Poems, for those who go for this sort of thing

I spent a summer working as a legal intern for the Sokoagon Chippewa Tribe in Mole Lake, Wisconsin. One day I took my bike out for a lunch time ride and found myself along the shore of a lake where an ancient battle had taken place. Despite the threat of thunder clouds rolling in, I stood in the rain and looked over the waters. Years later, I wrote this:

Bones

Thundering, dripping clouds
Dropping, sploshing, plopping in the shallow lake
Where the bones of warriors lie submerged
Ancient braves who defended well and died better still
Undaunted in the face of a superior foe
Matching the invaders blow for blow and then more
Two blows or three blows or even four
Until the enemy visage cracks to doubt
So the braves yell and strike with redoubled fury
Felling two or three or four for every one
Turning fortune, altering fate, striking awful tomahawk blows at defeat
On the shores of the lake where I stand listening to the splish-splosh consecration of the sacred muck beneath the waves


My Father’s Demise

Featureless face - pallid, sunken
Death by cancer - walking a plank
Of indeterminate length for years,
But now the edge is clear:
Liver failure delirium
Seeing things that are not there
Who am I?
It doesn’t matter, dad,
Sit
Rest
Be calm
Okay, okay we’ll take you,
But we have to go slow
Ready? 1,2,3
Whoa! There you go
Around?
Around the house?
Okay.
Hold on - here we are,
Let’s go outside
Shuffling on this journey ...
Something, his eyes suggest
That something lies behind them
Something that is him
And he chases that something
In a bathrobe and slippers shuffling
Like the races he used to run
As if he moves he will find it
In delirium
Or the spring sun

Antigo

Dirty little town of my dreams
Fragment of paradise
Skating or lolling or swinging or batting or chasing
or hiding or seeking
Kitchen sink filled with suds and dishes
and my grandmother’s able arthritic hands
The mincemeat cookies in the jar I smell
The ham or turkey roasting in the oven
So so beautiful heat in the kitchen
And the sweet savory scent and the mince-
meat cookies and the cold, cold milk
My mother and my grandmother chatting about
names I do not know - I revel in the womb-like
comfort of their voices, the homest home,
The beautiful space before everyone arrives,
before I am summoned or shooed or noticed,
It cannot last, I know it cannot last so I
visualize ‘unobtrusive’ and try to be,
to vanish, as if I could disappear
and marmorialize this into an eternal pose;
But my father calls and all is lost
As my grandmother’s hands take the empty glass
And plunge it into the soapy water

To the Dead Roaring
The consequence of listening
Is bondage, as Nietzsche knew
And I am unfree
But without regret
So I write
To the dead roaring

Sojourn
Shoulder to shoulder on a driftwood seat
Staring at the steel gray waters;
Cold - the vapor trails of our breath -
Makes us nestle closer.
Close enough to smell her hair -
That inimitable scent,
Heart quickening scent,
Crowding out sight and sound
And I am lost in the dream of her …

I Went to a Buddhist Temple In Waukesha, Wisconsin
The ancient Sanskrit chant
Barely perceptible
A floating dandelion tuft kissing your cheek
Passing unannounced, almost
This rhythm, slow and predictable,
The hum beneath the monks’ words
The space between saffron robe and them
Redeemable and necessary
Framing time then folding it in prayer
Familiar faces and a stranger
Welcoming the shoeless and floor-bound,
Offering gifts and repast
And wisdom and peace