That Old Black Magic

 

Ants, they may whisper, but they’re hoping for
Something preposterous, something more the size
Of Cincinnati, something which can catch
A mortgage in mid-air and snap its neck.
They may say shadows, even in the dark,
But what they mean are little men with knives,
Carving their names in the venetian blinds,
Altering light. Dressed up they may exude
The confidence of snipers, but they wear
An amulet of frog hair on each wrist,
Boasting that they walked miles to cure DTs.
Under the bed the suitcase is packed, the tag
Tied with a chain cased in a plastic sleeve,
Directing it to To Whom It May Concern.

The One and Only Spring

 

Spring left a note. It is not coming back.

Another spring, impostor, may be here,

May look and sound and smell like spring, sincere,

Display the right credentials, have the knack

Of daffodil and cuckoo, but it won’t

Be spring. Which left. Which took its green away

And said it loved us, but it could not stay.

They say they are forever, but they don’t

Make promises, the crocus and the leaf,

Or mean to. By Be patient, they mean Grief

Comes in a wicker basket, every day.

It Doesn't Scan

 

On the east coast of that unheated isle

A tribe of girls survives whose creed consists

Chiefly of singing Happy Fathers' Day

To someone else's father. No males found,

Which makes their culture something of a glitch.

Essentially they beat their boys and float

Young women out to sea at menstruation.

They mate with wind. We do not understand.

The central islanders claim their descent

From great Odysseus. Their Bronze Age rites

Are pure enough to justify their claim,

They know so many chanties about axe-

Hacked thews of sailors; but they haven’t heard

Of boats, making their worship of wet gods

Ironical and plausible and high

Fun for the Left Coast credit-carding clans

Who hold their wives in common, but who keep

Their cowries to themselves. The wives have heard

Reports of the East Coast; though misinformed,

They yearn to ship their kids to school back there.

Solstice Song

 

1 Angels think of little of consequences

on mornings like this, cold like steel thawing.

Singing chorales so old they sound avant-

us to mortal tympani, they rejoice

all over my clean walk. If snow could sing,

it would sing like this, crooning in low brass.

2 The Wise Men travelled in 3s. Stooges, too,

and Blind Mice. Whereas, the Angels keep watch

in companies, recruit the clergy, old

old women whose grandsons went up in flames,

and pods, squads, prides, and bright congregations.

We are well cared for in our ignorance.

3 You write from the Berkshires that all is well,

your husband having found a new wife, more

than 1/3 his age, and your sleep unmarred

by magic realism. An Angel, dressed

as a weather vane, surmounts your peaked roof

and chortles. Alleluia. All is Clear.

4 Through these white nights we trail crimson roses,

Ariadne's string. The Angels retrieve

them, smell them, watch them fade, flowers bestowed

on cheek and breast, but temporarily.

Our sin was not forever, but will do.

Steel gives way. And snow, caught by the great spruce.

Yo, Muse

 

Either because you're visiting

other, meritless versifiers

or because you’re trapped in a holding

pattern on your quills, I haven’t heard

much from you lately. The lamp’s been on,

my study casement has been unlatched;

but you’ve been off, I guess, teaching gaunt

refugees new names for old sorrows

or at Oxbridge again, haunting quads,

looking for lost honors. The floor’s swept

here, cushions plumped, and the bedskirts tucked

up. Warm milk, thick port, cheesy biscuits,

all are handy, but the oak bookshelves

are warping, and the old bindings crack

in this backwater clime. As for you,

my pretty, what else have I to do

but wait for a slot to open up

in your grey kidskin Life At A Glance?