Author Archives: Puff Of Smoke Poems

I.
In a separate dream last night,
I owned a small, soft, gray and white bird
with black markings so delicate
they looked painted on
though
in waking, walking around life
I have never owned a living bird

II.
The only bird I’ve ever owned is Pete, the wooden parrot—three feet tall, painted soft shades of green and pink like those pastel mints served at dinner parties in crystal bowls in the 1960s. Or at least, that’s how it was with my mother.
Pete the parrot was trash-picked off a Florida curb, for love, by me—and brought home as the single piece of carry-on luggage that, to date, has gotten the most comments of any odd thing I’ve brought on a plane.
No one else loves Pete as much as I do. Truly, no one understands what I see in him.
This is not the first time.
He hangs now on my bedroom wall where he is the first and last thing I see each day. If it is a day when I end up in my own bed. And excepting when I take him off his hook for special occasions.
Or when we’re traveling.

III.
In college, Anne had a bird. You knew to be careful and move quickly in and out of her dorm room because she let the bird fly around inside. All of this, as so much about my darling friend Anne, was
Against The Rules
I was always a little bit nervous about the rule breaking and also nervous about
tiny claw foot landing
on my shoulder, or my scalp
Plus, this was college—so there were
often
Happy Drunkards with much to say
barging in and out
leaving doors open
in their exuberance to be near
others of their kind

IV.
Once, after I divorced your father
and it was just you and I in our house,
when you were still in high school
Junior year? Senior? Old enough
to know that you knew Everything
and that I was Woefully Uninformed,
a dunce, really—which led to headache for you
(from all that eye-rolling)

During that time, we came home once
and found a large black bird in our house
though the windows were closed
The bird— possibly a crow possibly not
as that was one of the many things
I did not know in those days
or for that matter, in these days still

Back then, you threw a blanket
over the bird and carried it outside
where it could fly away
and did

Both of us blamed you for letting it in through
a long circuitous path tied to an unlatched garage door

Though, honestly, we never knew for certain
that it didn’t arrive from some parallel universe
Where Things Were Different

V.
When I was a small child, back in the days of pink and green mints in crystal dishes, my grandmother owned a parakeet she kept in a tall domed cage. They lived in my house, my grandmother and her bird.
Wings and cages made no sense to me when we were surrounded by windows, so I opened the cage, opened a window.
Later, there were tears.

Epilogue.
In last night’s dream,
our dogs killed the little gray bird
with its soft feathers and delicate black markings.
Not out of hunger or hunting instinct—
No, the bird was a casualty,
a side effect of Dog Exuberance.
Or that tiny, soft, most recent bird
was killed only for a coda
to close this latest chapter
in my life with the birds.

church of the lake
small, white clapboard
only opens in summer
May through September
for the lake people.

Already, now
before leaves even fall,
doors are locked, signboard
tucked away in the vestibule
and the forest returns
with its slow, steady gait

seedlings sprout on the brick front walk
wild grapevines trellis the entrance
pinecones and acorns toss themselves
along the path, make themselves at home

and the lake people?
Gone to their winter elements
some in cities far away
the others, with a small splash,
return to the deep waters
far down below the dying water lilies
Where they wait again for May

not a metaphor—
first morning of our school year
rain,
then a rainbow

the head of the history department
told me,
shaking his head,
Lately
I don’t have the attention span
for a whole book

He said more,
I think,
but I was
Distracted
and didn’t
hear any more

chilly August night,
first time in months,
dinner indoors—
garden tomatoes, basil,
zucchini dressed as pasta
a bottle of red wine,
dark chocolate you bought
just for me,
though I share.
We laugh and eat
and talk in early evening dark
of all the seasons ahead

We are used to each other, the flowering quince and I.
Neighbors now for over thirty years, we glimpse each other in
flashes
separated by long, oblivious stretches

all summer, next to this tree
I drank in my morning coffee and early skies

Our moods suited each other

she glowed pink with blossoms
and hummed, full of bees
until summer turned her lush and green

Her branches quieted,

as did mine

Good neighbor,
she knocks when needed.
Today, I look up and there she is—

Instead of a casserole or cup of sugar,
her arms, still green,
hold a scatter of yellow leaves
which fall at her feet
reveal the deep red fruit
growing all along
hidden
among bird nests and green shadows

She came to remind me
we all—woman, tree, everyone else—
work and change and grow
even when nobody else
notices and now
it’s time to pull in to our roots
drink up this summer sun
Ripen
and turn towards autumn

Stories from the world surround us if we listen.
It tells us tales we already know
and half-forgot,
the way you try to recount a dream over breakfast
frowning when you can only recall a shade of green
or a secret about to be told
hiding in the next turn of the stairwell

The trick is to listen. The world’s response, inevitable
The trick is
to find your own way—
where meaning and metaphor
meld
just as we melt together, half awake in the night

****************************************************

We talk on morning walks, the world and I.
I let the dog lead, with few rules. Sniff whatever
but only pee on street signs, utility poles, fire hydrants
Not the neighbor’s lawn ornaments bird baths realty signs

Never go back. Move ever forward.

The dog stops to drink from a puddle,
which he prefers to our kitchen’s clear water in his china bowl
I’ve known men like that.

Haven’t we all known men like that?

Down the block, the possibly stray black cat cries alone outside a back door
Oh, there have been long seasons of grief in all our lives, and will be again

And I’ve had whole years
sharp as the shards of broken glass
we swerve to avoid by the side of the road
None of us get to miss all the shattering
You have had those years too, I know

but today,
the world’s best story waits in my own garden
where enormous white hydrangea are barely blooming
weeks and weeks behind the rest of their kind
Mine are covered in beginner blossoms
and, as so much does these days,
it makes me think of you, love
of this romance whose weeks I’ve stopped counting

I choose instead what my hydrangea echoes back—
Savor this—
this leisurely flowering
the tissue paper blossoms
unwrapping
themselves
slowly—-flower by flower, chapter by chapter,
on this day, and then the next.
Enjoy every minute, every page of this, says the world
And ever practical, always recycling for its own sake,
the world adds—save all this softness. Later you can use it
to wrap all these scented moments
memories any girl would want to keep

Saturday’s bear
arrived two days after your dog
treed a smaller bear in the oak
at the bend in the driveway.

You could not be described as unconcerned
since, after all, the dog ignored your call to come
and you had no weapon
Not even a pocket knife, you said.

Still, there was a thread of excitement
in your voice as you told me.
Saturday’s bear was bigger
and, importantly for this story, farther away.

When I first spotted it, you estimated for me
in hundreds of yards—three, maybe four.
What I love wasn’t that he didn’t notice us
or that the dogs didn’t notice him.

It wasn’t even that I felt safe beside you
knowing you would shoot it if you had to,
if it came for us. Though I was glad.
None of that is what I love.

It was that you burst into song
And it was the Jungle Book,
Bare Necessities.
It was that you knew all the words
and sang them for me.

quiet is the small birds in the maple tree—
Here,
gone to the pear tree,
to the chestnut,
then back. Above
and below the notice
of the deer
or the two dogs.
They carry on their whole winged lives
in lucky trees

began on the quiet front porch,
coffee, berries, notebook
till too much sun
drove me to the back yard, beneath the trees
with coffee , berries, notebook
and the dog.
In the dappled light, I think
oh, what a summertime phrase it is—
‘dappled light’
and there is the seed of a morning poem
But
he has tangled
his long leash
again
by circling
from me to fish pond fountain to apple tree
to metal shed with its tantalizing scent
of woodchuck, past the clothesline and back to me.

His is a walking meditation

I untangle him
again. The third time, I threaten
to Put Him In The House
direst of dire and empty threats.
He circles, offers a damp toy
and his hopeful, goofy face
No, I say. No. I am writing and meditating, damn it.
Can’t you see how contemplative I am?
He drops the toy
on my foot
barks once
and wags his whole body
happy, happy, happy