, you would wish That he were less wretched to see; For his boot-toes, they gape like the mouth of a fish, And his trousers are out at the knee! In walking he staggers, now this way, now that, And his eyes they stand out like a bug’s, And he wears an old coat and a battered-in hat, And I think that the fault is the jug’s! For our text says the drunkard shall come to be poor, And drowsiness clothes men with rags; And he doesn’t look much like a man, I am sure, Who has honest hard cash in his bags. Now which will you choose? to be thrifty and snug, And to be right side up with your dish; Or to go with your eyes like the eyes of a bug, And your shoes like the mouth of a fish!