Seizing

We stand in her kitchen, talking. It's an abnormally normal moment with my mother. Ordinary things are said; I am saying something and I suddenly understand that she simply isn't there anymore. All signs of presence have left her eyes and I know she's about to go down. She seizes, a new experience for both of us, and I do what I can to help her fall.

Halloween Eve

Into the dark evening we walk the dogs, rattled at first by air colder than we expected. Houses in this part of town still have real fireplaces, and we smell burning wood, for us the smell of joy. No light left in the sky, we meant it this way, to better see the halloween exploding in lights, in inflated pumpkins, vampires, bats and ghosts. Better, much better than Christmas.

Somewhere Else

Looking in her element, my mother sat smiling by the window with a glass of iced tea. We were in a motel room in Times Square, 1985. This was a stillness between the carriage ride in the park and a shopping tour of Chinatown. She had a happy calm, not the false quiet of chronic sadness. We were where she always wanted to be, somewhere else.

Re-Entry

Golden brown tree tops glow in the late afternoon sun. I stand up from my desk and see just the illuminated tips against a marbly sky. The wind has blown out the rain and left the cold. Loosening my grip, I rise from my work to a new weather system. The day went by without my notice, and now it tells me I missed the world turning a little. 

Bird Wrestling

Two birds grapple in a parking lot. We wonder first if one is bound to the other, one just trying to free itself from a dead body. But they take turns looking like the dead body, and the best that we hope for seems to be true. They are fulfilling nature's imperative to survive. It looks otherwise, like they are killing each other, can't tear away even to save themselves.

Other Than Warm

Bone cold, the chill becomes an ache and it's easy to confuse tired with afflicted. There is no heating up. I know how it will go tonight; I will bundle up for bed and still shiver until sleep, wake up hours later in an incubated sweat, stripping layers, forgetting I was ever anything other than warm. Tonight and most nights, it's that moment I can't wait for.

Eastern Shore Ride

Moody October clouds and spit, but still warm enough for short sleeves on my bicycle. This isolated finger of Virginia is like a clearing, of land, of heads, of air. Onancock, Wachapreague, Pungoteague, Machipongo; any turn in the road can change our standing with the wind. We roll through hollows and between farmland, auburn woods and pale amber scrub. 

Night Swim

Some late night on a wide carolina beach, six or eight of us took to the water. New to college, I was happy to be in this new life with new people, doing new things. The mild waves crept over our ankles. We joined hands and in a line walked into the sea, soon a string of bobbing heads, pleased with ourselves. The warm dark wrapped around us like a womb.

Old Truck

Bouncing like a farm hand to my office job, I strong arm the big tall stick shift. Too loud to hear the radio or a phone, this is two-fisted driving. Left hand keeping me on the road, right hand keeping me in gear. When I'm driving this truck, I'm driving this truck. Utilitarian, honest, throwback, Buddhist. Like a calling, it demands all of me, responsive and present.

Looking Out

Still dark, I wander upstairs looking outward. The bathroom is full of moonlight; and the back porch bulb makes its make-do roof glow yellow like a honeycomb. The spare bedroom, where a silence and calm lives like nowhere else in the house, I can see out across rooftops eastward. And here, if I wait, I will watch the sun fight its way up through the trees.

Sixteen

I had my own universe at sixteen; a room of my own and a record player. I bought obscure albums from used bins, examined them in hours alone. This is when I wrote the poems, the epic melancholics, a squeezing of pain from one container into another. Sometimes after spending all the words I had, I looked out the front window at the world outside my head. 

Mine

My father's sweater, always in plain sight, I notice and remember sometimes. This I kept. Poly-blend grey and white, it's what he wore on Saturdays, hunting or napping. It stretched as he did; I wore it after he died until one of the pits wore out. Dead twenty-two years, there's almost nothing left of him. So I keep what I have, balled up, stuffed away, mine.

Autumn Greens

Swiss chard, collards, mustard greens, kale; I wash and pull the stems. In a line I boil then saute, store, refrigerate. This industriousness fueled by another morning at the market, stoked by my fond remembering that now is the time for greens. Larger, richer, sweeter; they only get better with the cold. Full-leafed abundance, Autumn blooms.

Deep Woods Home

A remote campsite; more what we had in mind, but not where our tent is pitched. We committed to a small national forest campground down the mountain, still too close to humans. But here, a mile and a half into a hike, we rest as if this was home. Sheltered by maples and hemlocks not a soul but us and a woodpecker. North Creek bubbles past and we doze.

Joanne's Pie

Yesterday we bought three pies. It seemed extravagant; we didn't know then that Joanne was dead. Our neighbor whittled away by hard years; she and I had a tenderness for each other. I knew this time with the ambulance was different. I knew she would go without me doing as much as I wanted. It happens that way; and it happened that the third pie, blueberry, was really for those left, the ones who helped her go.

Clay Mandala

No artistry here; I paid two dollars for a twenty-five pound bag of scrap. Red clay, it leaves a wet red residue and dries opaque over my fingernails; I could be up to my elbows on a riverbank. I pound and pull something from as deep as my small intestine. When I'm done, and when it dries, I'll break it up again into dust and let the river take it back. 

Hours

Waiting until morning; it must have been like this (or the origin of this) when everybody went home. Everyone but me leaving the sterile and silent, the dim-lit halls and elevators. Me, I was bound by I.V., bound by oxygen tent, bound by what I was told about what was best for me. And because sleep was also best, even nurses kept away. Awake, I waited for visiting hours.

Booksnobbery

I am grateful; I chisel through two book chapters, not a chore, but a peaceful exercise. This book is not chasing me through its bulk, keeping me up nights like an itch, tactically planting agonizing devices of suspense. It knows I don't want to be anesthetized; at least not today. Instead I want to learn a new language; to see my own world as new.

Restless

Our house and its contents have settled; Chris sleeps hard on this first night of ten days off. Even our antsy dog Scout has found this hour when she's wandered enough, scratched enough, sneezed enough. I am alone and awake, listening to our home exhale in the deep rhythm of rest. I am the real restless one; never ever finished, never ready to put down the day.

Fierce Logic

A radio reporter spoke reverently about Beethoven's piano sonatas; I could see again my grandfather's living room. We sat, much too young for this, listening to him play his grand piano. I wish I could hear what I remember seeing. I know now this music demands study to get beyond the surface sounds, inside the fierce logic, to know it. Just like my grandfather.

Just Tired

So little sleep last night it's not worth adding up the minutes, I feel what it might have been like to be three. Storms of confusion, euphoria, even tears pass through like a parade. Deep in there is the reasonable me, knowing full well that I could say to every blip, I am just tired. Like a sage in no other way than this, I know I'll feel better in the morning.

Home Body

Wiping clean the corners of our home, I remember making it ours. I pulled up the old, soiled carpet, hours stretched out on this floor with pliers, fighting long-toothed staples one by one. My brutalized fingers rubbed every quarter inch of this now revived wood. The more I grab hold, cleaning or restoring, the more this home feels like part of my own body.

Market Season

The first chill strong enough to see it as we exhale, we are picking out tomatoes and swiss chard. It's too early for the crowds, the familiar faces that turn this market into a social event. It's all business this morning. The farmers have brought almost everything, anticipating the end of the season. Sweet potatoes, kale, eggplant; we fill our bags while we can.

House Crazies

Embarking on the day, we left the house warm and peaceful. Then some strange madness set in. Scout the dog tore on the back door, desperate to get in; Billy the cat tore on the front door, desperate to get out. We came home to splinters and fallen blinds. Hours later now, and everyone is sleeping. As if the nervous terror ghost got what it wanted and left.

Word Cakes

All day, submerged. Long strings of words pulled out of me for this or that purpose. I muster the focus. Like applying a suction cup to my face, I've said to myself before. Keep your eyes front and center, look ahead, pour. I am a filter or an easy bake oven; taking in requests and specifications, mixing the mix, applying heat, spitting out perfect little word cakes.

Head Screws

I forget about early October weather. I only remember the air clearing and cooling. But it storms for a week, and in my head a crisis of tightening that takes away my reason. Six days, six headaches. The wind blows the still-green-leaved trees, shaking them like dolls. Something's turning the screws on the world, and I can feel every inch of lost circumference.