Up Under

You can stand up under it.
The only firm footing
Is higher.

Thunderstorm

I felt damp and sticky,
like you were holding me
in your cupped hands and breathing.

But then, when I scampered out barefoot
in the rain, I skittered like a chicken
as the thunder crashed, and covered my ears.

Girlishly. Laugh at me.
Feet in wet grass, on slick stone.
And lightening on the ocean.

May 28

I don’t know how to let go.

I’ve never let go in my life.

And I don’t even know how to write.

How to describe the clean sky morning,

the damp smudge of ink on paper, 

the heart’s incline. Desire and

the thudding of feet on pavement, on cobblestone. 

The cobbler. A pretentious glance, a sheepish foolish dance, 

three biscuits. A toss and a catch and a weariness. A strange 

disjunction of tears through a computer screen. Being seen. 

Being welcomed across a room. Being spoonfed. Being led. 

Being piled with seven small tasks and a last enjoinder 

to be genuine.

Unicorns and music at pranzo. Mauro and Enia 

with two pieces each. Anna Lardani’s extra kiss, extra squeeze. 

A grace penny at Sidis. Proud 

of otherwise perfect change.

Sweetness of closeness and ache 

of estrangement. Balding. Better 

than he would expect 

under the circumstances. 

A long, long hug.

A red wax chipmunk holding magic beans

in the cubby. We all liked the trumpeters. 

And the firecrackers on the little boys’ bellies.

Art and faith. Humility.

“Free yourself from the chains around your neck, O captive daughter of Zion.”

Marmalade and White

I will dance

Here on the shore until

The moon climbs over that branch,

No matter who finds me, no matter who comes,

And I'll bare my feet and run.

You were there

Over the streets of Rome

Just four months ago.

One, two, three, four, five.

And the dark, and the change, and the light.

We should cry:

What a machine can do

By a human hand

To the kitten, and the deer, and the man.

There they lie

And we sing, “glory, come,”

As we pass them by.

Marmalade and white.

Clover spreads

Like a hundred stars

Scattered over the grass.

Watch our legs

As we kick and dive,

Run, and sway, and laugh.

And summer has come at last.

The Oddest Hours

We’re out in the grass with the damp in our hair,

I look like a crazy, but you never care.

And the houselights wink in the dark,

And you tuck my arm in your arm.

You still wake me up at the oddest hours, 

and I don’t mind

The mockingbird sings and the chimes chime,

We climb on the swings and we swing in time

(Oh, time).

Where are the days of the meteor nights,

When we wrapped up in blankets and turned out the lights?

And my father would smile at the sky,

And my mother would wonder and sigh.

We’d huddle together in green plastic chairs,

And the meteor lights would career through the air.

It was then that I started to love

Broken nights with the lights up above.

And you still wake me up at the oddest hours, 

and I don’t mind.

And Orion stands, and the Pleiades dance in the sky...

Who can bind

The sisters

The brothers

The fathers

The mothers

The lovers?

My Lover…

You still wake me up at the oddest hours, 

and I don’t mind.

Last Afternoon in the Park with Heather

You can’t fake showing up.

She knelt over me with the black umbrella, her face sculpted against the sky. The rainclouds rushed together, massy and edged with gold. Only a moment before, the sky was so bright my left eye watered when I tried to look at her. 

I closed my eyes and lay back, listened to her voice, and slid tall heads of grass between my fingers. The overgrown swayed around us.

The wind kept her up last night, but she wasn’t angry. Anger seemed childish then. And life seemed carved out of marble, or else full of the stuff marble means. Bernini must have seen this. This much. Rain.

And we tried to name, and we couldn’t name, the richness. We played games with our tongues, trying to understand. And we finally grew quiet.

Here our only need is

Incarnation.

April 27th, Train To Roma Termini

I feel closer to you, somehow, 

in this light. 

In this lack of sleep, this dreaming, 

sweating, dying. Dying. Feeling love flame out, 

flame within quietly, 

in a wordless prayer. 

Love burns, and light burns, 

and the world is hard, and the world is beautiful. 

We are strangers.

I do not know you. But I want to. I want birds 

to fly between us. I want the softness of the stars 

to bind us. For words to mold into movement, and quietness. 

And mornings, and sunlight.

And light burns, 

and love burns.

Roma Termini. Sweat, urine, 

alcohol. Mouths hanging 

open. Green fields, feathery tops. 

Slanting light. Reflected light. Empty. Clear. Clarity.

Images swimming, 

emerging, fading. 

Interconnecting.

Eyes.

Being destined. 

Destiny. And where 

we’re headed. Somewhere. Anywhere 

we go. Everywhere, You are.

The dropping out from underneath, the guttural 

moan. The wail. No longer pretending. 

This is real, and this 

is real. And this is a practice 

of reality. Holding in, 

letting out, not trying. Doing without. 

Doing without trying.

My delight. My beloved. My weak, my lovely one. 

Will you look at me? 

Remember 

your first love. 

Purity is not denying love – it is loving 

one thing only.

Jesus.

Another beauty. A look 

that might have meaning, that might 

have permanence. 

That might span continents. 

I trust you to remember, 

but you may not believe. So believe. 

Believe.










Credit to Madeleine L'Engle, A Ring of Endless Light