872 Life poems

We have had our lives. The reservoir visible In the window beside our elbows, and the willow Branches trailing at our stop Are the nature we leave Behind us gladly, since it has no place For all we have recently learned: that sex Is temporary, help Ours to hand down now, and materials science Not the only kind. We thank Calm, careful Minerva, goddess Of adults, who for so many years took us To school: her voice the timbre of fretless bass, Her eyes the color of pencil lead, she taught Us how to behave in order to have our rewards In twenty years. We have them, and if we wish Too often, this fall, to have led another life We do not mean that we would give up ours: Though we stand in a row and sway Before an obstructed view, we are able to find Initials outlined in the crosshatched trees, And pebbles—calculi—around our ponds And cherish them; we like to watch the roads Along which the perennial pollen sifts down As finely as ever, making a soft powder Of brass amid the troughs in softball fields. Our skills are finally in demand. If you mock us, Pan, In whom we also believe, do it As gently as you can.

I have a perfect life. It isn't much, But it's enough for me. It keeps me alive And happy in a vague way: no disappointments On the near horizon, no pangs of doubt; Looking forward in anticipation, looking back In satisfaction at the conclusion of each day. I heed the promptings of my inner voice, And what I hear is comforting, full of reassurance For my own powers and innate superiority—the fake Security of someone in the grip of a delusion, In denial, climbing ever taller towers Like a tiny tyrant looking on his little kingdom With a secret smile, while all the while Time lies in wait. And what feels ample now Turns colorless and cold, and what seems beautiful And strong becomes an object of indifference Reaching out to no one, as later middle age Turns old, and the strength is gone. Right now the moments yield to me sweet Feelings of contentment, but the human Dies, and what I take for granted bears a name To be forgotten soon, as the things I know Turn into unfamiliar faces In a strange room, leaving merely A blank space, like a hole left in the wake Of a perfect life, which closes over.

The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live. The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on. We chase chickens or dogs away from it. Babies teethe at the corners. They scrape their knees under it. It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women. At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers. Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table. This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun. Wars have begun and ended at this table. It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory. We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here. At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks. Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.

A boy from Brooklyn used to cruise on summer nights. As soon as he’d hit sixty he’d hold his hand out the window, cupping it around the wind. He’d been assured this is exactly how a woman’s breast feels when you put your hand around it and apply a little pressure. Now he knew, and he loved it. Night after night, again and again, until the weather grew cold and he had to roll the window up. For many years afterwards he was perpetually attempting to soar. One winter’s night, holding his wife’s breast in his hand, he closed his eyes and wanted to weep. He loved her, but it was the wind he imagined now. As he grew older, he loved the word etcetera and refused to abbreviate it. He loved sweet white butter. He often pretended to be playing the organ. On one of his last mornings, he noticed the shape of his face molded in the pillow. He shook it out, but the next morning it reappeared.

Don’t take it personal , they said; but I did, I took it all quite personal— the breeze and the river and the color of the fields; the price of grapefruit and stamps, the wet hair of women in the rain— And I cursed what hurt me and I praised what gave me joy, the most simple-minded of possible responses. The government reminded me of my father, with its deafness and its laws, and the weather reminded me of my mom, with her tropical squalls.

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Now when I walk around at lunchtime I have only two charms in my pocket an old Roman coin Mike Kanemitsu gave me and a bolt-head that broke off a packing case when I was in Madrid the others never brought me too much luck though they did help keep me in New York against coercion but now I'm happy for a time and interested I walk through the luminous humidity passing the House of Seagram with its wet and its loungers and the construction to the left that closed the sidewalk if I ever get to be a construction worker I'd like to have a silver hat please and get to Moriarty's where I wait for LeRoi and hear who wants to be a mover and shaker the last five years my batting average is .016 that's that, and LeRoi comes in and tells me Miles Davis was clubbed 12 times last night outside birdland by a cop a lady asks us for a nickel for a terrible disease but we don't give her one we don't like terrible diseases, then we go eat some fish and some ale it's cool but crowded we don't like Lionel Trilling we decide, we like Don Allen we don't like Henry James so much we like Herman Melville we don't want to be in the poets' walk in San Francisco even we just want to be rich and walk on girders in our silver hats I wonder if one person out of the 8,000,000 is thinking of me as I shake hands with LeRoi and buy a strap for my wristwatch and go back to work happy at the thought possibly so

She says she had a baby but I don’t believe her Let me tell you the feeling of relief when I started to believe her baby wasn’t real “What’s she getting out of it?” I surrender without a fight Ok, you can have your baby Sometimes all you can do is reify your worst fears What if I can’t have healthy relationships Ever With anything Even your cat Undressing in the open window Like being in public Is it not knowing or not caring? I’m offended reading memoir advertised as essay I give a mini-lecture on insecure attachment from the living room As if to ask Is that what you wanted? Who you think I am Improving my senses You see I was siding with the baby

Stilled as in image, at dawn sliding into blue harbor, boats clang, where does he the man I imagine gripping several ropes return from. Is he conflicted, does he perceive the sky oscillating like a dimmer machine, a mouth, a war, language not declaring its most effective self,bellum grazing ever nearer to beauty, a possible apotheosis how what is left of sense is comfort. Not inebriated much anymore, I rented a lawn to stand in with you, crueler was always singing to our mutual forks, knives. Our translation of a subject drones on unblinking, something black for him returning, his forearms there laid themselves down, ships gone out another pale-plated night.

My husband was in the CIA. That’s the kind of woman I am. Lived all over Asia in suites decked out for the embassy staff, lounged around pools with sweet Singapore Slings, but now that I’m on my own, I can’t stand to waste a minute, not a breath. You may know my regular work at Helen’s Mademoiselle Beauty Nook downtown, but on the side I help women trim their belly fat. “Lose weight now, ask me how.” A thin American girl is a happy one, I always say. Oprah, too, but the drugs witch doctors sell can kill brain cells quicker than liquor. And your will, your liver. Listen, herbs are just what you need to cut that cellulite. I learned that in the Orient. I had spare time to spare and paid attention. Embrace herbs and exercise daily with a proper purge, just like the monks of Buddha. Tablets help, and fruit shakes, too, make you frisky as a prime-time preacher, but here’s my recent love and pleasure: invention. True, I mixed a chemical rinse that made great colors like the ao dais in Saigon, but some of the girls said it burned. Then I worked with Gene Graddick on a special quick perm you can get wet, but he cut out before we got it perfectly perfected. Beauty, though, that’s the ticket. I knew that even in Nam, while Jim-ass was off on his secret missions. The new machine I’m the mother of will move senior citizens and the, you know, “crippled” gals to the swivel chair without a hitch. I saw too many women, men, and sad children with stiff legs (or one or none) who couldn’t move after one government or another gave invitations to mortar fire or a claymore mine. With this machine I could prop them straight and wet-cut any willing guinea pig—pardon my calling the handicapped that—blow dry and comb them out with no inconvenience. My prototype is getting made in a LaGrange body shop this minute, if Bish is working late like he promised, and I aim to franchise, since Jim left me flat busted—well, you can see that’s a figure of speech—with back bills piled to the ceiling. The government has laws that business can’t fairly slight the challenged, so if I get it right, it’s got to sell. I can’t tell you how it works, you know. I learned secrecy from an expert, covert fool. It’s called “The Phyllis,” after me. What’s wrong with that? It’s no brag if you really did it. Hell—excuse my French—you know Snake Grillis of Snake and the Grass? He can pick the fiddle better than any man alive, and says so on stage. It’s no lie, so let him waller in it, I say. Look, I’m salt of the earth and have all the right attitudes and skills, not that selfish royal act my Jim put on when we went to the market. He called the people “slants” and laughed when they didn’t savvy. It’s no wonder he carried a Colt in his belt; they could tell how superior he felt, and they hated him hard. That asshole—pardon my French, but it’s so. No thanks, I stick to coffee. Hard stuff was what my ex used to wet his whistle and make him sharp for following spies, and cocaine, too, I suspect. Myself, I don’t need a jumpstart when loving’s on my mind. I got a tummy tuck, a boob job, a wardrobe straight from Penney’s Gay Parisian line. You’re a devil, but you smile like a G.I. on leave, and I can cure your entire cowlick problem. I’ve got a chair and a whole outfit at home, plus a queen waterbed and a Sony VCR on credit. I’m maxed out! Grab your jacket, buckaroo, and to hell with any sour memories. I’ve got bourbon and branch, black lace, and oodles of time. I’ve got a Walther in my purse and boudoir kung fu tricks for two. I’m here now and just for you. Call me Phyllis or The Phyllis or Boo, then just call me in time for breakfast. Ain’t this a lucky rendezvous?