FINDING THE OLD LANGUAGE

FINDING THE OLD LANGUAGE

In a rage to know all things,

Or as many things as it is possible

To know when one is eleven years old.

The divine walking amongst

Our friends, choosing this one

And that one, taking them away.

Unlacing their memories,

Giving their recognition of others

To the winds, to the birds,

Both flying away in a flurry of noise.

Electrical storms across the brain

At any time; just sitting there,

Getting out of bed, walking from one

Room to another.

All that was familiar

Suddenly not at all

Understandable.

Time without borders.

Anything could happen

At any instant,

Or perhaps not happen at all.

Waking from a summer nap.

The light, enchanting, over everything,

Temperature and sound engaged

In a magnificence of waking.

The world, yes!

Rulers of the mind,

All chemicals and fires

In the neurons and synapses.

More and more information

Beyond explanation.

The half-remarkable question:

"What is it that we are part of,

And what is it that we are?"

*

The delight of the dance,

The endless business of water.

That which is love,

Beneath the stars,

Inside all of sleeping,

Surrounded by its

Insistence on forever

Waking once again in the same

Room. Still here upon the Earth.

Doing things that become familiar,

To us. No longer surprised

By every act, by each event.

Moving through the day,

Learning laughter and

Helping one another to

Understand how something

Works. Finding the old

Language, the color, the

Limited means of expression.

BURNING GREEN WOOD

Antoni Tudisco

This is a poem from by book WHERE THE STARS ARE KEPT.  Rattlesnake Press, Pollack Pines, Ca. 2007.

The book is no longer in print.

BURNING GREEN WOOD

Once in Spring, i saw a heart

Smoldering atop a fire of green

Wood.  “Pruning fire,” the farmer told

Me when I came closer to watch.

“Looks like a heart in there.”, I said

Pointing.  “Reckon so,” he answered.  “Came

Out of the pears.”  He gestured to the 

Orchard.  “Kind of unusual, no?” I offered.

“Found ‘em before,” he said, poking at it

With a long-handled rake.  “After Winter

There’s lots of stuff comes out of pruning.  I’ve found

Boxes of letters.  lots of dreams, well, parts

Of them anyway.  They don’t last long usually.

Even found prayers, once or twice.  Think

People would take better care of them.”

The heart caught fire, flamed briefly then

Quieted down again.  “Out here’s a good

Place to leave things, “he continued,

“Puppies, kittens, a body once,

Nobody knew who he was.

Things that are hard to lose, have to put

Them someplace.  Think that heart’s been

There all Winter.  Looked pretty battered.”

“Kind of sad, isn’t it?” I asked.

“Always is,” he said looking me in the face.

“Better than after the war though.  There were

A lot of them then.  That’s why I use

Green wood, new growth.  Makes lots

Of smoke, yes, but it’s new stuff.

Seems better to do it like this.”  He shifted

His weight and threw more wood

On the flames, covering the heart altogether.

“What are you doing out here?” he asked.

“Walking.  I like long walks.”

“Good thing, walks,” he said.  “Have a nice one.”

“Thank you,” I replied and started away,

The smell of wood smoke in my nostrils,

The tower of it reaching high above

The orchard.  The sky still morning pink.

A sound of songbirds came, first far away,

then closer, insisting that the moment

Indeed be Spring, all else of no matter whatsoever.

BREAKING TEMPO / AND WITH YOUR SPIRIT

This poem appeared earlier this year in Medusa's Kitchen.  It is part fiction, part remembrance.  Baxter is E.R. Baxter III, my best friend back in Niagara Falls, NY.   He is a poet, novelist, and a wonderful essayist with more than a few books in print.  His Niagara Digressions is a lovely collection of essays.

BREAKING TEMPO / AND WITH YOUR SPIRIT

There is a slight rise just at the edge

Of the wood where the trees seemed

To have decided they would go no further

Than this.  A rise pushing up with

Visible boulders and short grass.

When I used to go there it seemed

Very important to get right to the brow

Of the place.  There one was even with 

The tops of the trees and could look down

To the ice-edged creek that named the place,

The Baxter Run the people called it.

Baxter had had a farm not too far

From the rise and the stream was a quick

One, moving over rock, heading for the lake

With a couple of deep holes

Where dark fish dwelt, sun fish,

Perch, crappie and bullheads.  Raccoons,

Foxes and raptor birds liked to come here.

I decided to come here for the same

Reason these creatures did,

To know the place.

A place to put my heart and to know it

In my blood and feel it in my bones.

A place where, no matter who came there

They could never find it as I had.

In the silver of summer, if it were quiet

I could hear the lake water lapping

Just at the edge of sound.

A place where I could image old Baxter

Getting up from his kitchen table, lighting

A cigarette, putting on his coat and boots

And making is way to the barn

Where the few head of cattle he kept

Waited for him. Their lowing in the night

Air just above the waves.

He too would walk by the Run.

He too would see the same water

Curl around the edge of the farm,

Past the cabbage field and into

The hardwoods to the rise.

Some evenings I could hear him talking to the cattle,

His voice deep and resonant, a caring.

Then I was the fox and the raccoon,

Then I was the darkened wing headed

Into the woods to find where the night was safe.

Now I wake from deep sleep

In a bed on the other end of evening 

And I am on that rise above Baxter’s run.

I wish for a moon.  I get one.

If I want to see the water rushing

Just beneath the thin ice, I am able

To do so.  If I wish this place 

To become forever, it does so and I become

The place, the rain, the snow,

The wildflowers of Summer,

The insect orchestra.

The tendrils of each day breaks

And there will never be anything

Greater than this peace.

FOR GENERATIONS TRAPPED IN THE GAS VANS

FOR GENERATIONS TRAPPED IN THE GAS VANS

“What exists as reality can be so substantially

Altered that when we kill those who disagree with us,

There will be no notice of the event.  They seem to,

Then do, rush to the light, to where the light

Closes upon them.  When we open the doors,

At the end of the operation, they are crowded at the rear doors.”

I keep waiting to see the big rooms.

We must be able to find them, open,

Light streaming in, the angels of

God, seated quietly, composing the

Sounds of what we will come

To know as the language of loving.

Here a touch, from the heart

To the groin.  Here, a kiss,

From the name of time to the

Second Drawer of Spring, as it

Reels its petals full force into

The face of desire, unaware

Of the vicissitudes of the 

Seasons, full and culpable

To the caprice of the erotic,

Slitting its lips open to accept

The dogma of the carnal.

The roads only lead to the north.

Direction is a function of the loins.

Yielding and penetration of ideas,

Debate by debate, circumcises itself

For the benefit of an acceptable

Resolution of the source of a particular

Season.  The mouth closes over

The tip of the concept and fills

With a million ideas.  All of time

Begins understanding its own creation.

FRUITS OF THE EARTH

Victor Bregeda

FRUITS OF THE EARTH

Night decides to take over the conversation.

The shadows stir, the spiders begin

Their spinning toward the dawn.

Spring begins its work toward those

Seasons it will never see. The exuberance

of buds and bright flowers, the dazed

Spinning of elm seeds through the green

Air.  Soon there will be no room upon

The ground for all will be growing.

We do not wait.  We dig the soil, find

The seeds of plants we want to see

In particular, begin the garden rituals.

We too become fruits of the earth,

Laboring toward the harvest, privileged

To entertain the dance through all the seasons.

The morning excuses itself from the night.

The night pales before her great might,

Calls the dark spider back to itself

And bides until the story changes once again.

WALKING ALONG THE ROAD WE STOP NEAR A STREAM IN SPRINGTIME

This poem is from a forthcoming book THE NIGHT MARKET.

WALKING ALONG THE ROAD WE STOP NEAR A STREAM IN SPRINGTIME

You have found bits of song caught

In the spillway of a beaver dam.  They

Are church-like in their praising.  They shake

The collection of sticks

Piercing the face of the dam like so many

Bayonets.  A rain begins and spills

Upon the surface of the pool, each drop a book,

A crowd, a child, a Golden Heart singing to the fools,

To what is left of the dancers, the poor shoulders

Of the river made to bear a cascade of tears.

They have built a monument on the edge

Of a cliff.  It is impossible to get close enough

To look at it without plunging into the mind of God.

We stand watching the little fires in its towers,

The pitiful way it seems to contemplate the end

Of  day.  A vibrant eye peers from every window,

Some of them weep as only ones who have seen murder 

Can weep.  Ships send up flares to illuminate this place.

We walk along the edge of the pond where the grass

Grows tall and yellow.  We stop and kiss each other

Before deciding to lie in this place and create

Another world, full of wings and the silence invented by snow.

We are unquenchable as acrobats before the highest throne.

House, knife, wonder, tears, cold, a flute,

Lambs, bridges, hills, the beautiful dark,

Silver bells opening like journeys, a crying,

Weaving a web around the heart that it may

Not break.  All of the heavens resting

In the corners of your smile.