Poems 1962-2012 (15 page)

the great difficulties have never as yet

been faced and solved—

They cannot see themselves,

in fresh dirt, starting up

without perspective,

the hills behind them pale green, clouded with flowers—

She wants to stop;

he wants to get to the end,

to stay with the thing—

Look at her, touching his cheek

to make a truce, her fingers

cool with spring rain;

in thin grass, bursts of purple crocus—

even here, even at the beginning of love,

her hand leaving his face makes

an image of departure

and they think

they are free to overlook

this sadness.

THE HAWTHORN TREE

Side by side, not

hand in hand: I watch you

walking in the summer garden—things

that can't move

learn to see; I do not need

to chase you through

the garden; human beings leave

signs of feeling

everywhere, flowers

scattered on the dirt path, all

white and gold, some

lifted a little by

the evening wind; I do not need

to follow where you are now,

deep in the poisonous field, to know

the cause of your flight, human

passion or rage: for what else

would you let drop

all you have gathered?

LOVE IN MOONLIGHT

Sometimes a man or woman forces his despair

on another person, which is called

baring the heart, alternatively, baring the soul—

meaning for this moment they acquired souls—

outside, a summer evening, a whole world

thrown away on the moon: groups of silver forms

which might be buildings or trees, the narrow garden

where the cat hides, rolling on its back in the dust,

the rose, the coreopsis, and, in the dark, the gold

           dome of the capitol

converted to an alloy of moonlight, shape

without detail, the myth, the archetype, the soul

filled with fire that is moonlight really, taken

from another source, and briefly

shining as the moon shines: stone or not,

the moon is still that much of a living thing.

APRIL

No one's despair is like my despair—

You have no place in this garden

thinking such things, producing

the tiresome outward signs; the man

pointedly weeding an entire forest,

the woman limping, refusing to change clothes

or wash her hair.

Do you suppose I care

if you speak to one another?

But I mean you to know

I expected better of two creatures

who were given minds: if not

that you would actually care for each other

at least that you would understand

grief is distributed

between you, among all your kind, for me

to know you, as deep blue

marks the wild scilla, white

the wood violet.

VIOLETS

Because in our world

something is always hidden,

small and white,

small and what you call

pure, we do not grieve

as you grieve, dear

suffering master; you

are no more lost

than we are, under

the hawthorn tree, the hawthorn holding

balanced trays of pearls: what

has brought you among us

who would teach you, though

you kneel and weep,

clasping your great hands,

in all your greatness knowing

nothing of the soul's nature,

which is never to die: poor sad god,

either you never have one

or you never lose one.

WITCHGRASS

Something

comes into the world unwelcome

calling disorder, disorder—

If you hate me so much

don't bother to give me

a name: do you need

one more slur

in your language, another

way to blame

one tribe for everything—

as we both know,

if you worship

one god, you only need

one enemy—

I'm not the enemy.

Only a ruse to ignore

what you see happening

right here in this bed,

a little paradigm

of failure. One of your precious flowers

dies here almost every day

and you can't rest until

you attack the cause, meaning

whatever is left, whatever

happens to be sturdier

than your personal passion—

It was not meant

to last forever in the real world.

But why admit that, when you can go on

doing what you always do,

mourning and laying blame,

always the two together.

I don't need your praise

to survive. I was here first,

before you were here, before

you ever planted a garden.

And I'll be here when only the sun and moon

are left, and the sea, and the wide field.

I will constitute the field.

THE JACOB'S LADDER

Trapped in the earth,

wouldn't you too want to go

to heaven? I live

in a lady's garden. Forgive me, lady;

longing has taken my grace. I am

not what you wanted. But

as men and women seem

to desire each other, I too desire

knowledge of paradise—and now

your grief, a naked stem

reaching the porch window.

And at the end, what? A small blue flower

like a star. Never

to leave the world! Is this

not what your tears mean?

MATINS

You want to know how I spend my time?

I walk the front lawn, pretending

to be weeding. You ought to know

I'm never weeding, on my knees, pulling

clumps of clover from the flower beds: in fact

I'm looking for courage, for some evidence

my life will change, though

it takes forever, checking

each clump for the symbolic

leaf, and soon the summer is ending, already

the leaves turning, always the sick trees

going first, the dying turning

brilliant yellow, while a few dark birds perform

their curfew of music. You want to see my hands?

As empty now as at the first note.

Or was the point always

to continue without a sign?

MATINS

What is my heart to you

that you must break it over and over

like a plantsman testing

his new species? Practice

on something else: how can I live

in colonies, as you prefer, if you impose

a quarantine of affliction, dividing me

from healthy members of

my own tribe: you do not do this

in the garden, segregate

the sick rose; you let it wave its sociable

infested leaves in

the faces of the other roses, and the tiny aphids

leap from plant to plant, proving yet again

I am the lowest of your creatures, following

the thriving aphid and the trailing rose— Father,

as agent of my solitude, alleviate

at least my guilt; lift

the stigma of isolation, unless

it is your plan to make me

sound forever again, as I was

sound and whole in my mistaken childhood,

or if not then, under the light weight

of my mother's heart, or if not then,

in dream, first

being that would never die.

SONG

Like a protected heart,

the blood-red

flower of the wild rose begins

to open on the lowest branch,

supported by the netted

mass of a large shrub:

it blooms against the dark

which is the heart's constant

backdrop, while flowers

higher up have wilted or rotted;

to survive

adversity merely

deepens its color. But John

objects, he thinks

if this were not a poem but

an actual garden, then

the red rose would be

required to resemble

nothing else, neither

another flower nor

the shadowy heart, at

earth level pulsing

half maroon, half crimson.

FIELD FLOWERS

What are you saying? That you want

eternal life? Are your thoughts really

as compelling as all that? Certainly

you don't look at us, don't listen to us,

on your skin

stain of sun, dust

of yellow buttercups: I'm talking

to you, you staring through

bars of high grass shaking

your little rattle— O

the soul! the soul! Is it enough

only to look inward? Contempt

for humanity is one thing, but why

disdain the expansive

field, your gaze rising over the clear heads

of the wild buttercups into what? Your poor

idea of heaven: absence

of change. Better than earth? How

would you know, who are neither

here nor there, standing in our midst?

THE RED POPPY

The great thing

is not having

a mind. Feelings:

oh, I have those; they

govern me. I have

a lord in heaven

called the sun, and open

for him, showing him

the fire of my own heart, fire

like his presence.

What could such glory be

if not a heart? Oh my brothers and sisters,

were you like me once, long ago,

before you were human? Did you

permit yourselves

to open once, who would never

open again? Because in truth

I am speaking now

the way you do. I speak

because I am shattered.

CLOVER

What is dispersed

among us, which you call

the sign of blessedness

although it is, like us,

a weed, a thing

to be rooted out—

by what logic

do you hoard

a single tendril

of something you want

dead?

If there is any presence among us

so powerful, should it not

multiply, in service

of the adored garden?

You should be asking

these questions yourself,

not leaving them

to your victims. You should know

that when you swagger among us

I hear two voices speaking,

one your spirit, one

the acts of your hands.

MATINS

Not the sun merely but the earth

itself shines, white fire

leaping from the showy mountains

and the flat road

shimmering in early morning: is this

for us only, to induce

response, or are you

stirred also, helpless

to control yourself

in earth's presence—I am ashamed

at what I thought you were,

distant from us, regarding us

as an experiment: it is

a bitter thing to be

the disposable animal,

a bitter thing. Dear friend,

dear trembling partner, what

surprises you most in what you feel,

earth's radiance or your own delight?

For me, always

the delight is the surprise.

HEAVEN AND EARTH

Where one finishes, the other begins.

On top, a band of blue; underneath,

a band of green and gold, green and deep rose.

John stands at the horizon: he wants

both at once, he wants

everything at once.

The extremes are easy. Only

the middle is a puzzle. Midsummer—

everything is possible.

Meaning: never again will life end.

How can I leave my husband

standing in the garden

dreaming this sort of thing, holding

his rake, triumphantly

preparing to announce this discovery

as the fire of the summer sun

truly does stall

being entirely contained by

the burning maples

at the garden's border.

THE DOORWAY

I wanted to stay as I was,

still as the world is never still,

not in midsummer but the moment before

the first flower forms, the moment

nothing is as yet past—

not midsummer, the intoxicant,

but late spring, the grass not yet

high at the edge of the garden, the early tulips

beginning to open—

like a child hovering in a doorway, watching the others,

the ones who go first,

a tense cluster of limbs, alert to

the failures of others, the public falterings

with a child's fierce confidence of imminent power

preparing to defeat

these weaknesses, to succumb

to nothing, the time directly

prior to flowering, the epoch of mastery

before the appearance of the gift,

before possession.

MIDSUMMER

How can I help you when you all want

different things—sunlight and shadow,

moist darkness, dry heat—

Listen to yourselves, vying with one another—

And you wonder

why I despair of you,

you think something could fuse you into a whole—

the still air of high summer

tangled with a thousand voices

each calling out

some need, some absolute

and in that name continually

strangling each other

in the open field—

For what? For space and air?

The privilege of being

single in the eyes of heaven?

You were not intended

to be unique. You were

my embodiment, all diversity

not what you think you see

searching the bright sky over the field,

your incidental souls