Blink

Tags

poetry, Relationships, sex, universe, void

The ancient yogis said the universe
blinks on and off, and many of today’s
quantum physicists believe the same.

A neon sign blinked
outside the hotel window, rundown,
downtown LA, Rolling Stones
our background music,
while my boyfriend and I,
abysses of inexperience,
managed to have sex;
blinking neon, on and off,
much as the universe,
from being into void and back,
each blink a chance to
change and change again, so

how did Mick already know
that we would get no satisfaction:
paying for the hotel room
meant I would pay and pay,
talk of other women
manifested as affairs,
I would stay,
darkness would descend
and cloud his mind,
and all felt like the pull of gravity,
of fate, inevitable, forcing
us down the only path we saw

while outside the window
blinked the universe,
birthing other universes
with each blink?

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Groundhog Day

Tags

beach, break-ups, Love, pagan, poetry, Relationships

In the movie Groundhog Day,
Bill Murray has to live the same
day again and again.

The day of sun and wind,
when we met at the Blue Danube,
would be my choice, if I could choose
one day to live
over and over.

We left and took a walk;
on narrow streets
you told me about growing up
in London, Irish Catholic;
by the beach I talked
about my life, laughing:
all my stories so sordid;
as kites soared high,
I felt free
to tell you anything.

I wouldn’t have to improve
my endlessly repeating,
already perfect day,
since I didn’t know yet
the chilly wind
meant you would soon turn cold.

Each year the groundhog,
on his day, comes out
and sees his shadow or he doesn’t,
predicting more of winter
or coming of an early spring;
I never heard this year’s prediction,
but it feels
like a long, long winter.

Songs in the Dark

Tags

birds, Love, poetry

Next door, the birds—now too late
to know what kind—sang in the dark,
kept me company long before dawn;
the neighbors boarded up the eaves,
told me, laughing, that the birds,
for days, kept flying, flying
against the boards.

Sometimes I find I’ve boarded
up my heart.
One by one I take the boards down,
let in the pain and love again.

The early morning dark now quiet;
I don’t know when your heart will fly
home to my heart,
and so I sing.

Landing at Antioch

Tags

airport, Antioch, flying, poetry

Antioch, CA, 1981-2, Alameda, CA, 1983-2012

I never flew into that little airport;
it’s gone now, bulldozed, houses built,
but back then, Charlie said, final approach
was over a tree-covered hill: clear the trees,
cut power, rapid descent
to the narrow runway; too daring
for me, wanting tamer destinations
for my solo flights.

Early years with him: sunrise flight lessons
before work, first solo and first kiss
on the same day, weekend trips
through sunlit skies over green fields,
following rivers, highways, train tracks
below; destination always freefall into bed.

After his death, a former flight student,
smiling at Charlie’s humor,
told me he once was supposed to land
at Antioch, but hadn’t climbed high enough
to be above the trees; Charlie asked
if he was planning on flying
around them or through them.

He’s been gone a year and a half now;
after those sunny years, we made
a slow descent
into an unhappy marriage,
a bad landing we barely survived.
Then and now, I wish we’d found
a way around the trees.

The Dead Come Back With Things to Say

Tags

death, poetry, psychic awareness, soul

They show up in dreams as I shop for flower
pots, or peer down from above, crowded
by golden angels, or arrive in my study
like silent thunder. Tell my mother I’m fine,
they insist,

or, Tell my children not to cry, I’m in Heaven, or,
Say I’m with them all the time. The messages
I sent to families met with silence, even anger;
my courage faltered. The dead review
their lives and see

things in new ways, though they lose interest
in earthly doings and come rarely.
Last night my husband came from a place
or time so distant, he was the faintest
signal, light

from a burned-out star. He couldn’t
speak at first, but finally in a whisper
said, I’m sorry. In life he’d thought
I didn’t love him, and gouged me
with words

and withered me with silence, but now at last
he knew I cared. My old friend Kathy,
gone twelve years, came too, an angel
in a long robe, gray-blue, with curly hair
and wings of paper mache

the color of antique brass. She blessed her children,
leaving them at last. She had asked me to tell
them she was there, but I never did. She forgave me,
glided past the steeple of an old church and said,
I am at peace.

Past Life Together: A Fragment

Tags

ocean, poetry, Reincarnation, Relationships

Beneath the brilliant sky
the dark sea heaves and rolls;
our boat lifts and drops
as you pull the oars,
guide us
towards the narrow inlet,
rocky cliff on each side.

Belongings in the bottom
of the boat, tied in an old shawl,
soaked with seawater.
In danger, pursued by the past,
our future lies between
the walls of rock.
If we can get ashore,
I know where to go.

Orpheus and Eurydice

Tags

death, Greek mythology, I Ching, Love, Orpheus and Eurydice, poetry, Relationships

How steep the rocky path, how dark,
how often Orpheus must have longed
to look back and reach out his hand;
Finally he turned around, only to see her
become a shadow,
arms outstretched toward him,
floating down, down.

The I Ching says
I must not write or call you;
it says your love for me
must draw you up the path, must
overcome your fears and doubts.
I must not look back,
must not
reach out my hand.

Underground River

Tags

blocked emotions, break-ups, emotions, Love, poetry, river, underground

Alameda, CA, 2014

Where are you? says
a voice inside me,
and I see you sitting
in my living room
the morning you left.

Part of me
doesn’t know you’re gone,
perhaps the underground river
flowing in the dark,
carrying pain too deep
to know.

But no, the river knows;
I am the one refusing,
refusing to admit
you are gone.

Queen of Lightning

Tags

emotions, Love, poetry

Found poem: in an email from a man I’m seeing
June, 2014

I am playing
with pickup sticks and matches
and you are the queen
of lightning.

Blue Danube

Tags

Blue Danube, break-ups, emotions, Love, poetry, Relationships

If I went to the Blue Danube again,
would I see our shadows
sitting at that table, drinking tea?
I’ve never been back,
old happiness too much to bear.