snow bombs
sometimes you hear the womp
of a pile of plush snow
plunging from the treetops
down onto a deep drift first
other times a curtain
of sifted snow waves across the sky
like a veil between the trees
every time I look for the chickaree
or chickadee who precipitated it
there’s nothing
it seems the work of snow spirits
walkers on the wind
beings keeping watch over us
who we can only know
by what else they move
snow ghosts sneezing up
soft clouds of hushed white debris
staying away
as long as we don’t meet
I’ll know it’s not my fault
(anything that might happen)
and how could I live
with having harmed you?
we all say these words
to everyone now
stay alone for all of you,
our loves who we most long
to wrap our arms around
to share breath together
(the Māori know)
makes us most alive
but I can’t risk
robbing you of yours
so we’ll stay alone in our little
forced-air windows
saying hello through flickering screens
where we can’t smell spring
together
casting about
how can one endure
house arrest
without knitting gear?
Bernie
I wanted him to run
past all hope of winning,
a trustworthy soul
with a consistent stance
who was always there for
us believe-in-better-days folks,
those more than ready
to be the change.
But he couldn’t possibly win!
Alex says in exasperation
(though he voted for him, too).
I wanted him to keep running anyway
I say fiercely.
I wanted someone to keep pinning my hopes on
in these uncertain days
when anything may happen.
I wanted him to be there
to be a reckoning.
atypical migraine
each time
the brain storm strikes
I wonder
if I’ll ever be the same
each time
after it’s over
I retest my malfunctioning faculties:
once again
I can read
I can think
I can speak
I can feel my hand –
these are all
plenty to celebrate:
I’ve been spared
again
blind judging
how to tell the story
without the names,
{my name included}?
first I make all the names
into Xs
capital crosses
the paper riddled with treasure marks
{the editor says
it’s too ex-perimental}
next I try saying
trust me
it’s a worthwhile story
but meaningless without the names
{but it’s not in an editor’s nature
to trust}
next I make the names
into big black bars
highlight each soul in black
to make it disappear
the way corrupt governments do
{now they look more like names/bodies
but maybe it’s too transparent –
you could still calculate the characters
if you were hell-bent
on unmasking the dead}
finally I go to sleep
letting the problem work itself out
in dream
{trusting my summoned ancestors
to reveal a next step
that preserves their dignity
alongside my anonymity –
they do}
Ursus
in the dark
a stiff snort
and out of the black shadows
comes an even darker lumbering shape
shaggy hungry clawed and climbing
it’s our springtime wake-up call
the mountains are coming alive
(even now in these peak weeks of death)
and with all that motion and growth and melting
come the bears
groggy and ravenous
but still polite enough to let you know
they’re watching
masked Americans
we’re a nation of outlaws
bandanas pulled up to our eyeballs
or faces defiantly bare
we don’t take orders kindly
them who’re crafty will survive
and for them that don’t
there’s a mass grave waiting
the potter’s field
a place where people
become bodies
become numbers
become liabilities
and while we’re all distracted
hand-sewing cloth masks
the usual suspects are
making off with our future
breath sold to the highest bidder
toilet paper $16 a pack
elections continued
though voting’s impossible
next the disease
will get its own ™
symptomatic vocabulary
blue sky sprites
words that would have given me hope
four years ago
my body’s white blood cells
pulling out all the stops
working to bring me right
but without those words
my vision was clouded
another bit of normal
perhaps forever gone
grey drifts of dots
descending slowly
every time I blinked
blue sky sprites
if only someone had given me
these three words to hold on to
a whole new way of seeing
this change that typhus wrought
I would have worried a little less
believed in magic a little more
