Long ago
pride of a working farm
that old barn collapsed
folded in on itself
hay and horse stall
chicken musings
dung and rafters
opened to the rain
all the moments held
within the wooden walls
thoughts and breath of
cow and farm hand,
their worries and plans
and memories
released
to rise through the air
Opened To The Rain
birds and the shadows of birds
hours and hours
since our votes were cast
Counting takes time.
Any preschooler or store clerk
could tell you that.
Counting
Not even counting but
Waiting
while someone else
Counts.
birds and the shadows of birds
is a line of a poem
which flew in my window
and nestled in my lap
while I was meditating
or if I wasn’t meditating
I was at least sitting still
in flickering sunlight birds and the shadows of birds
is a line of a poem I
may never finish
seven counted syllables
the middle of a haiku
while I sit and breathe
not looking, not listening to news
Blind To Beauty
Yesterday was eight years since I posted my first poem here. I’ve missed several of these anniversaries, blinded by hurry, distracted by life. This year I remembered. No great epiphany, no poem resonating inside me. But at least I noticed. At least I was awake enough to my life to notice. And that, always, is the whole point of these poems. To mark a moment, to notice the life I’m living. Even when that life feels like a long, noisy, gray subway ride instead of a walk through the glorious autumn hills.
leaf peak arrived and left
on cloudy days, with fog
and more rain. Red, gold,
green fell and withered
while we–
chipmunk, squirrel, human
Scurried and gathered
easily distracted
and blind to beauty
Landscape Fancywork
as leaf glitter falls away
dark green threads of pine trees
reveal how the mountains
are stitched to the earth
If Autumn Is A Writing Prompt
Yesterday’s walk through autumn hills–
One maple, any color, is pretty.
Spectacular is hill after rolling hill
red, yellow, orange sprinkled with forest firs
above a still bright green field.
Halfway up, one tree is
deep maroon, nearly purple
We could paint this view, one of us says
But our schedules don’t match
I could do it alone, one of us says
But I won’t
Here, friends, a gift–
this could become a poem about
being better together, whether friends or trees,
or it might become an ode to maroon or maples
a singularity
or a rift on leaves and calendar pages
both shaken free, drifting on a caught breeze
It could turn into a poem
about words and leaves changing,
turning themselves and turning how we see
You decide–and let it be beautiful
Breakfast Pears
breakfast–
pears from the tree in your new yard
ground-picked, ripened
under the feet of insects, your cat, and
whoever else wanders by
while you sleep in your new house.
Last night, I dreamed of a bear who,
happy to see me,
wanted to climb into my car
Maybe he too walked
through the grass selecting pears
close enough to perfect
Impossible Schools: Another Teacher
“I’m not gonna lie,”
she says
all the time
and then does.
Hurtling Through The Unknown
On the news today I learn about
the Kessler syndrome, though it’s over forty years
old–a scientist named Doug said
that right about now
Now
we’ve filled space with too much junk from
space missions and satellites that keep slamming
into each other and breaking into smaller and smaller
pieces. Doug says a paint fleck, or a piece of metal the size of a grain of sand can destroy a satellite or space station and that soon this will make space unusable.
Huh.
I sip around the cracked rim of my coffee cup
chipped from my hasty dishwashing
and discover a poem from Macedonia
Martin, the poet, writes that the city is following us
and says the moon glimpsed between
skyscrapers from a cab to the airport
Will be the thing that stays the same.
So
Before I even finish my morning coffee
I contemplate beautiful words from far away
and destruction brewing in the sky
I must conclude that you and I
ought to stop hunching our shoulders
stop cowering before the unknowns and
Their Inevitable Arrival —showering us
With killing trash and transporting poetry
crickets still sing in the garden
not knowing (do they?)
that there’s a cold snap coming tomorrow
which will stop all songs beneath the hydrangeas
For a long, dark time. But they or
their descendents will (probably)
begin to sing again
next spring
Farmstand Art Installation
My favorite isn’t the new one painted red to resemble a barn,filled with bins of vegetables and miles of imported mums. I pass it by for the one small as an afterthought
On a working farm. One open roofed shed
faded to soft unpainted gray
A few shelves and a locked aluminum cash box but
Out front the father tipped a hay bale on its side painted it orange
with a jack o lantern face on one round edge
A long open cart roadside holds a few dozen mums grown behind the barns. The busy mom who teaches elementary school alternates colors while her 7th grade daughter prefers rows, a swath of yellow, then white, then deep red, then purple, orange, yellow again
The grandma is head of this artistic clan
her art installation pleases me every year
When she places the smallest pumpkins
miniature plump and orange
one on top of every fence post
where they’ll stay
till winter brushes them away
Pandemic Autumn
Amid such worries, this–
sunshiney weekend
hammock, book
Every so often a rest from reading
by filling up with maple trees
who shine and spangle in the breeze
Inventing the dappled light
here we were, for hours, full and green
Puff Of Smoke Poems 