25. AGE
Under the weary leather flesh
an umbrella frame flexes
and reminds the world that it isn't dead yet
No one hears the droning gush of wind
or heeds the warnings let forth
from that half-crusted ancient orb.
Scattered seedlings, carried off by crows
turn their oblivious roots elsewhere
unhindered by connections they can't see.
A shadow ghost of meaning
at the edges of a season yet to come
drop branches in oppressive summer heat.
The crows won't answer your pleading.
Even roots cannot escape the blaze
of blackened yearning.
24. FATHER'S DAY
For years, we joked about
your "male answer
syndrome"
perhaps to make up for
a childhood of fact
checking.
But it was remarkably
accurate,
your running commentary—
you were the smartest guy I
ever knew—
and, somehow, that is all
I seem to have of you, now.
You never wore your heart
anywhere visible—
perhaps that constant flow
of data helped to hide it—
but Mom always intuited
some depth of feeling
underneath,
and, stung sometimes
by our native unfeelingness,
she'd prompt us to talk to
you.
In those moments
I would see a hesitation,
the guard let down,
a shining eye, an earnest
grin,
and be reminded
that a human lurked behind
the wall.
23. DOLDRUMS
Saturday afternoon in the
middle of June
a hot sunny day with nothing
to do
birthday has come and gone
vacation trip has come and
gone
the oldest kid is off at
work,
the middle kid is holed up
in his room
snapped chatting and
blasting nirvana
the youngest has drifted off
with a buddy
to watch TV in his basement.
The cat is panting in the
shade
of a drooping birch tree
that rustles in the hot
breeze
and if you look at its
leaves,
you will think it was something
momentous, self-important…
but its trunk, camouflaged
in a striking white pattern
that belies mundane
functionality
does not move, cannot move,
tied to its place in the
earth
by its intransigent root
system
which does what it can to
sustain.
The birch leaves would like
to
fly off with the wind,
swirl around the pigeons,
play with the children walking
past,
but any who do that
must separate themselves
from the
life-sustaining branches,
trunk, roots,
and their swansong of
freedom
will be their funeral dirge.
22. THE BEST LAID PLANS
When our children were small--
tender unformed souls,
inchoate shadows of their
future selves--
we swore we'd never let them
vandalize those blank slates
with
the violent graffiti
of video games.
They played with toys
handmade in Norway:
wooden trains and painted
drums,
lawn games and puzzles.
And books! Of course. Lots
of books.
Books about wizards who
longed for their parents,
books about aardvarks who
fight and make up,
books about time-traveling
treehouses,
talking animals
and books with pictures to
find.
Pre-teens, they played real
sports
with teams, and equipment,
and all the trappings.
They practiced real
instruments—
trumpet, trombone, and sax,
and they read real books,
without pictures.
And still they never plugged
in to video.
But something changed at
puberty
and after the dam was
breached
by that first innocuous Wii
which was supposed to be
about
moving around, Just Dance
and Wii Golf
it morphed into Pokemon
battles
then Mario Kart, and then
Smash Bros
and soon it was mindless
thumb violence:
Call of Duty, Overwatch,
Assassin's Creed, and now
books are a foregone
conclusion.
21. SEVEN ENTROPY HAIKU
Brushing your teeth
the yellowed enamel, the worn caps,
staving off the decay
Filling up the car—
you ignore globe warming—
the freeway demands a full
tank.
Is the utility bill due?
First, checking account…
Second,
where did you file it?
Allocating the IRA
is a first world problem,
trying to predict
the economy 20 years out.
Trimming the nails
does it always have to remind you how
they
keep going after you die?
Charge your iphone battery:
your only one way to prove it isn't yet
completely superior.
Haircuts— sigh.
Why must we impose fashion
on our naked scalps.
20. THE IRREPRESSIBLE JOY OF
A RETURNED FRIEND
I don't know why it is, but
I feel like there are certain people who, just being in their presence make
life wonderful—somehow there is some pixie dust they sprinkle, there is some
magic they bring to banal, quotidien events. As though somehow the forces of
the universe change for them, the inexorable pull toward increased
entropy is temporarily stilled, and for the few minutes you get to spend with
them, the cares of the world melt away and you can truly enjoy yourself, lose
yourself in the moment and not notice the tooth rot and sciatica and not think
about the impending balloon mortgage payment. Pour a glass of champagne and
share it with them, for they are like the bubbles and the yeasty splash of
liquid joy that you can taste instead of your usual tap water.
19. SWIMMINGLY
Another day of swimming laps
and I float along the clean blue water of the Country Club pool not at all
missing the murky green crowded water of the YMCA, out here in the east
foothills, the mansions nestled around the golf course, and I think about how
after my amazing book of poetry sells for millions and I am not a pathetic
detritus of the capitalist machinery like Dustin Hoffman in death of a
salesman, but can afford my own palace here, I will help the poor Mexicans by
improving their school and I will bring cultural excellence to the neighborhood
that only celebrates rap and graffiti and grand theft auto, and while I am
skimming along the water, unable to stop or I will surely die, the weighty
thoughts call me in over my head as down I am pulled to the bottom.
18. THE GOLDEN GLOW OF THE
FAMILY ROOM
And what is a lyric poem,
anyway?
Is it just a poem with a lot
of adjectives?
Is it one where you break our
astringent modern rules,
and inject purple prose?
When you walk into your
living room at night,
And the wall sconces are
gaily lighting a scene
Of domestic tranquility,
kids on their phones,
Wife reading the Times,
Is it a poem where you talk
about the quality of light in the room?
Where you rhapsodize about
the sense of harmony among to warring brothers,
Where you eulogize the
discriminating reading of the wife?
Where you don't talk about the
politics in the headlines,
Don't editorialize about the
mindless Netflix shows?
17. COCKTAIL PARTY
Après six semaines des constructions
de bordels dans la cuisine
de dégâts partout, de dîners en carton
une invitation de notre voisine :
cocktail et apéro chez elle.
Des tas de petits plats d'amuse-gueule:
poivrons grillés doux et tendres,
un foie gras à patiner, onctueux,
sur des petits morceaux d'un pain
mousseux et herbeux aux citrouilles
et confiture riche de figues aussi
un boisson de rhum, jus d'orange et de grenadine
qui allait très bien avec olives amers et
salés,
des chips et croquant avec dip d'artichauts
des saucisses grillées succulents
et des personnages sympathiques,
qui nous distrairent de nos peines.
16. FLAG DAY II
There is a worse desecration of the flag that
even the most ardent defenders of the flag never seem to complain about. A
disrespect, not of its physical form, not of that square of cloth, but more
perniciously of the ideals of freedom, self-reliance, equality, that the flag
is supposed to represent: Men who fly our American flag over the overseas
factories where child labor and exploited workers toil, and not even for any
purported good to the American people, but for their own selfish and
un-American profits while hiding behind our flag. Or corporations who fly our symbol
over the environmental disasters they create in other countries? Isn't that a
worse degradation of the flag, to drag it in the muck behind their ugly havoc?
Or what in my mind is the most disturbing of all, the anti-Democratic
mercenaries who wrap themselves in our flag and thereby sully the once-respected
name of America as they destabilize the sovereignty of other nations,
assassinate intellectuals and democratically elected leaders, and skulk behind
thrones propped up with American firepower. I wish everyone in this country
would pay less attention to the silly college kids and their little temper
tantrums than to this form of desecration--even if their pious sham flags never
touch the ground.
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