jottings
I want to live, I want to travel,
I do not want to become a fountain pen.
— Jean Cocteau
like a mole struck from a tunnel, like an onion
dragged from a root cellar, tentacles of hope
lifting green limbs into light
— George Kalamaras
thoughts are only one aspect of conscious life
— Adrie Kusserow
Travel makes you no one
and if you are no one already, travel takes you home
— Terese Svoboda
no word in Greek for privacy
Only secrecy, or loneliness
— Diane Thiel
Ah! Que le monde est grande a la chatte des lampes
Aux yeux du souvenir, que le monde est petit
— Charles Baudelaire
why take what’s offered, why not walk toward
the green & flickering sea that comes to meet us
— Diane di Prima
it’s not really camping when you don’t have a house
— Neal Stephenson
sleep is the shadow of the earth as it seeps into our skin and
spreads throughout our limbs, dissolving our individual will into
the thousand and one selves that compose it — cells, tissues,
and organs taking their prime directives now from gravity and
the wind
— David Abram
Imagine that you are always wrong.
— Y. Madrone
When property = freedom
choose itineracy or vagabondage over the happy home.
— Zoe Tuck
I write with a longing that a wire has for electricity.
— Amir Rabiyah
Write a sentence that is a drone.
— E. C. Crandall
It used to be that even talking on the phone meant your voice
had to be somewhere
— Jaron Lanier
it is something strictly American to conceive a space that is filled
with moving, a space of time that is filled always filled with
moving
— Gertrude Stein
and the little breezes of her speeches smell like parsley
— Alice Oswald
elsewhere
from Eddie Glaube's Begin Again:
Elsewhere is that physical or metaphorical place that affords the space to breathe, to refuse adjustment and accommodation to the demands of society, and to live apart, if just for a time, from the deadly assumptions that threathen to smother.
not metaphoric but metamorphic
Rock Castle Gorge, West Trail
soon as I see bear sign — words
on dirty white metal — I fear
meeting a black bear, me hiking
bravely forward, no, weeping at first
for half a mile I’m quaking inside
bear on the trail, paws tearing bark
from trees, snatching up pine cones
no, I’d scarcely be its chosen meal
a bear would be scared as I am
but a bear would be larger, stronger
& if the bear were it, my death
I would meet it, completely alive
What Might Have Been
The poet roster ends with one
Zukofsky. If not great, he’s at least here
singing of horses on a day without sun.
End of the alphabet, he defines arrear.
Two Ks, a Z & a Y — at school the butt
of jokes, plus he refused to forever pair
with Lorine, forced her to flush twins (gut
punch), then let her go, put Celia there —
married, they raise a son & music make.
I have a hard time reading his words
due to Niedecker’s trace. It’s offense I take.
Glad I never met him face to face.
Mishap aside, Lorine’s superior pace.
Their offspring might have been twinbird.
Love Is
love is hit or miss, what counts
is dailiness, earthworms, their responsibilities
& segmented grubs, earth-dwelling spiders
earwigs, caterpillars climbing weeds
Rabbit
comes back . what comes back to me is the rabbit
streaking . no . rocketing from front yard to back
rabbit run . a rabbit running for its life . rabbit life
fear here . joy there . full measure . full grown
white tuft aft . four legs outstretched at every bound
not height but length of bound what matters . woods
to lawn to norther woods . another chase won
another day gained . shelter won . of day . of night
High Falls
a natural wonder — water, falling —
I reach by a wide clean gray gravel road
the park calls a trail, I call it a highway
a motorized wheelchair could climb
the greater the wonder the more public the show
much as I love falling water — boiling froth
slick rock & glassy spills, greenish flat rock
under four feet deep flow — I don’t want
to be here in this carved-out space
nature no longer wild, nature tidy as
a downtown street & just as well attended
once it would have been space for falling
from life too much ache to endure
once it would have been a spot
where my body would never be found
A Wind & a World
scratching wakes me, must be
the cat, yet strange space looms
it’s the back door open, it’s dark space
our house open to the rest of the night
I’m standing now, my heart all thumps
I step into pants, wrestle a shirt, walk
to the threshold, why’s the door open?
is someone here? has the cat escaped?
I find a light, the sleepy puzzled cat
studies me from the hall, she sees
more than I do, if a stranger came here
she’d wake before me, she’d run & hide
daily she begs to go out in the real world
I tell her no, it’s not safe, yet tonight
while I sleep, keen to be with us
a wind & a world push their way inside
Three Words
if today I choose to put an end to
all but three words, I will keep dream
because the only people I’m ever with are in
my dreams — we are busy beavers with real lives
we talk & touch each other in our dreaming world
& I will keep children, plural, so they can be together
afraid & unafraid, because they still have a chance
if the world decides to keep them, & the third word
I've yet to choose, though in thinking about it
I’m ending ever so many words, for example, hero
& good & bad & order & law & before & after & pain
oh, there it is, I found it, the third word is river
because so much must exist for there to be rivers
& rivers run
Once New, Now Old
light comes up, goes down to dark
cloud, more rain, no thought of hiking
few thoughts at all beyond hauling this
then that from the house, parade
of boxes, loose handfuls, old chairs
tunneled byways the history of mice
what we seek is nothing, is the space
trapped in cumbrance, to become
unencumbered is to make space to live
colder too, day masquerading as night
River Run
Hiking upstream along the Charles River
I picture my uncles — Leo, Tom, Charlie,
& Joe — rowing a homemade boat
thirty miles downstream to Boston.
When I was a teen, Charlie — his loose-lipped
maniacal grin — dared me to believe it.
Venturing out in a boat like Odysseus
off to Troy, their sisters watching them go.
It must have been a hard row back home.
Today the river smells sour — chemical
& organic, polluted or thriving — earth
doesn’t speak, wind & cloud won’t say.
Side by side these rural rights of way.
More than a decade these boys, their
sisters, all but these pictures are gone.
The river outruns us, mud-brown water
flowing around & through the livid greens.
After Li Bai
graying hair
east west south north
cycles of sorrow
frost spangles fallen leaves
a thousand shades of red
After Jia Dao
the hermit’s gone
to gather chanterelles
alone & lost the guest
samples amanita
After Zhang Ji
to beg lodging
wish for a friend
a pale night sky
no locks, no bars
moon by morning
After Li Bai
ripe for change
for gray skies
& cold rain
for warm clothes
long nights
hard freezes
silent snowy walks
Carving Dragons
heron, egret, crane
three toes carving
through marsh, a road
outlining, rerouting
where bills grope
for diggers & swimmers
footprints the hollows
tidal flows erase
feet lift, wings ruffle
ocean breaths exhale
Tender
John retrieves paper money
strewn in the putrid gray slime
puddling the floor of the Middlebury
Transfer Station dumping bay.
Three bills, folded, crumpled
under his boots as he drives the van.
Home he washes the bills, a five
& two ones, one of the ones
only two thirds of what it once was.
What hand, what pocket or wallet
dropped them? I hope
they weren’t lunch or the gallon of milk
someone meant to bring home.
Flattened, faded, one five one
dried flakes on porch planks.
Trust John to turn tender to art.
After Liu Xie
mantis, we pray you devour
the hordes of mosquitoes
lunge & snap & swallow
one after one, bless us with
chillier walks in coloring woods
without the slapping hands
speck-sized corpses
streaks of sullied blood
the scratching, the scabs
Off-Roading
let the bicycle be a flexile boat
feet not pedaling but paddling
the trail a flowing snaking river
studded with spiky growths
hold the line, maintain momentum
cause if you don’t, the dream
will end, the earth will meet you
not fluid, not yielding, but hard
Ein Ganzes Leben
ripples of a sunshot lake
wooden dock
twig of a red-haired girl
bare throat, arms, knees
stick for a pole
the line between her fingers
twirling a small fish
somewhere in Georgia
— after Rilke
Way Stations
each place has its graces
animals outside the doors
natural light, flowers & trees
hiking & biking close by
& each has faults — old stove
or no stove at all, lumpy bed
stiff sheets, too steep stairs
windows that don’t open
doors that don’t lock, damp
& decrepit sofas, lamps
too dim to read by, a copper
sink that doesn’t drain
so many tchotches, dismal art —
when a rental ends
I’m always ready to pack
load the car, load the map
head for the next stop
Plank Road
gravel fills the road
autos, farm trucks, graders carve
bicycles gambol
Single Track
gray chips trace a narrow berm
between two slopes, left down to
a grassy ditch, right down to roots
of taller-than-me grass gone to seed
& spiking thistle, “ride the line,” I cry
aloud, pedal steady, front wheel
straight, thistle grabs, velvety plume
caresses, I stop, pedal again, stop
to pant, to breathe, there'll come a day
Laboratory
a room of large tables, shelves of bottles
the glass brown or clear, the contents liquid
some are tombs for bodies, for body parts
what I learn is the smell of formaldehyde
the look & feel of a glass pipette, a pointed tip
submerged in a beaker of distilled water
“it’s like a straw,” my grandfather says
“draw the liquid up beyond this mark”
an etched number next to an etched line
“then stopper the pipette with the tip of
your index finger, tap to release drop
by drop until the liquid level meets the mark”
this practice, this exactitude, lifelong
Beatrice
I weep for her. John weeps.
Our minds fracture into
search parties. Hunting
on beyond six days
& seven nights, we fear
as she fears. If we are not
to find her, give us a caverned
corpse, a limb, a scatter
of bones to make a cairn of.
We know how strong preys
on strong, how the strike
the wound, the play
plays out, memory of each
mouse, spells of defiance
attempts at escape, casual
buffets & final blow. Like
her namesake, she’s taken
too young. We know
she fought. We travel far
lifelong. We are never done.
Pholcus phalangoides
Don't worry spiders,
I keep house
casually.
— Issa via Robert Hass
all I’ve done for nine months is travel
what have I learned? what’s the prize?
a newborn seems a prize until it’s crying
I’m sick of moving house, yet here I am
in a house not mine, a bare space, not unlike
any place where life must spring from a pen
to fill the hollows — here’s a gnat, in the sinks
are crane flies & daddy longlegs, Pholcus
phalangioides, aka skull spider — Wiki says
it's like but not a crane fly, aka Tipulidae
some call Opiliones daddy longlegs
though they aren’t, they’re harvestmen
the air in this room brims with Arthropoda
come clades, settle this latest home
Otter Creek at Belden Falls
divide & fall, two times & more
boats climb your bank for portage
conglomerate machinery straddles
your east flank, overlays of
concrete & steel, bolts, pipes
gear that powers towns
rippled glass pours down your brow
tumult below, boil & froth
spill across massive boulders
spiral through wide & narrower gaps
arcing above you a hiker’s bridge
chain-link toe & finger holds
to guide me up & over
a plunge if that day comes
νους / θυμος / επιθυμια
Plato’s theory of the self . . .
νους / nous — reason: the controller
θυμος / thumos — passion: anger / fear / ego
επιθυμια / epithumia — appetite / affection: bodily desire
as if passion were power & affection weakness
Every Boat
hubbub of a city park, whisper of my mind
walking along a paved path, others talking
aloud, a boat — white strings, triangle
of flimsy cloth, silvery hoops & nails joining
three pieces of wood into a proposition
set loose on a pond, motion proof of a breeze
I stop to feel, the sail filling one way
the boat going another, what suggests
a boat will return? freed, it yields
to wind & water’s will, a wallowing hull
a luffing sail, how can a boat not
capsize? my watching can’t but jinx
the ride — best to let the question pass
it’s not my boat, every boat I fancy lost
Preseason
climbing the CAT track
between ski runs
signposted in four colors
past pipes & solar
ready to make snow
the nature center’s
taxidermied beasts
blue jays high on birches
needle ice bursting
thru autumn soil
nine of us reach the top
of Stark Mountain
three dogs, six people
we’re not together
except geographically
we share a dress code
zippers galore
multi-pocketed packs
bright merino beanies
in 36° sunshine
on a Stark’s Nest bench
eating designer snacks
the signal strong
for well-thumbed phones
at least three of us
slip & fall on ice
we’re okay, nothing broke
no missing pieces
the dogs — off leash
day-glo sweatered
nose to earth — ignore
our hubris, our greed
just as we ignore
every coral reef
every atoll nation
every climate refugee
destined for squalor
thanks to our behavior
In Their Shoes Banana Skins & Aspirins
no wallets or phones, those were stolen
or let’s say, they walked to the beach
untethered, locals, noted a blue bunny
under a clump of grass, orphaned children
runaway mothers, the father compelled
by magnets, alchemy, ice — plimsolls
& strappy sandals, aspirins in a vacuum pak
aspirins for those who found them lost
their swimsuits spread on offshore rocks
bananas to fuel their strokes to reach
riptide, abandon of swirl & swept away
gasp, swallow — shoes as urns, vittles
& solace inside, bananas they fed to apes
they met on the sand, bananas the children
took on the dune buggy ride, aspirins
one stole from a kiosk, a small package
easy to palm, aspirins they would take
if rescued, prevented from taking their lives
plimsolls a pastel green, willow her favorite
tree, popple his — the sound of three p’s
let's say they carried harpoons but not
a net, off to spear blues, the glimmer
that fades the farther it travels from true
bananas stolen from farms along the way
gluey, meaty, like perfumed cheese
Snake Mountain
night & day rain, the trail
gleams dark with mud
hikers blister & corduroy
come freeze, every rut is recorded
I feel the trail, think of my boots
how not to sink them, the trail
feels boots, remembers deer
their weightless springing
cleavings at intervals
crossing bog, sleek pelts
fleeing, or without hunters, not fleeing
bed to feed to drink to bed
fawns glance back to locate
others between bare trees, angles
of oak leaves not fallen, feet
dark with earth, that cacophony
Aphasia
one child replaces another — Frances
for Layla, Elsa for Bea — every death
punches a hole in the universe, we all
stream through, unstoppable, like rain
like snow — compensation
for what has been lost, sunlight is backdrop
is scenery, is streaming down on
riprap, forgetting is the collapse
of language’s wave function [Waldrep]
speaking on a roll is speaking a wave of
eminent elegant words from a web
where they hang for safekeeping
now the webs sag, words falter
eminent might have been pertinent
though you feel the swell of eh . . .
exigent . . . though no word comes
besides, who is left to listen?
picture an auditorium waiting for words
like a domed arena, cots in neat rows
nurses washed up, wounded, alive
Cloud
muscled streaks
scud toward black hills
reckonings of water
blood-gorged barbs
burrow into slopes
earth & water
rocks woven into trees
upheave, compress
eons of water
cumuli whittle
to wattles, barnacles
molecular water
commutable sacs of self
karst, cenote
disappearing water
day beginning, day end
bird, beaver, bobcat
mingle at water
Noli Me Tangere
Incompletion makes someone
want to fill your blanks in.
— Kathleen Rooney
inhabiting Weldon Kees
years turn ulcer
to scar, scar to fold
lost in wrinkles
I climb cold cliffs
mouth open
to wind hail snow
swallow any kind
of weather
I follow the road
enter the woods
let wild beasts come
fail at speaking
a feral tongue
I cross water
barreling
rock after rock
gravity’s darling
take me, fill me
I’m here to be gone
Parade
white trunks, brown foliage
green fir, blue sky
the shimmering image propels a leaf
loose flowing white-armed Hera
leading the thunder-hurling
ankle-winged, lyre-strumming crew
the trim flotilla streams by me
watching-from-the-lee-shore
long-past-the-time-of-Greek-gods
mortal that I am — each god
I mean ship, I mean leaf
weaves through tapestry
warped in water drawn by sun
once a song of Homer
Kingsland Bay State Park
the lake spreads out like the space
left by a missing year
gleam between winter trees, steel blue
white plastic moorings
cold water, diving ducks, shoreline
curbs the view of more water
below the trail earth plunges, rock
& trees barely hanging
slippy footing on glacier-carved rock
tree roots used to bruises
ahead of us the whole way the dog
noses another trail
a past we can’t perceive
alive to her as if it’s now
she’s old, she closes her eyes
at other dogs
To My Friend Who Is Outraged at Little Marsh Man
for Disregarding HOA Regulations
little marsh man
pruning & sodding
the marsh commons
planting flower gardens
to better his view
he’s adorning
earth, he’s making
what he believes is beauty
or calls beauty
while you, my friend
rage —
I’m not willing
to say that only nature
can triumph
it's the nature of the view
of the viewer
what he wants
vs what you want
likely his position
in the community
outrivals yours
else your complaints
would hold water
instead
like the marsh
things ebb & flow
parch & flood
he’s common
the little marsh man
soon enough
he will die
as will you & I
while the marsh
water & wild grass
creatures of water & air
& mud
will remain
Hotel
opening night — live music
drugs at the table, skin on stage —
later the hotel he brings me to
New York City is not my turf
I’ve no idea where we are or why
the room is so dark, so gray, so grim
smell of someone before me & yes
urine, though I see no toilet
a metal bed low to the floor
he sits me down & stands there
I’ll come back for you in the morning
then I’m alone — street noise, bands
of yellow light, I close my eyes
why did he leave me here?
what’s he doing now?
loud voices outside my door
footsteps back & forth, by morning
who’s to say I won’t be dead?
A Plinth is Temporary
parliament, dogma
regime by regime we founder
toss our bones to fish
scavengers webbed with micro bits
our heroes who sparred for fame
stand naked & maimed
uniformed in urban air
fingerprint smear, pigeon slick
it’s time to end male pranks
agora, politic, campaign
wrecker ball swing, smelter melt
let vixen & witch remain
Path
hemlock branch loaded with snow
you block the path
under your shadow I reach for you
shake shake
uncovered you spring up, weightless
I wait for flakes to settle
my glove, shoulders a scatter of white
now the path is unburdened
I carry no burden
the path can’t be freed
I search for the path not there
fox, bobcat, crow
trees fallen, rocks bare
