DESTROYER

We’re waiting for the address
to begin, most of us have
an idea of what to expect—a call to the ark.
That’s why we’re here.

Behind me are voices I know,
calling to perdition. And the person
holding tightly my hand
stands at the nexus of light and dark.
What will be her fate?

(November 26, 2007)

FROM THE GROUND UP

After dinner and dishes, you read,
to salvage something out of the day.
These are places and customs that will always
be there, no matter how much you try
to wish them away. They breathe as you breathe.

Today I stood alone among things
I don’t know anymore; “the future,” I said,
“the future.”

(November 24, 2007)

UNCERTAIN WEATHER

It’s Thanksgiving Day today, my first here
in five years. We still have the same food—
a juicy turkey, homemade stuffing, candied yams,
warm apple pie straight out of the oven—but it’s not the picture
you see on TV commercials. We have our own
local color here, but that comes along
with dying traditions and a changing future. I don’t see
the same faces anymore, or as often. We’ll all be splintering off
into our own directions, crossing whatever borders
we need to cross—some telling the wind to follow them,
some letting the wind take them where it will.
And as a country, who knows how long these traditions will last
when our future really reveals itself.
One day, those TV commercials won’t be characteristic
of any home—even if we’re serving up plates with turkey
and potatoes and stuffing and yams,
followed by pie and coffee.

(November 22, 2007)

MIDDLE GROUND

The walls are decorated with people,
but we only see the flaws. There must be
something wrong, even if we can’t see it right away.
That’s the talk that probably went on.

And a pattern develops, a loss
of middle ground in the space between
free expression and perfecting a craft—
our mutual lives are lost.

And what’s inside us may go to sleep for years,
decades even. If I only turn to create
a person of my own, I can already sense what will
be wrong with it, and I say, “Save it for another day.”

(November 21, 2007)

WHAT THE SUN’S LESSON IS

I pierced the cloud today.
What the sun’s lesson is,
I don’t know. The world is calling!

(November 14, 2007)

BROKEN THINGS

There is no more time to be wasted
on broken things. Most of what is sent
my way still takes me by surprise,
but I’m getting better
at seeing what’s broken
and what isn’t, knowing
when there is no one to pray
for your safe journey home.

Sometimes I lower my head
on my prayer book, just to remember
what it was once like
to lay it before God.

(November 10, 2007)

DOWN THE ROAD

There is little air in the words
circling around me all the time—
some that drift through my head, some that
well up from my chest, some that dribble
out of my fingers. I guess that happens
when you don’t realize what has
built up around you, or what has appeared
while you were out.

The hills outside my window
are still there, with maybe only
a hiking trail or two
to indicate they’ve been touched by human life,
but they may as well be states away, or in some part
of the past that won’t return again
for decades.

(November 8, 2007)

A THOUSAND-MILE WALK

Old sunny days
are good to remember, as a
compass to guide you
through the deep and winding forest,
but not to get lost in them.
Every morning
becomes a new way of learning—
a thousand-mile walk to shed old, tired skin.

Light in the sky is coming.

Sometimes you have to let go
of other people’s salvation.

(November 5, 2007)