The Daisies Mown

 

from These Denver Odes

The daisies mown will blow again.
The moon pines not, nor is dismayed,
rejuvenating without pain;
once man into his grave is laid,

he is no more a man. His dust
may someday form some form instead.
It won't be he. The new moon must
return; but man, when dead, is dead.

So you, figured like Helen, bright
of eye, Celinda, will not see
how good you look, made up for night,
to be illumed like Semele.

Little Elijah Dance

 This appeared in Chimaera.

Little Elijah cannot find his pants.
Do you suppose this will forestall the dance
Great joy requires? Not the slightest chance.

He drags his feet through mud. He shakes his head.
He beats his little fists until they’ve bled
Upon the yard he slowly colors red.

The sparrows flee. The boxer pup retreats.
The crows applaud, guffawing from their seats,
As though instructed by his infant feats.

His mother is embarrassed and his pa
Humiliated by the breach of law.
Such misplaced gametes might occlude his craw,

Were he not drunk and god-fearing. This child,
The funk of bees and puddles make a wild
Embouchure: and he blows as though defiled

By thoughts of nap or spinach. But he’s not.
Little Elijah does not feel so hot,
And soon the crows pick up what he forgot.

Forcing the Spring

 

The hyacinths break ground, the daffs

All green, intrude, the tulips force
Themselves upon us, and the snow
Continues intermittently.
Nobody knows the bulbs I've seen--
Nobody knows, but Flora says
Ceres keeps her eye on me,
Calling to get a daughter back,
Hers to bestow. I am the dark,
Damp alternative. They text
Green, she and Flora, sharing the sound
The topsoil makes. Somewhere beneath
Contracts a kill--we mobile few,
We pink extensions of the air,
Rootless and conscienceless and blithe,
The swift disturbers. Give me back
My seedlings, painful Ceres says.

At The Good Hotel

 

At The Good Hotel, with white picket verandas,

they bow you in, in ways those of our kind

cannot ignore and have not been brought up to.

It just feels awkward, all the smiling brown

men bringing you drinks and suitcases and fruit

and hairdryers. We shoo them off. We try

accouterments, amenities, appointments,

and bathrobes, all there waiting. To The Good

Hotel requests for food are never outré:

still smiling, brown men bring you kippered things

and cognac, day or night. They press your shirt

and wax your shoes until you cry to go

shopping for the familiar souvenirs

the folks back home believe. You watch TV

to limited effect. They do not stream.

The Good Hotel was built in ‘86

to emulate imperial designs.

Even the tarts dressed swish; they had to come

in through the side. If here today, they look

like you and me and pay with MasterCard

and take it, too. The guests then didn’t note

the deference they paid for, just its absence.

The ice came in by ship, as did the girls.

The middle class’s ship comes in today;

that’s us, and all the rest who book rooms here.

We don’t know where the well bred stay. We eat

what Chef Bertrand suggests, sauced and flambéed,

here at The Good Hotel. We boogie nights

or walk on the beach, preferring to keep dry

our boat shoes and our pants. We burn. We take

a thousand pictures of a dozen sights.

In ‘28 The Good Hotel was hit

by mortar fire: someone didn’t like

the concept of an empire. Home grown

the tyrants flourished, visited their mews,

and died in nasty ways at local hands.

The Good Hotel pays taxes, knows no party

except the anniversary and birthday

and local fêtes, invented so that pigs

could go to Heaven holding on to fruits

three times the size of those we eat at home.

When we are home and full of sleep and fat

with indignation, prostate woes, and beer,

our photos all misplaced, new shirts too stained

to wear, except for yard work, we all call

The Good Hotel the way it used to be,

though not for us, and not again, not now.

A Meditation on Matlock Bath

        This appeared in Lyric.

About this town which I have never seen

I can say anything: unbound by fact,

I can make grass like fuchsias, daisies green

policemen decorous with grace and tact,

imbued by sun and suave citizenry

with politesse. Alsatians bow and smile,

the cottages all tactile bonhomie.

The pubs are warm. The postmen dress with style.

On Sunday morn the smallholders emerge

to sing like gleemen old-time rock ‘n’ roll,

their back doors left unlocked. A sudden urge

to love one’s wife is balsam for the soul,

the vicar says. All this, here far away,,

is slightly different. We speak in wrath

to those we trust; we greet the dawning day

with trepidation, far from Matlock Bath.

Perhaps a girl in Matlock Bath is thinking

that overseas young men appreciate

young ladies who do not want to go drinking

and be led home in a disheveled state.

Perhaps, she thinks, they do not have to study

away their May on Tudor crowns and math;

perhaps, she hopes, the world is not so bloody

awful, far away from Matlock Bath.

Perhaps. But I don’t know, and must not see,

the commons or the chemist there. I’m blessed

with wanting them to live life differently

than we do, not like us, like all the rest.