This old man goes rolling home

SPRING-STEP

Sunlight glints in flash-of-gold

on blue-gray lashes, curling

sea around each green-

black pupil glancing from cold

Pontus-depths, like lacquered pearl.

Each soul hath such a wild

wee isle – immurèd child

of even-star, whose raven whorl

beams out of everwhirr – bright

innocent prinkster, fleet-

footing the complete

spring-step, so shamrock-intricate;

Tara, Soissons, Iona know

how low she twirls, she droops

before her leaping swoops

a coign... Elijah – let her go!

Light-nimble Columba... thundery-

coot’red Geraldine... – fits

Geraldine, the crown fits

Geraldine!  In a wheel of clay

through the eye of time – in a ray

of light, through a feather-

full of waterfalls... there,

there!  Look there!  A catenary

clover-span!  Four-folded spire,

planted on copper penny-

whistle... one milky-

black Eire-eye rose Paycock-fire!

3.17.16

so much depends, so many deep ends

Intrepid detective work of William Logan & others unearthed in fine detail the local story behind one of WC Williams' most dependable poems, "The Red Wheelbarrow".  Reading this article, I couldn't help but think of all the local minutiae lurking in my own poems, since I may be departing this dear locality for my native Minnesota soon.  It will be 45 years since I first showed up in Providence, with bicycle, eyes closed, to go to school (Sept. 1970)...

so much depends
upon

a Rhody Red
Hen

soused with sea
water

beside the Black
Ships

So I'm starting up chapter 4 of the Ravenna Diagram qua-qua train.  Along with many another internal reverb, there are things in this excerpt which only make sense if you happened to read the Providence Journal newspaper this week... such as the fact that the 2015 North American Irish Dance Championships were held in Providence this year... or that Glee Gum is just one of Deborah Schimberg's exercises in earthy & empathetic enterprise (we were both in the local agriculture & community greenhouse biz back in 1980 or so - she kept at it).

Sail on, Ocean State -

OCEAN STATE

Bridget flings her emerald

signal flags SE,

NW – kicks her heels

& gyroscopes along a thread

of starfish glisten (penciled

Cornish involution).

You follow her confusion

of species, her grave mongreloid

ellipse, toward the vault of your own

vertigo (in exitu

del mio Gypsy-o) –

the weight of this diamond casket (sun-

burnt charcoal).  Mark the black rings

beneath her eyes, ringlets

of raven-hair, her fits

& stirs.  How the pain sings

on the way to Mendelssohn, or

Littletree – way back

to the cricket-shack.

Venite, powerful western star...

or is it North, now (dizziness

part of the package)?  I’m

packing my leaving rhyme,

my Rhody limes.  I guess this is

a goodbye tootle.  Ocean state.

Vast in our eye, your

jewelry gum (Glee-ore) –

the giving was the thing, chic mate.

    7.6.15