Puff Of Smoke Poems

Before there was luggage
we only kept what we could carry
in our arms
jumbled together everything
visible to the world
Then we invented luggage
Suitcases purses bags of all kinds—
messenger duffel lunch garment
velcroed and zippered tightly
wrapped, manageable though heavy
Eventually, having already invented
the wheel, we glued them
to the bottom of our baggage
Now our burdens can glide behind us
like obedient versions of puppies
and keep pace as we try
to hurry away.

Prayer flags strung
on the white barn
walls such servants
will hold with patience
all the peculiar evidence
of our desires
picture paper paint prize
holding still while we measure
what fits with the couch
or comforts the cows

his flannel shirt
clothesline-dried
its whole long life
fades, softens by seasons,
sways in this summer’s
breeze this same
breeze the barn opens to
brisk through autumn
flows to blizzard
barn shrugs and smiles
settles into its
patch of well-loved earth

Contentment and loneliness
paint such different pictures with
the same through line of
Quiet

in the space below morning’s birds
a slow sound and I don’t know
if it’s the candle guttering
or the cat purring by the door or
the low song of the washing machine
drifting in from the kitchen

or may be
it’s my sweet old house
humming to itself

Only teachers and moms
have trouble with this,
said the waitress.
Everyone else
throws money on the table
until someone says,
Enough.

But in us some force
rises to battle chaos
to whittle the world
into percentages
until it turns out
Fair for everyone.

She says,
Those dented boxes
you have stuffed
full of old photos
and ink-faded letters?
The dusty boxes stacked
precariously in the corner
(stacked on your heart,
stacked in the corner of your eye)
Oh, what you built there,
she says,
Those are a metaphor.

red flowers green leaves
blade of grass on the lawn chair
shaped its summer self
to this long distinctive curve
an ornament hook
in search of a holiday

over the thousand summers
all this music was here
pinned to the cool white door

is how I would describe
their tastiness to the
movie dinosaurs
whose every roar and
gnash was restated
Loudly so the whole theater
could enjoy the talents of
the two women behind us,
women formerly known
as obnoxious who I would now
characterize as deliciously crunchy

in every sense of the word.

why have clocks and pockets at all
unless occasionally I empty them
past all bits of lint and wrappers
past every squandered hour
and spend it all
for the joy of not measuring
and for the sweet relief of
After