the otherness of the poem

RIVER-VEIN

The turning year brings its anniversaries.

Sunken ships in the harbor.

My fleeting image of an arbor

green on the slope at Golden Gate – Julie’s

last day (her father Jim’s birthday).

Today the sun glistens

as if through Temple linens;

pearl beyond price, merciful Gateway...

The otherness of the poem is merely

the cosine of a conversation,

Cuz.  Light trinity of sun-

moon-star, embedded in clay lips (dearly).

As America is balanced in the scales

by a feather from Byzantium,

so a Pipestone eagle-drum

summons a kingdom borne on wing-sails.

Covenantal arc of steel

at navel of the earth;

gangway to spoke-berth

coralized beyond our iron wheel.

& from a pearl-eye in the mandorla

light beams to every hamlet-

brig across the planet –

melting the blood-red wax of Danelaw

& Washington, pouring dark wine

into each muddy river-vein,

lofting all-human

fellowship again (curving J-spiral sign).

12.7.19

not kingly oak

SPRY LIMBS

Not kingly oak, nor prescient almond...

just some pale cottonwood.

Moon milky-green, for good

measure.  Shedding vagabond

fluffballs – like poetry, or

cotton boles – bales

for Memphis, N’Orleans...

spry limbs bent into hangin’ tree.

I go into jags & eddies, dried

pemmican.  Downstream

from vinegar dream-

sponge (where the Bre’r-man died).

If the Word were truly a fluffball of light

I would be acorn coracle

green mote on miracle

worker spinal curvature (bent wight).

It gleams through red Pipestone

peacepipe – an emerald

happiness, turned gold

as sunshine.  Welcome, Everyone!

Translucent presence of a place

for you, before all places

cling to timespaces...

a nest for omnipresent Falcon-Ace.

Benevolent breeze, that moves these leaves

to waver into swing-time

antimatter – chime

morning with Hope (sings in the sheaves).

6.6.18

light grows lighter

CATLIN WATERCOLOR

Late August light grows lighter.  Wispy

between extended shadows.

The cricket chorus has

a song for this, by Mississippi

banks – that bronze sustaining bass

in parallax of plaintive

high-pitched creel.  I’ve 

got to plead the crickets’ case,

quizzical Hobo mumbles to himself.

What good’s that Easter

Resurrection, if there

be no faery morn, silkworm to elf?

That is, no general coming back

to life... old Yeats’s sense

of unquenchable experience?

Manitou pipes at Fond du Lac...

as in a Catlin watercolor

along shores of Great River

life-lines   etched forever

in raven-ink barge Seine-trawler

or in a summer garden   with Apollinaire

our flimsy smoke lifting above

rooftops   & fading   eve of

war   Christ the Pilot in the air

over our heads   the gentle hero

retiring into poplar-voice

grey Hobo   warbling rejoice

inscrutable Holy Wisdom   flutters near

8.25.17

he talked in sign lingo

COPPER BEECH

Late crickets from low crevices

scree high morse code

along the River Road,

mourning what vanishes.

The trestle bridge shoulders its iron

rust refrain.  Hobo,

Henry rehearse their slow

converse – where’s Bunny Rabbi gone?

He talked in sign lingo, for fun;

smoke signals over Pipestone

bearded the Old Gray One

whose windy glance was made of sun.

The bards were babbling nonsense

around the Ink Palace...

forgive their lack of grace

whose pride is their inheritance.

Meekness is the key to peace,

a mule named Franky said;

our mutual Day of the Dead

fringes each cot with golden fleece;

both enterprise & government

rest on bone shoulders

of the poor – our diverse

attitudes were never meant

to drive us to unpeel the Union.

Pensive eyes discern

gray beech limb’s copper urn

of reconcilement (smiling veteran).

11.8.16

steady seasonal work

LITTLE STORIES

                                       Jim Northrup, 1943-2016

The dead cottonwood leans its broken fork

like a Y-brace against

the live cottonwood.  Who’s

helping whom?  The river’s work

is steady, seasonal... flows

nearby.  Past Fort Snelling

like a hurt knee – swelling

strong west branch waters,

Dakota memory.  The boarding school

in Pipestone, pushing English

like a Ghost Dance wish

across calumet plains.  Clouds pool

like smoke under their limitless

blue dome.  The little stories

join hands – morning glories

vining indigo blooms... a sky-caress

out of heavy red clay.  She will go

with you to the Happy Land

her canoe made of almond

joy heartbeats, in waves.  I know

where I’m going... just a change of address.

The flower of a smile

blooms out of dust – the trial

just a test of loving (wilderness).

You’ll find the carnation in a sailor’s

chest, the rose in a worn

lapel.  So being born

will ride the swell, through locks, through doors.

8.8.16

*for more information about Jim Northrup, see today's NY Times obituary

where friars met the chiefs

BRIGHT EIDOLON

Like a round dime tossed in a round

lake, hermetic lady

(Mendelssohn, or Galilee)...

the circle of clans closes on a mound

of blue-white clay.  With a star

beneath pulsing waves,

to summon all the braves.

Rêve-dream, song-songe (de la mer).

Smoke rises from Pipestone, where

friars met the chiefs –

an old Amerique (Lief’s...

Hennepin’s, Marquette... le voyageur);

Rose de St. Louis, Annie

de Texas... Jessie O.

from N’Orleans – down below

rim-sleep (full fado, Ariel).

The fumes are gray & sinuous

veins within rose

windowpane (chartreuse?) –

where a rustic yokel stems the breeze

like mast in steady gale.  He’s

smiling (thick mute mule,

dumb lamb).  You’ll

toss him in a hole – he slappim knee.

The frost hurls stern memorials

across blank mirror-ice

(in Mendelssohn).  Yet twice

& twice, bright eidelon... (loon calls).

6.13.16