Poems 1962-2012 (12 page)

To let up insults the opponent.

Each player has one pile to the left, five cards in the hand.

It's good to stay inside on days like this,

to stay where it's cool.

And this is better than other games, better than solitaire.

My grandmother thought ahead; she prepared her daughters.

They have cards; they have each other.

They don't need any more companionship.

All afternoon the game goes on but the sun doesn't move.

It just keeps beating down, turning the grass yellow.

That's how it must seem to my mother.

And then, suddenly, something is over.

My aunt's been at it longer; maybe that's why she's playing better.

Her cards evaporate: that's what you want, that's the object: in the end,

the one who has nothing wins.

CONFESSION

To say I'm without fear—

it wouldn't be true.

I'm afraid of sickness, humiliation.

Like anyone, I have my dreams.

But I've learned to hide them,

to protect myself

from fulfillment: all happiness

attracts the Fates' anger.

They are sisters, savages—

in the end, they have

no emotion but envy.

A PRECEDENT

In the same way as she'd prepare for the others,

my mother planned for the child that died.

Bureaus of soft clothes.

Little jackets neatly folded.

Each one almost fit in the palm of a hand.

In the same way, she wondered

which day would be its birthday.

And as each passed, she knew a day as common

would become a symbol of joy.

Because death hadn't touched my mother's life,

she was thinking of something else,

dreaming, the way you do when a child's coming.

LOST LOVE

My sister spent a whole life in the earth.

She was born, she died.

In between,

not one alert look, not one sentence.

She did what babies do,

she cried. But she didn't want to be fed.

Still, my mother held her, trying to change

first fate, then history.

Something did change: when my sister died,

my mother's heart became

very cold, very rigid,

like a tiny pendant of iron.

Then it seemed to me my sister's body

was a magnet. I could feel it draw

my mother's heart into the earth,

so it would grow.

LULLABY

My mother's an expert in one thing:

sending people she loves into the other world.

The little ones, the babies—these

she rocks, whispering or singing quietly. I can't say

what she did for my father;

whatever it was, I'm sure it was right.

It's the same thing, really, preparing a person

for sleep, for death. The lullabies—they all say

don't be afraid,
that's how they paraphrase

the heartbeat of the mother.

So the living slowly grow calm; it's only

the dying who can't, who refuse.

The dying are like tops, like gyroscopes—

they spin so rapidly they seem to be still.

Then they fly apart: in my mother's arms,

my sister was a cloud of atoms, of particles—that's the difference.

When a child's asleep, it's still whole.

My mother's seen death; she doesn't talk about the soul's integrity.

She's held an infant, an old man, as by comparison the dark grew

solid around them, finally changing to earth.

The soul's like all matter:

why would it stay intact, stay faithful to its one form,

when it could be free?

MOUNT ARARAT

Nothing's sadder than my sister's grave

unless it's the grave of my cousin, next to her.

To this day, I can't bring myself to watch

my aunt and my mother,

though the more I try to escape

seeing their suffering, the more it seems

the fate of our family:

each branch donates one girl child to the earth.

In my generation, we put off marrying, put off having children.

When we did have them, we each had one;

for the most part, we had sons, not daughters.

We don't discuss this ever.

But it's always a relief to bury an adult,

someone remote, like my father.

It's a sign that maybe the debt's finally been paid.

In fact, no one believes this.

Like the earth itself, every stone here

is dedicated to the Jewish god

who doesn't hesitate to take

a son from a mother.

APPEARANCES

When we were children, my parents had our portraits painted,

then hung them side by side, over the mantel,

where we couldn't fight.

I'm the dark one, the older one. My sister's blond,

the one who looks angry because she can't talk.

It never bothered me, not talking.

That hasn't changed much. My sister's still blond, not different

from the portrait. Except we're adults now, we've been analyzed:

we understand our expressions.

My mother tried to love us equally,

dressed us in the same dresses; she wanted us

perceived as sisters.

That's what she wanted from the portraits:

you need to see them hanging together, facing one another—

separated, they don't make the same statement.

You wouldn't know what the eyes were fixed on;

they'd seem to be staring into space.

This was the summer we went to Paris, the summer I was seven.

Every morning, we went to the convent.

Every afternoon, we sat still, having the portraits painted,

wearing green cotton dresses, the square neck marked with a ruffle.

Monsieur Davanzo added the flesh tones: my sister's ruddy; mine, faintly bluish.

To amuse us, Madame Davanzo hung cherries over our ears.

It was something I was good at: sitting still, not moving.

I did it to be good, to please my mother, to distract her from the child that died.

I wanted to be child enough. I'm still the same,

like a toy that can stop and go, but not change direction.

Anyone can love a dead child, love an absence.

My mother's strong; she doesn't do what's easy.

She's like her mother: she believes in family, in order.

She doesn't change her house, just freshens the paint occasionally.

Sometimes something breaks, gets thrown away, but that's all.

She likes to sit there, on the blue couch, looking up at her daughters,

at the two who lived. She can't remember how it really was,

how anytime she ministered to one child, loved that child,

she damaged the other. You could say

she's like an artist with a dream, a vision.

Without that, she'd have been torn apart.

We were like the portraits, always together: you had to shut out

one child to see the other.

That's why only the painter noticed: a face already so controlled, so withdrawn,

and too obedient, the clear eyes saying

If you want me to be a nun, I'll be a nun.

THE UNTRUSTWORTHY SPEAKER

Don't listen to me; my heart's been broken.

I don't see anything objectively.

I know myself; I've learned to hear like a psychiatrist.

When I speak passionately,

that's when I'm least to be trusted.

It's very sad, really: all my life, I've been praised

for my intelligence, my powers of language, of insight.

In the end, they're wasted—

I never see myself,

standing on the front steps, holding my sister's hand.

That's why I can't account

for the bruises on her arm, where the sleeve ends.

In my own mind, I'm invisible: that's why I'm dangerous.

People like me, who seem selfless,

we're the cripples, the liars;

we're the ones who should be factored out

in the interest of truth.

When I'm quiet, that's when the truth emerges.

A clear sky, the clouds like white fibers.

Underneath, a little gray house, the azaleas

red and bright pink.

If you want the truth, you have to close yourself

to the older daughter, block her out:

when a living thing is hurt like that,

in its deepest workings,

all function is altered.

That's why I'm not to be trusted.

Because a wound to the heart

is also a wound to the mind.

A FABLE

Two women with

the same claim

came to the feet of

the wise king. Two women,

but only one baby.

The king knew

someone was lying.

What he said was

Let the child be

cut in half; that way

no one will go

empty-handed. He

drew his sword.

Then, of the two

women, one

renounced her share:

this was

the sign, the lesson.

Suppose

you saw your mother

torn between two daughters:

what could you do

to save her but be

willing to destroy

yourself—she would know

who was the rightful child,

the one who couldn't bear

to divide the mother.

NEW WORLD

As I saw it,

all my mother's life, my father

held her down, like

lead strapped to her ankles.

She was

buoyant by nature;

she wanted to travel,

go to theater, go to museums.

What he wanted

was to lie on the couch

with the
Times

over his face,

so that death, when it came,

wouldn't seem a significant change.

In couples like this,

where the agreement

is to do things together,

it's always the active one

who concedes, who gives.

You can't go to museums

with someone who won't

open his eyes.

I thought my father's death

would free my mother.

In a sense, it has:

she takes trips, looks at

great art. But she's floating.

Like some child's balloon

that gets lost the minute

it isn't held.

Or like an astronaut

who somehow loses the ship

and has to drift in space

knowing, however long it lasts,

this is what's left of being alive: she's free

in that sense.

Without relation to earth.

BIRTHDAY

Every year, on her birthday, my mother got twelve roses

from an old admirer. Even after he died, the roses kept coming:

the way some people leave paintings and furniture,

this man left bulletins of flowers,

his way of saying that the legend of my mother's beauty

had simply gone underground.

At first, it seemed bizarre.

Then we got used to it: every December, the house suddenly

filling with flowers. They even came to set

a standard of courtesy, of generosity—

After ten years, the roses stopped.

But all that time I thought

the dead could minister to the living;

I didn't realize

this was the anomaly; that for the most part

the dead were like my father.

My mother doesn't mind, she doesn't need

displays from my father.

Her birthday comes and goes; she spends it

sitting by a grave.

She's showing him she understands,

that she accepts his silence.

He hates deception: she doesn't want him making

signs of affection when he can't feel.

BROWN CIRCLE

My mother wants to know

why, if I hate

family so much,

I went ahead and

had one. I don't

answer my mother.

What I hated

was being a child,

having no choice about

what people I loved.

I don't love my son

the way I meant to love him.

I thought I'd be

the lover of orchids who finds

red trillium growing

in the pine shade, and doesn't

touch it, doesn't need

to possess it. What I am

is the scientist,

who comes to that flower

with a magnifying glass

and doesn't leave, though

the sun burns a brown

circle of grass around

the flower. Which is

more or less the way

my mother loved me.

I must learn

to forgive my mother,

now that I'm helpless

to spare my son.

CHILDREN COMING HOME FROM SCHOOL

1.

If you live in a city, it's different: someone has to meet

the child at the bus stop. There's a reason. A child all alone

can disappear, get lost, maybe forever.

My sister's daughter wants to walk home alone; she thinks she's old enough.

My sister thinks it's too soon for such a big change;

the best her daughter gets

is the option to walk without holding hands.

That's what they do; they compromise, which anyone

can manage for a few blocks. My niece gets one hand

totally free; my sister says

if she's old enough to walk this way, she's old enough

to hold her own violin.

2.

My son accuses me

of his unhappiness, not

in words, but in the way

he stares at the ground, inching

slowly up the driveway: he knows

I'm watching. That's why

he greets the cat,