grand piano truck

There are eight pianos in the church:
an embarrassment of riches.

We have three baby grands, stepsisters:
one brown as old shoe leather, mumbling
in a corner in her tattered robe;
one waiting patiently beneath
the cracked dome,
a jilted bride who hums and preens
all unawares;
and the old-money heiress, reduced
to yearning for young, afluent hands
in shot cuffs;
she is still sleek, still supple
and subtle,
and laying in wait, she seems to submit.

We own four uprights, jolly aunts
raddled by Sunday School generations,
scraped and banging and tune-
resistant, telling their tales
of merciless wickedness.

We have a grand - the great bony dame
lounging amongst the cabinets filled
with sheets of choral music, crumbling.
Forgotten in her faded ball
gown, grown weak;
til resurrected and re-tuned;
resigned to plunking schoolgirls.
And yet, thundering unexpectedly,
like a whale, she wallows in the dim
fluorescent twilight
of the music room,
her heart an echo chamber.

Into their lives, the moving men
with mob-worn faces and union cards,
with hard forearms and rolled-up sleeves, they know
their women.
Easing the curve of an operatic hip
and the slender reserve of a delicate leg
'round the frame of a door,
coaxing them out -- the girls
will moan and protest
and gasp in their shame at the wide-
awake world; the moving men
who know too well
the damage done, will curse
and wait, light cigarettes
and wait some more.
And gradually, with much creaking complaint
the ladies will consent to be touched
and promenade
with elephant grace
up the gangplank to
Jerusalem.

may

outside the air is all lilac
and the inner thigh of the earth
is the promise
of resurrection
I hear the trains below
smell the backyard fires, no stars
and like the whore in love
resist the impulse

I listen, and think

oh, I will wait for you
to the end of my days
and sing my bullshit ballad
of your purity
I will lay down my Karen Carpenter
keep time
against the pulse of the hummingbird
snare, why do stars
suddenly appear?

in suburban alleyways
maternal mop and bucket
at my side
the night air smells of lilac
cats moan, trains throb
and I will keep time

the unknown choir

in the spring
or
at the spring
i cannot recall

the voices of those men in unison
playing their ungodly harmonies against my spine
so close I can hear their sinews
shivering
in the cold of Eastern Europe, in the careful
composition of state-sponsored culture
that has born unknowing
the ache of sex and birth, the keen of loss
in voice, in a simple air that leaves the mouth
across the instrument
of the soul.

for Georgette

The gate of your studio is locked
though the mail comes and goes.

I play the coward:
last month I left a note that I wrote
on a styrofoam cup that I found
on the curb: came by, it said
thinking of you.

I know you're waiting -
not for me, but for his yahrzeit,
and the walls are bare.
White canvas, a void you can't fill: an imprint
of flesh on the bed,
of hands in clay, and the smell
of him, fading.

But walk a little way in the orchard,
and you see how the tree's roots extend.
The children,
coined and partnered now, and parenting,
aligned in their beauty, their faces
speak to you now of him.
In row after row of days
their hands still reaching up,
the seed bears forth,
and spring rushes over us.
And surely the people are grass.

You taught me
how to put stones on a grave
and I am foolish
but I stand here at your gate,
for the moment,
with empty hands.

monroe street, 9 a.m.

there is no mistaking blood
on the sidewalk, if it's fresh
and each time reminds me of the last
and of the city:
people walking
their feet keep moving
in spite of the wounds
and they take the straight paths
whether or not
they have some place to go.

this time, it's a blood trail
just a splash, like a raindrop
every ten paces or so.
(last time was on the bridge,
the splashes were larger,
closer together,
and ended in a pool beneath
the bus bench.)

tiny drops, really
like a bloody nose -
a young man, I'll bet,
walking fast.
they never carry tissues. just let it drip.
it will stop
on its own.
Or, perhaps, it was
the man two seats in front of me last week
who could not stay awake.
full bus, aisle seat, the woman
beside him pressed against the window,
not looking.
he was doubled over his knees,
nodding, and seemed about to land
in the aisle. I hoped hard for a bench
to open up, so he could lean.

And it did, he switched;
now right before me. I could smell
how much he needed a safe place.
he kept jerking upright:
wouldn't even rest his head on the side
of the bus, why? wake with a start,
furiously rubbing his nose, and one eye
and he turned, his hood
sliding part way back, and I saw
the dirt and blood on his skin.
hunted.

but today it was probably some punk
instead; allergies, you know?
no one sees.

untitled

the tale end of winter:
by degrees barely endurable
ascending
into air and light again,
out of the trenches

roadside snowbank layers shift
according to the tilting axis
and reveal amongst the leaden sediments
signs of passage:
things we lost

subduction:
as those same degrees at planetary pace
reveal the grim debris,
the earthquake-strewn, down along the fault lines
down in summer's ruins
low in the latitudes

the light shines in a bottle
(and the darkness does not overcome it)
one warms his hands over a burning barrel
(or a burning bush)
we dig away the filth that blurs our souls
we yearn

Envy

for DJS


I've seen more tears shed in the daylight
than I've ever cried
Have watched the hours slide
across the sleepers' faces
silent, like weeping
Have cried my tears alone, at the bottom of night.

Can't make myself lucky that way.

There's easy grace in those who wear
their sorrows well,
who gratefully take compassion's arm,
and pace the widening aisles of peace.
I cower, coward in myself,
am only brave enough to covet the reward
for what I can't release.

And I'll grow older in the hollow rooms.

Tears left un-shed don't fill the well.

They trickle down the walls and sparkle
in the darkening air, hang like a haze
trapped in the beams
of passing cars, they make a noise like chimes,
like beaded curtains stirred
by breath of slumbers.

Envy is hungry, an open hand
where minutes, dreams and sleep
and memories keep
until they turn from tears to sand.