our annual dread

Here's another poem submitted here for the sake of timeliness and not for the fact of its doneness. You see, I would rather come off as aware than I would as prepared.

Alabama Heat

It comes early and leaves late.

Each year we forget, stunned

By the oppression of the sun.

As Noah’s flood—from the sky,

from the ground, all at once—

The inundation of fire.

And yet somehow we forget the rivering sweat, the wavering asphalt, the lolling

Tongues of dogs.

It’s the burden we bear

To our swimming pools,

The yoke of our wet towels

Coming home; we slap mosquitoes, cussing

A storm, shaming grave-drowned mothers.

Fireflies elude the children,

High into the maple,

Down into the ditch.

Down where the black-bags

Of dry-bone leaves loiter, forsaken

By the city-trucks. Summer, summer, summer . . .

Fanning ourselves with yard-sale fliers,

We hum our praises

As we tend to do in the face

Of our oppressions, of our God himself—

His spirit descending like the gloaming-bats

To intercept the mosquitoes

And, our annual dread,

To alight in glory on our heads.

shake the shadow

Ether, I am old. Not ancient, not on my death bed, but old. Too old, more specifically, to continually fashion myself after the manner and modes of my mentors and betters. As I lay in bed last night editing a recent poem in my head (my most frequent and, unfortunately, most ineffectual sort of editing), it occurred to me that it was not J. H. Scott's voice warning about this cliche or his mental pen scratching out that hokey rhyme--it was the voice and pen of my mentors and betters. My little Obi Wan Kenobis speaking to me from your very own Nothingworld, dear Ether. And this was no isolated incident. I realized how pervasive are the voices of these Others in my editing process and, more discomfiting to me, how ultimately persuasive those voices are. I tossed, I turned, I got up to pee. Eventually, my own voice squeaked through, "You're getting too old for this."

Because at some point we have to let ourselves be ourselves. Authenticity. Actors on our own authority. Authorship. Not only good writing but so much of good living derives from the quality of our distinctions--even if it means we are doomed (no such thing but it I love the sound of that word) to being "inferior" or "marginal" in relation to the Others.

Can I evade the influence of my predecessors? No. On some level, no matter how I might protest, I will never even be able to shake the shadow of Shakespeare. How much less so my immediate influences? My thesis director to whom I owe the largest share of my development as a poet, my favorite contemporary poet, Andrew Hudgins, whose deft lines are at once flowing and formal, those of my peers I admire and envy? No, all of these and the many to come can not be avoided and should not be ignored. We are what we eat and we eat all the time--gobble what seems most delectable and too often glut on what we could really have done without--we require the nourishment of our surroundings for our sustenance as creative, authentic individuals.

That poem I was working on--well, it kinda sucked. To finish it, I decided, would be a waste of time. It just didn't jive with . . . wait . . . with what? On second thought, no . . . it's a mighty fine poem. Oh yes, it jove and it jives. With my mentors and betters? Not really. With me? Yeah, with me. I took a chance, stepped out of my mold, and proceeded in good faith. And it still kinda sucks. But I like it. And besides, I'm far too old to change it now.

Next poem.

in the aftermath

On the 27th of April, a violent storm plowed a massive swath of destruction across the the Southeast. The cost in life is unspeakable, the cost in property is incalculable. The damage runs deep-- beyond the death toll, beyond the structures--into the psyche of those affected by the devastation; a depth I cannot fathom. As a poet, I could not help but be fascinated by such an event; the poetic mind is, I think, less creative than it is empathetic and less that than morbidly curious--if not as a whole, than at least for me. So in the aftermath of the storm--the news coverage, the horrifying images--of course I was compelled by my blinking cursor to say something. To make note of the event if not sense of it. But I knew I was no match for the cataclysm. Nature, as she often does, had left me nonplussed.

A couple of days passed. I took stock of the storm's disarray, hoping to find my way into some aspect of its horror (empathy) or beauty (curiosity). Then I remembered something I heard on the radio when the tornado was bushwhacking Tuscaloosa. The meteorologist had said something about the debris--how it was turning up in Birmingham, falling from the sky.

Then I wrote the following poem. It does not do justice to the storm. Because it can not. In fact, the storm is intentionally distant, ravaging elsewhere, juxtaposed with the relative calm of a flower garden. Because flower gardens, I can do. EF-4 tornadoes--not so much. This is still a work in progress (and please do chime in, if so inclined) but I thought I'd share it while it's fresh.

Debris

“ . . .soon in glory bright unclouded . . .”

Tornadoes came to Alabama—commemorative

Stamp of blasted timber, shattered homes.

Miles away, Eugenia transplanted bulbs

Of tulip. Each time she stood, her spine radiated

Tendrils of flame. Wincing, she spaded

The soil. Winds flexed and muscled trees.

Eugenia sang her favorite hymn.

“ . . . all my sins and grief to bear . . .”

Tornadoes ambushed Tuscaloosa, spun

Cars and children and motel receipts

From clandestine loves. Hailstones the size

Of tulip bulbs. “ . . . what a privilege to carry . . .”

A photo fell in Eugenia’s garden, worse

For the weather—torn and grimed, missing

The head of the man beside the woman

Who smiled a smile for the ages, eyes cinched

Against a flash in the offing.

Eugenia hummed an interlude, surveyed

The sky—white clouds and blue on blue.

“ . . . o, what peace we often forfeit . . .”

Eugenia resumed. The photo flew

On a gust. She reached but her back caught fire.

She passed an hour supine, watching mementos

Fall, blinking off incidental splats of rain.

Litter like ashes like weeds in her garden—

To be plucked and shoe-boxed just in case.

“ . . . blessed Savior thou hast promised . . . "

Tornadoes plowed, Eugenia sang. A smile for the ages

Flew—mile after mile on weakening gales.

lowliness and other disregarded heights

A Crawl Space for an Attic

Behind me drags my leg, ahead my mind

Gazelles—presenting problems: stairs,

Cobblestone, pristine golf-course greens in spikes.

I’m adolescent—all thrust and no thought,

Careering limbs. A basement’s what I need.

A place to walk without descent,

Provided I do not come up for air,

For light of day. Down-dwelling, in the must,

Book after book: natural selection

And other disregarded novels, one

About backyard songbirds, a hundred more

Concerning governesses. A T.V.

For zombie films and sit-coms without laugh-tracks.

Provide your own applause, I’ll say, if you

Come visit me. Come for my sundry wisdoms,

Come for my television. Stay the night.

A basement’s what I need and a crawl-space

For an attic. For my things. My boxes

Of books and boxes of dust. Hands and knees,

Courageous through the spider webs,

A flashlight in my teeth. One leg will lag

But you can’t fall from a crawl, not so far

To break a bone or hard enough to crush

Your guts. In fact, it’s the perfect distance

To fall. To gather new wisdoms from worms

And roaches: lowliness and other dis-

Regarded heights. During that night, the one

You’ll stay to watch T. V., I’ll usher you

Through dark, dank, catacombs of rusted tools,

Decapitated dolls, and unused paint.

Just follow me, I’ll say, Follow my scoot

And drag. Do like me, I’ll say—

Kneel, scoot, drag.

absorb the rattle

Not a Poem

This is not a metaphor:

I am ready for the storm.

My chin on the window sill.

Dust and webs. A dead hornet—

Crispy carcass teetering

On air-condition drafts.

From dark clouds a darker one

Descends. That is not symbol,

Not figure. That’s tornado.

I am ready. Dust and webs—

A sneeze.

The hornet flies—tick, tick, tick—

Quick against the purpled pane.

A literal twist of air,

Itself a grand simile

Likened unto the tempest

Of jealous love, or unto

Worry,

Loosely wound fingers around

The old, proverbial neck.

The window rattles. I lean

My nose to the glass, turn cheek

To cheek, absorb the rattle

To my very bones. The storm

Goes by.

I watch the cloud unravel,

Ascend, rejoin the massive

Continent of gloom, and wait

For hail—the racket of ice,

The real shards of angry skies.

she did not whoa

[From my novel in limbo, now in 3rd person. Justin Latterly, in this instance in his capacity as tutor, responds unfavorably to one of his students--Macy, perpetual bemoaner of her circumstances who, in this instance, having just insulted Justin, is at her wit's end. Elisha, another student from whom Justin is failing to keep an appropriate distance, intervenes.]

“Don’t be a bitch, Macy.” There it was—suspended in the center of the room like a disco ball casting its many facets, leaving no aspect of its longitude or latitude unspoken, a hundred daggers from a hundred eyes—there it was.

Macy stepped into the room and the door eased shut behind her. A warmth kindled and grew, the winter air at bay. With her back against the door, Macy slid to the floor. Her arms, now pale, fell limp at her sides. She moaned and wept, hands knuckle-down against the cold, worn carpet, shoulders in sobbing paroxysm.

Fan-friggin-tastic. He had a teenager in tears, on his beat, just the two of them shredded by the mirror ball. But this is not your fault, Latterly. This is the culmination of circumstances in which you are a minor character. You are just the prick that burst the festering wound. To look on the bright side.

Meanwhile, back on the dark side, Macy started banging the back of her head against the door. Thunk, grunt, thunk, grunt, thunk.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Justin jumped-up. She did not whoa. Anticipating the intervention, she added speed and force to her efforts. “Macy . . . oh god . . . stop.” He snatched one of her limp arms and yanked her away from the door. A sick little pop left her shoulder. She wailed. She cursed him. He squatted and crutched her armpits with his hands to lift her but she was too heavy and too slick with cold sweat. He sunk in front of her where they came face to face, her upturned hands in his lap. Cinnamon and onion breath. Patchouli scented flesh. His gut curdled. Slowly, she settled into pathetic sobs. Against all impulse and judgment, he stayed seated in front of her. To let her calm down or, if nothing else, to continue to curse him.

His cell-phone buzzed. He let it go to voice mail. The door cracked and bumped against Macy’s back.

“What gives?” Elisha asked.

“Hold on.” Justin stood and smoothed his clothes. Macy scooted away from the door to the nearest wall and looked up smiling. Smilingly. It made him nervous. Elisha came in. Her nose and her cheeks were red. Cold weather suited her. He had noticed the other night at the cemetery how she seemed to glow. How she wore the paltry starlight in silvers and wide-eyed blues. How now, adorably nonplussed in the doorway, she seemed to still be spangled by the residual light.

“Seriously, what gives? Is everybody ok?” She looked at Macy then back at Justin.

“Yeah, I think so . . . Elisha, do you know Macy? Macy, Elisha?”

“Of course,” Macy said. “We went to the same high-school.”

“Until Junior year. Then she disappeared,” Elisha said.

“I didn’t disappear, I graduated.”

“Nice. Way to go,” Elisha said, truly impressed. As much as her prettiness and charm, Justin admired the simplicity of her graciousness. (Also evident in the simplicity of her contempt; but in this case . . . )

Macy started crying again. He hoped that the head-banging would not follow. Elisha let her hand glide along his back as she made her way around him. Without comment, she simply knelt by Macy and hugged her sobbing shoulders.

They stayed that way for five minutes. Macy crying, Elisha rocking.