they were playing Benjamin Britten

LEAF-MURMUR

In the peace & quiet of her little room

with cactus & late poinsettia

on the sill, she’s growing quieter

herself, just one step from the tomb.

They were playing Benjamin Britten

on the radio, his Moonlight

from Sea Interludes.  Slow

breathing, like tides come in;

the pulse of one high cresting wave;

flute-shrieks of gulls.

Her strong deep swells…

receding now.  She curls concave

into her wheelchair, brave head bowed

(the pride of life, brought low).

Her potter’s wheel, slow

spinning, rounds her own clay into cloud

as in the Garden of Gesthemane

all-powerful God

knelt to his own rough mud

fleshing star-fire to flinty harmony.

The wheel of life, how she runs down

at last!  This shadow of herself

feigns sleep, feigns prayer.  Only

the fleeting elfin smile remains her own.

Stalin, Akhmatova… terror & grace,

beauty & ugliness meet

in the grave.  A life’s complete

that hears leaf-murmur through a face.

3.5.20

oak-leaf plate by Mary R. Gould

inside the coracle

UNBENDING PINE

You hear the rustle of a spring

in the moss forest;

in the immaculate nest

inside the coracle.  Outside, nothing.

Milton tutored Williams in Italian;

Roger taught John a mite

of basic Narragansett

collecting firewood around London

to banish winter at the poorhouse.

Here in January ice

beside the river, ICE

is on my mind.  The Emperor’s

in league with Herod, every infant

trembles for her life;

Virgo is mummified by strife;

grieving, she murmurs her dissent

from frozen exile on external heights.

Meanwhile sweet Providence

searches for evidence

& Lincoln coins... irrevocable rights.

Your imago, moss copper-serpentine

(between Son of Man

& some unbending pine

of immeasurable heaven) is Washington

redeemed, again; your Virgo (hovering

ethereal triangle

o’er Spotsylvania) might mingle

with Virginia clay... Jonah, recovering.

1.18.19

the principle of the epic poem

STAR-FIELDS

A monarch sails transparent air

over a sea of grass

toward Mexico cedars.

June hums softly into summer

orchestra – a Symphony

of Ocean River (flutes

by Apollinaire).  Broom-roots

of harmony brush copper tympani

with nervous splendor.  The principle

of the epic poem – Hart

Crane’s plangent part

for solo Jonah (sailor’s pipe)

merges with cat-gut chords

of choral hymn, Atlantean –

sagas of Everywoman,

Everyman (adze-edge word-hoards).

A stone spun from heaven... King

Tut’s meteoric dagger,

sanded to plow much bigger

meadows.  Star-fields of the tongue

flicker from familiar cave –

shape speech to love,

vault from worm-grave

to groves of cedar (almond nave

upon a flame-stream, evergreen

to save).  Pine-needles

tingle with seedling-

cones; wings fan (bright V-formation).

6.7.16

Lake Vermilion (sunset, 6.5.16)