AVISO!

 

The very old muse has not for a while 

Brought me a poem that only works

In Linear B or in Ural-Altaic. Today,

Looking pleased, she brought a poem

In a living language but one of which

I know only a handful of words. It's true

That I can give an eloquent warning

Due to years of reading subway doors:

Aviso! La via del tren subterraneo

Es peligrosa! It has great dignity, I think

Be advised! The way of the underground train

Is perilous! Not only perilous but with perils

Who are female -- peligosa, not peligroso.

Still, unless the poem means to urge young folk

To generally avoid walking on subway tracks

It should probably find another poet.

DEMONS AND MY FATHER

 

That the world is filled with demons

Didn't surprise my father nor alarm him;

Having nothing against them he assumed

They felt no personal ill will towards him. 

They were just there, needing occasionally

To be brushed aside, like clouds of gnats.

He became interested after he retired

In the economics of being a demon

What they sought and why and what they did

In their free time. They liked him for this.

One of them told him "If we'd much free time

We probably wouldn't be demons."

VISITS

 

My family's banshee (don't ask me how Jews

Came to have a banshee -- we just do)

Knows when I'm doing laundry and comes by

To tell me I'm doing it all wrong and should

Find a river and, wailing, batter my clothes with rocks

(Gets out the blood something wonderful, she says.)

Sometimes, if the Immovable Wisdom King drives, 

She brings along her friend Corn Woman --

Still depressed over the death of her last priest

Three hundred and six years ago.

TIME OFF

 

Shadows in hospitals are made to work

For their keep but union rules require

Occasional time off so my grandfather's --

The one he lost track of when the Army

Requisitioned it during the Great War -- 

Drifts by once in a while. He asks if I've recalled

Any new details of what my grandfather did

After they parted. I had to show him photographs

Before he'd admit I didn't make up the mustache.

THEORIES

 

You ask why shadows accumulate

In hospitals. Some experts say hospitals

Are both more real than the world

And less. A rootless shadow

Might feel comfortable there; 

One left behind and not reclaimed

Might have no place to go. Other experts

Insist the first experts are full of hooey.

CELESTIAL BUDGET CONSTRAINTS

 

The worst thing about changes to Kabuki Heaven is that

Each actor no longer has a boy on stage holding a candle

To make him visible to the audience. The little flashlights

We shine on each other or ourselves are not the same.

BACKGROUND CHARACTERS

 

None of the finished angels were available

So an outline with a little color brushed in

Was sent to tell Hagar that she has

Been traded and will now belong

To another story. Unfinished

Has no voice but acts out seventeen

Possible ways Hagar's new life may go

Ending all but one with a touching death

Hoping she'll choose the one in which she

Learns from him how to take long flights

On a blurred suggestion of wings.