LORETTA WANTS THERE TO BE A POEM ABOUT HER

 

There's a poem right now that's

Nohow mine but keeps buzzing around

Saying I should write it down before

Its words faint from exhaustion and leave

Punctuation marks hanging in the air.

It's for sure not one of my poems and seems to be

About a girl named Loretta. Loretta has

Her points and her problems but the poetry of her

Gets right by me. I try to go back to my book but Loretta,

Who thinks I should be writing, looks through my eyes

And wants to know what makes the book more interesting

Than she is. It's not that, I'm sure the right author

(Who isn't me) will come along and turn you 

Into a National Book Award and a life of

Reciting you at colleges and book clubs and

Perhaps a bowling alley. What's your book about? she says

And I say it's about Carnival season in Venice in

1755 and Casanova's having an affair with a nun

Who dresses as a man sometimes. How's it come out? she says

And I say Unhappily. The nun falls in love with

Another nun who leaves her for the French ambassador 

And Casanova grows old, sitting in a library and writing books.

POSING

 

Arcadio, the studio assistant who calls himself an apprentice,

Was dressed as Mary so we could do preliminary sketches

For an Annunciation  -- a big job and a rushed one

So those of us who had a right to call ourselves apprentices

Had all been pressed into service. We intended later

To put some wings on Cardio and a harness for more sketches

But then an intrusive angel turned up -- they were, that summer,

Everywhere in Florence -- telling us in that queer echoless voice

The angels all seem to share that he brought news of great joy.

Arcadio hiked up his skirts and ran off. None of us blamed him.

HOW THINGS WORK IN HIROSHIGE PRINTS

 

The nobleman has given it

The merest toe-tap but the ball

Soars into the sky where it hangs

Pretending its a stitch-seamed moon

BERNINI'S ANGEL WITH A SCROLL

 

A finished sculpture

Of an unfinished angel

One wing is entire

The other stops halfway

Allowing him to fly

Only in circles so that

He walks when tasked

With some miracle or,

If it's urgent, runs. 

FLIGHT

 

The Portuguese writer Antonio Lobo Antunes 

Often dreamed of flying as did my father;

Lobo Antunes flew by himself; my father

With the assistance of angels. Sometimes,

If they were in a hurry, the angels

Would toss my father back into his bed

Through an open window.

This never happened to Lobo Antunes

Who had, however, problems of his own.

REFLECTIONS

 

Shunsho once drew a samurai glaring

At a young geisha looking back at him

From his mirror. He obviously thinks

He's being poorly served but at least

The geisha has a clever look to her

And is probably good company.

My mirror parades ragged old men

Who seem distressed -- helpless creatures

Who can't even comb their hair properly.

Any of their originals -- surely a sorry lot! --

Are welcome to come fetch them. I'll  make do

Until my reflection returns. (I assume he's in jail;

He'd better not be hanging out with geishas.)

DRAGON CONJURED FROM A CUP OF TEA

 

I don't know if my grandfather Joe

Frequented all-night diners but since he died

It's where I generally see him in dreams --

Often multiplied so that he's most

Of the customers, quietly chatting

With himself in a booth, waiting

For a seat at the counter, glaring

At the change the cashier is giving him.

The next time we meet I mean to show him

Harunobu's picture of a girl conjuring

A dragon from a cup of tea.

STRATEGIES

 

Death, wanting to be loved,

Has learned how to make an omelet

And to do a very creditable

Imitation of a crow though not

At the same time. This, he believes,

Is why his strategy has so far failed.

SOMEONE HAS TO DO IT

 

Formerly, my cat Casey (deceased)

Was responsible for looking from

An upstairs window every morning

To make sure the world was still there.

I never thanked her. Now the job's mine

And nobody thanks me either.

HIROSHIGE SKETCH

 

The nobleman has given it

The merest toe-tap but the ball

Has soared into the sky where it hangs

Pretending to be a stitch-seamed moon

VEHICLES

 

In their perverse metal hearts some cars

Dream of being hearses, slowmoving,

Leading long processions of other cars

With their lights on in the daytime, ignoring

Traffic lights since no cop tickets a hearse.

Hearses, though, wish to be ambulances

Screamshouting on desperate missions.

Ambulances make no wishes, have no dreams.

TROPE

 

Since I am generally held to be

The Good Son the smart money is that

I'm actually evil or that, put to the test

I will crumble under pressure. At best,

I can hope to prove a weaselly hypocrite

Or to have a serious drinking problem.

HAMMER

 

Sometimes, do you see, an angel

Would come by with a hammer and

Knock down a house -- he'd say he had

Orders but I think he just woke feeling

Mean. He'd work steady, stopping

For a cigarette or two (Angels

Don't have souls and don't get

Lung cancer) and leave the district

When the house was down, Once in a ways

Gangs of angels - - three of them, maybe four --

Would come and build another house there

Or the same one that had been there

Or a house that had been there a long time ago

THE WAY OF IT

 

Somewhere a shadow

Digs my grave. He's in no hurry

But the thing gets slowly deeper.

I try to distract him, pretend

To feel sympathy. "Poor chap!

Out in such weather!" 

I offer to trade a tea-spoon

For his shovel saying

He'd be a fool to refuse

An elegant utensil, made

From genuine silver-plated tin.

When he's not looking,

I kick some dirt back in.

DIRECTION

 

There was a time, years ago, when I

Was constantly asked for directions

Then it stopped -- my look became

Less trustworthy perhaps. Now

I'm being asked again, in languages

I don't know; I answer anyway

Really, I'll have to follow someone

To see where they wind up.

A FEW WORDS

 

Fog. Shadows take the place

Of workers, safe at home.

DAY WORKER

 

Going to my job I'd usually

Walk through a passage that

Was either a dark, narrow street or

A broad, well-lit alley. Partway,

The shadow I wore at home

Would slip off, nodding to the utility player

Who'd dog my steps at work. Protocol

Demanded I pretend not to notice.

SOMETHING YOU COULD DANCE TO

 

A small bird -- possibly a female robin --

Called to me that she was the legal representative

Of Sara Teasdale and that I should know

Her client had insisted that her books of poems

Include a notice that "For permission to set

Any of the poems to music, application

Should be made to the author." I said I

Had no intention of setting anyone's poems to music

Any anyway Sara Teasdale has been dead

Since 1933. The bird said "We're working on that and,

In any event, we're putting you on notice. There is

Something about your eyes we don't trust; something

That says  'I wonder what the October poem

Would sound like as a maxixe?'"

HYDE PARK

 

A half-hundred years ago I 

Took long winter walks

Up the Midway or along

Fifty-Seventh Street or down

Cottage Grove Avenue. The sidewalk

Rang under my feet and winds

Blew from Lake Michigan 

The perfect, said Plato,

Cannot change which, if true,

Would be reason to avoid it.

CAROLIIIIINA (THE EXTRA LONG GRAIN RICE)

 

In the far reaches of my mind there is

A band willing to swing into action

Whenever my attention wanders by.

They've somewhere found a sultry girl singer

(The 1950s were awash in sultry girl singers;

You tripped over them everywhere).

She knows most of the lyrics to an old ad

For Carolina Rice and is willing to sing them

Over and over, telling me she comes

From Carolina so I should pardon her drawl;

She's here to sell extra long grain rice to you-all.

True to her original, she refuses to prounce the r

In nourishment so the word becomes nuhishment

As in "For quality and nuhishment it's Carolina Rice."

Nothing will break her of this habit.

ENCOUNTER

 

It was 1955 and you were wearing

A hat with earflaps and

Though you knew it was Death 

It looked so wan and helpless. Sick too,

Huddled in a doorway and coughing.

You nodded; he lifted one hand.

THE ANGEL OF THE OTHER ANNUNCIATION

 

The angel sent to tell Mary that she

Will die soon has chosen to appear as

The stout middle-aged woman from 

Nicholas Maes' Portrait of an Unknown Woman

Her eyes are sad and shrewd, her lips

Pressed together in half-hearted disapproval. 

She tightly holds a closed fan by the wrong end

Ready to poke the butt-end at anyone

Who tries to come too close.

AND DON'T ASK ABOUT THE DUST

 

The Memory Palace I built years ago

Is smaller than I remember it

And surrounded by outbuildings

So that whatever I seek always seems

To have moved to the Memory Garage

Or hides under a clay pot in the Memory Toolshed.

MORNING OF THE WORLD

 

In the beginning there was nothing

Or nothing much -- just some odd-shaped rocks,

A few spools of yellow thread and the shadows

Of things not yet created. God and His dog

Were restless and went for a walk. The rocks

Hurriedly shrugged themselves into mountains

Or powdered themselves into sandy flats

So the two of them had places to walk.

The thread -- it was good thread but nothing 

You couldn't find at a five and ten cent store

If fives and tens and stores had been invented --

Spun a hasty sun into the sky. The shadows

Became chance-met strangers eager to point out

To God and His Dog the local sites which appeared

After they were described. Then some of the shadows

Decided they'd been cats all along.

UNRELIABLE AND COVERED WITH DUST

 

The Memory Palace I built years ago

Is much smaller than I remember it

And surrounded by outbuildings

So that whatever I seek always seems

To have been moved to the Memory Garage

Or lies under a clay pot in the Memory Toolshed.

THE LIMITS OF MEMORY

 

You remember distinctly that

At the end of  long night St. Wyndred,

Coiling herself into being

From the smoke of a blown-out candle,

Offered to perform a small miracle,

Just for you. What you cannot recall

Is what the miracle was or is or will be.

RELATION

I never had an Aunt Edith since she

Who would have been died after a few months

And is buried in a very small grave

Still, I've done my best for her, casting her

In this role and that. (Read my third poem

About the eleven thousand virgins

Who traipse about with Saint Ursula; she

Is the third virgin in the second row, the one

Who's halo is slipping sideways, annoying

The virgin next to her). She'd have been tall

I tell her when she comes by, and funny

And have had a fondness for large hats.

Now, though, she wants to know more

What jobs did she have? (Mostly clerical

Though during the war she learned to weld)

Did she marry? (Twice, once happily)

What was wrong with the bad marriage?

(I'll get back to you on that).

 

CHESSMEN

 

My grandfather Joe would sometimes look

At a chessboard and rearrange the pieces

Two black bishops might change places

Some pawns would yearn forward

Others retreat to the back of their squares

Or sit with deadly calm in the exact middle.

When he played he might put a finger on a piece

To see what it wanted to do. Knights, though

He always took by surprise. Never wise

To know what a knight was thinking

A MOMENT ON THE WAY

Passing the house
Where she'd have lived
If she'd taken another road

A FEW INSTRUCTIONS

 

When you wake up 

Look in a mirror and say

"I am no shadow" 

Until you believe it.

Next, gather substance.

Stand without flickering.

Remember not to change size

Too radically.  Hire servants --

You'll need at least four: one

To attend you outdoors; one

To appear by artificial light; one

To be invisible to all but you; the last

You must not acknowledge

When you meet again.

LAMB'S CONDUIT FIELDS

 

At Captain Thomas Coram's Foundling Hospital

There was a side entrance for desperate folk

To leave infants, often with notes or tokens --

A blanket, a toy, a bright bead, some coral.

One morning they found one, small and sick,

Wrapped in a basket with a letter pinned

To his blanket saying "This is Death. Please

Take care of him. I'll come back 

If things ever go better for Me."

BAGHDAD AND CHESS

 

"In Baghdad a thousand years ago," I told the ghost

Of my grandfather Joe, "well-advised men were not

Blacksmiths, butchers, conjurors, policemen,

Night watchmen, dung collectors, tanners,

Bathhouse stokers, makers of women's shoes,

Well diggers, masseurs, pigeon racers or chess players."

"Better-advised men," he said, "left Baghdad

And played chess in peace."

SPARAFUCILE'S COMPLAINT

 

In my career, says Sparafucile, I fulfilled the terms

Of almost every contract. Hire me and your worries

Were gone or replaced at least by ones more interesting;

You could go right home and start thinking

About what to wear to your enemy's funeral.

Really, I was that good. Killing the Duke

Was nothing special for me; I'd killed kings!

I gave Rigoletto a bargain price; I liked him

And yes, I know that I mistook a slender soprano

For a bulky tenor but it was dark and she, remember,

Was trying to fool me. You'd think there'd be operas

About the many times I killed the right victim

But no -- there's not even a poem.