Poemunity — your poem community

II. The first time I had you killed I made you a hero of the Vietnam War. The third grade social studies textbook said young foreign boys hid grenades during corner games, seamstresses doubled as spies. Why wouldn't you have died on those streets, clutching my mother's photo with your thumb pressed cold against her belly, wishing you'd had a chance to propose, hoping for a girl? But that war ended before I was born. Next, I had a drunk driver end you. Said I visited him in prison to spit in his face. Forgave him for a speech during health class. In eighth grade, I made you die young of natural causes, so I could teach a grieving classmate the proper way to mourn.

Wild, wild the storm, and the sea high running, Steady the roar of the gale, with incessant undertone muttering, Shouts of demoniac laughter fitfully piercing and pealing, Waves, air, midnight, their savagest trinity lashing, Out in the shadows there milk-white combs careering, On beachy slush and sand spirts of snow fierce slanting, Where through the murk the easterly death-wind breasting, Through cutting swirl and spray watchful and firm advancing, (That in the distance! is that a wreck? is the red signal flaring?) Slush and sand of the beach tireless till daylight wending, Steadily, slowly, through hoarse roar never remitting, Along the midnight edge by those milk-white combs careering, A group of dim, weird forms, struggling, the night confronting, That savage trinity warily watching.

As soon as I speak, I speaks. It wants to be free but impassive lies in the direction of its words. Let x equal x, x also equals x. I speak to hear myself speak? I had not thought that some- thing had such undone. It was an idea of mine.

I walk down the garden paths, And all the daffodils Are blowing, and the bright blue squills. I walk down the patterned garden paths In my stiff, brocaded gown. With my powdered hair and jewelled fan, I too am a rare Pattern. As I wander down The garden paths. My dress is richly figured, And the train Makes a pink and silver stain On the gravel, and the thrift Of the borders. Just a plate of current fashion, Tripping by in high-heeled, ribboned shoes. Not a softness anywhere about me, Only whale-bone and brocade. And I sink on a seat in the shade Of a lime tree. For my passion Wars against the stiff brocade. The daffodils and squills Flutter in the breeze As they please. And I weep; For the lime tree is in blossom And one small flower has dropped upon my bosom. And the splashing of waterdrops In the marble fountain Comes down the garden paths. The dripping never stops. Underneath my stiffened gown Is the softness of a woman bathing in a marble basin, A basin in the midst of hedges grown So thick, she cannot see her lover hiding, But she guesses he is near, And the sliding of the water Seems the stroking of a dear Hand upon her. What is Summer in a fine brocaded gown! I should like to see it lying in a heap upon the ground. All the pink and silver crumpled up on the ground. I would be the pink and silver as I ran along the paths, And he would stumble after, Bewildered by my laughter. I should see the sun flashing from his sword-hilt and the buckles on his shoes. I would choose To lead him in a maze along the patterned paths, A bright and laughing maze for my heavy-booted lover, Till he caught me in the shade, And the buttons of his waistcoat bruised my body as he clasped me, Aching, melting, unafraid. With the shadows of the leaves and the sundrops, And the plopping of the waterdrops, All about us in the open afternoon I am very like to swoon With the weight of this brocade, For the sun sifts through the shade. Underneath the fallen blossom In my bosom, Is a letter I have hid. It was brought to me this morning by a rider from the Duke. “Madam, we regret to inform you that Lord Hartwell Died in action Thursday sen’night.” As I read it in the white, morning sunlight, The letters squirmed like snakes. “Any answer, Madam,” said my footman. “No,” l told him. “See that the messenger takes some refreshment. No, no answer.” And I walked into the garden, Up and down the patterned paths, In my stiff, correct brocade. The blue and yellow flowers stood up proudly in the sun, Each one. I stood upright too, Held rigid to the pattern By the stiffness of my gown. Up and down I walked, Up and down. In a month he would have been my husband. In a month, here, underneath this lime, We would have broke the pattern; He for me, and I for him, He as Colonel, I as Lady, On this shady seat. He had a whim That sunlight carried blessing. And I answered, “It shall be as you have said.” Now he is dead. In Summer and in Winter I shall walk Up and down The patterned garden paths In my stiff, brocaded gown. The squills and daffodils Will give place to pillared roses, and to asters, and to snow. I shall go Up and down, In my gown. Gorgeously arrayed, Boned and stayed. And the softness of my body will be guarded from embrace By each button, hook, and lace. For the man who should loose me is dead, Fighting with the Duke in Flanders, In a pattern called a war. Christ! What are patterns for?

We could paint semi-darkness in semi-darkness. And the ‘right lighting’ of a picture could be semi-darkness. Wittgenstein from Remarks on Color These islands lie off the west coast of Ireland as if nothing matters. The people have lived here for centuries with only a thin covering of soil over the surface. Great use is made of the seaweed, the cattle swimming out. The women here are justly famous. They weave their own tweed and make a type of belt called criss. The heavy Atlantic seas, the slip stitch. The difficulty of the patterns are never written down. Most impressive and rich, the trellis pattern and the rope, the tribute to the hardworking bee. But sometimes their knitting shows mistakes, with a true Irish touch of nothing really matters, a careless nonchalance of the crossing of their cables. And note mistakes in the simple patterns: forked lightning or cliff paths, small fields fenced with stone, the ups and downs of married life, the mosses. The openwork has a religious significance or none. Sometimes the clarity of the pattern is lost through the use of very fine wool. Green from the mosses, brown from the seaweed, grey and cream color from the stones and pebbles: many are distinctly over-bobbled. No matter. They are too lovely to be lost. Wool and knitting leaflets can be obtained. In no case is the whole pattern given. There are certain gaps and yawns and part of the pattern is left out as if it doesn’t matter, or was too lovely, so was lost. Some of the simple patterns are charming for children’s jerseys. This one, for example, would be lovely on a child.

1 One could sing October rain, and one had a gift for plain chant and prayer, a domain unsettled by love or its intimate other. What fits with this theology no one dares to say. These twins so perfectly in tune must know "the modesty of nature," the perfect art and texture that sustains the other name. Paris could not be the frame for loyal Romans, their shame worn upon their bodies light as air, and nothing is quite as endurable as death. Those who have taken this path move with an abiding breath. Such a common dance this dense intention of love's expense. Keep this for that special hour when the Roman drops his sour gift for abandoned splendour; et c'est la nuit, the footfall that troubles that other Paul. 2 I have learned the felicity of fire, how in its wake something picks at buried seed. Think this a most festive deed, nature's mistake, borrowed flare of a village dance, satire of the sun's course, light you read through waste, repair. Death had freed that first opaque habitation (what a widening gyre), an aspen ache, a lustrous scar that might lead to a hidden grove, or breed astonishment in its loss; all entire, a shaping breath proposes its own pyre. 3 Solitude guides me through this minor occasion; moon is my mentor, one on a spree. This notion, night's philanthropy, courts my favor. Devotion, love's predecessor, sings its tidy discretion. Such gentility reins all vigor, all caution.

Now, God be thanked who has matched us with his hour, And caught our youth, and wakened us from sleeping! With hand made sure, clear eye, and sharpened power, To turn, as swimmers into cleanness leaping, Glad from a world grown old and cold and weary; Leave the sick hearts that honor could not move, And half-men, and their dirty songs and dreary, And all the little emptiness of love! Oh! we, who have known shame, we have found release there, Where there’s no ill, no grief, but sleep has mending, Naught broken save this body, lost but breath; Nothing to shake the laughing heart’s long peace there, But only agony, and that has ending; And the worst friend and enemy is but Death.

Peace be upon you— ministering angels, angels of heaven— from the King who is king of all kings, the Holy One, blessed be He; in peace be your coming— angels of peace, angels of heaven— from the King who is king of all kings, the Holy One, blessed be He. Bless me with peace— angels of peace, angels of heaven— from the King who is king of all kings, the Holy One, blessed be He, in peace be your leaving— angels of peace, angels of heaven, from the King who is king of all kings, the Holy One, blessed be He.

I collect them now, it seems. Like sea-shells or old thimbles. One for Father. One for Mother. Two for my sweet brothers. Odd how little they require of me. Unlike the ones they were sent in memory of. No sudden shrilling of the phone. No harried midnight flights. Only a little water now and then. Scant food and light. See how I’ve brought them all together here in this shaded space beyond the stairs. Even when they thirst, they summon me with nothing more than a soft, indifferent furl- ing of their leaves.

from           the 4        corners       of this tower      lumped on a map the     best     magician   wins   the        day  /        thinks he’s invisible     /          white rabbits           hide       in        cupboards in          boxes        in      hats  /      a peaceful contradiction       exists  / a   plan    for    a    park    a plantation for immaculate thoughts for    flower beds     which    eat    fragrances         all  year round  / from    this  monolithic  inheritance       avenues           spoke outwards to         capture             returning prodigals  /    ancestral dropouts  /              the            multiple   births               of          children the             sun’s               last    sentence       of            the             day