a grain of truth

Vladislav Khodasevich; portrait by Valentina Mikhailovna Khodasevich

BLUE EYES

Vladislav Khodasevich,

past master of style

felt that truth, not style

unites the beautiful with Uglich

& art with life (so much ongoing

sordidness & light).

& if the heart is upright,

somehow… even pain might sing

as honest witness to the memory

of what was loved, back then.

My mother, once again

so firm in her infirmary

looks in my face with such solemnity

I have to shift my gaze

from stern blue eyes –

your aching isolation of senility

since I remember just how quick

you sprang for joy (sheer

giddiness of being here)! 

Now you’ve forgotten how to walk.

Maybe we’ll limp along in spirit, then –

as once Natasha with Osip,

Anna, Nadezhda… slip

the chains of boring gravity one

Leap Day!  Deep in snow & sunlight

not much different from Siberia

or Voronezh, syestra-Columbia –

imaginary friend… (wings’ wavy flight).

                                                      2.29.20

under the Memory Wing

A-FRAME

Henry’s ancient mother in the Memory Wing

shows him how dying &

amnesia are kin.

When coarse indifference is the thing,

my countryfolk, how to redeem the time?

Henry tumbles down with Hobo

to wallow like a gator now

in river muck – fish out the paradigm.

Wakan Tanka, Great Spirit, O

Thunderbird of Red Wing’s

olden days – you being

transcendental I AM – hey ey yo...

The metaphysical is just outside

your A-frame, Hobo sez –

& as such, pivot of the rez

(or any reasonable maze of hide).

You get me, Hen?  Might be

the shadow of that Jonah-

bird – ur-meta-Noah

J’waytroulife, clear to eternity.

So this rough clay my mother molded

with bare hands (these

Mexique 4-face planters)

might morph a continent – dead

rising altogether from each cold silo

into the dream-sponge –

Providential plunge

uncoiling slowly (at Cahokia Ground Zero).

7.28.19