Seven Poems from a Writing Workshop

4th (time's a charm)


back again
back in Miami.
Let's see, first time
1957, cousin's wedding.
Hung out in Coral Gables
with the Aunt & Uncle, & Greek
Grandfather; got acquainted
with fire ants and rode
in a "Whistle Buggy". 34 years later
flown in from Atlanta, convention
workshop presenter for a fledgling
program that grouped men in distress
using duress to encourage emotion. Third
time's a charm, as they say, so we drove
to Miami from uneaten New Year's Eve
dinners in Tampa to meet a daughter
with tape on her eyelids. 4, Jung said,
is a symbol of unity, completion
the full circle. I'll take it
as answer enough
for why I'm here
posing as a writer. I've turned off
the cell phone, left it
in the car, savoring the experience
of being in one place
at a time, doing one thing
or not. Miami is a city of breezes
floating Royal Palm fronds, a city
that appears to take education
seriously, a city by big water, where
a wandering visitor
can walk up and board the elevated
train for free, a city of beautiful
breasts. I am here to write, to read
to observe, to listen
to workshop (what is that exactly?)
even now the possibility
of a migraine vanishes, the stresses
of life, far away. It isn't easy to leave
anymore. There are new plants
to water, humans
and animals at home
who demand attention. There are phone calls
from anxious realtors, eager
to make the deal work. I am grateful.
They are working hard to sink us
in debt -- all for my dream
of a place to revive the lost art of reading,
a chance to restore the sensual experience
of holding a treasure of leaves
in one's hand, and listening
to the voices. A last ditch at giving
the machines
a run for their money.
I will return refreshed,
better writer or not.

---

Tattoo


She promised her mother
not to get another one, and me, I've
never been enthusiastic about wearing
skinart. The full color dragon
that stretched from coccyx to C7
evoked breathless silence as pathologist
and assistant rolled her body
over on the stainless steel
autopsy table. It's been a year
and the ink still burns her script
into my left forearm.

---

Lucky


In Cymric my name means
grey-dweller-by-the-dark-stream-who-hails-
from-the-town-on-the-hill. Thankfully, mother
named me after her favorite novelist.
Shucks, missed out on the family middle
name, or the ostentation
of a third.

---

Sleepwalk


Stairs lead, protracting
an endless circus illusion
into dark basements.
Black boots. Garden
all day, anyday. Black
boots. To lose another member
of my family, before
their time. Black boots.
Regain the intimacy. Black
boots. Wind flutters thick ficus,
jostling wind chimes over blue
butterfly bench. Black boots.
Cows scream and groan
in the pasture on the south side
of Rutland Road. Black boots.
The dense silence
of the house when everyone else
is asleep.
Black boots.

---

The Title Is In The Last Line


In the Wolfson Campus Library
the novelists and poets shelved
alphabetically, a prominent sign lists
all areas of knowledge in neat Library
of Congress fashion. My search for "P"
takes me around the last aisle
by wood and steel carrels
into a cul-de-sac
of fiction. At last, I find her
on the bottom of the penultimate
stack, thumbing through until I locate
"Daddy". Recently, a desire consumes me
to write a poem entitled
"Every Woman Adores a Fascist".

---

Return


The house
from streetview, foliage-blocked
ancient forest
sprung up in a fortnight, drive cracked
windows in shadow, no one
home. Gone
a week, or a century?

---

Gertrude Stein Imitation & Riddle


Aroma, the aroma
old shoes, damp newspapers
musty shoes, shoes and newspapers, doors
to somewhere else.
Ribbed or perfect
stitched or glued - cracking, bent
in the common hands, standing
on their cover edges, rustle
of leaves, green, brown or blue,
some dance in gold-leaf and end paper
paisley. Inky: is short for typesetter. Incunabula:
swaddling clothes.
Bound, dust bearers
in leather shackles: the end
of trees. Silverfish swarm, warm
attics, cellars, what is a spine?
A spine is biblio erectus . Aroma?
The aroma. Mouldy minions
doors doors doors
to somewhere else.

---

March, 2006