HISTORY AND SECRECY
All the snow will fall
in the wrong place, and I will glimpse
the mountains. The mountains of the high
Himalaya. I was there once,
outside time, in the soft glow of the chilly morning
that yielded to a warmth in the afternoon.
Years ago, those moments eluding time.
We measure distance in the flight
of the travelling heart. I touched down
at the foot of the lake in Pokhara.
Then I knew all the names
of the mountains in their arrangement—
as I was standing there, as I was
being remade. The old life fell away,
the new life was at some distance,
I was between lives looking
at the snow-capped peaks.
History and secrecy will bring you to the verge
but not beyond it. You’ll have to carry
yourself beyond the limited extent
of everything you’ve known and been
and ever been. To stand there in the morning
light of Nepal and be everything,
and nothing much at all.
GIRASOL
So he loved her.
That boy or young man.
Chased the ghost of love
an entire lifetime,
until he was old.
She touched him
when he was vulnerable.
There were stories
in their encounters,
elaborate stories
that wound through past lives.
But none of them were his.
He was a newborn angel,
in love
with a wavering sunflower.
THE BUSINESS OF LIFE
Who you’re going to fall in love with,
who you’ll befriend, the work you’ll do,
the children you’ll have,
what they’ll be like, how they’ll look—
I know all that now.
I got on with the business
of life, and then, one day,
it left me here, with everything
explained.
So now I want to go back
to the carefree days
of being a child,
being like a child,
tired of the residue
of adult responsibilities.
Put me out in the morning
and tell me not to come back
until suppertime.
I want to ramble around
getting into
all sorts of trouble.
AMONG THE PAGES
Let’s move from page to page.
There are scenarios, difficulties,
the things we forget
in the lines we forgot.
Once upon a time it was
November of 1985.
John was writing a poem on a placemat
as a barfight was breaking out—
we were in the Yukon
waiting for a plane.
Returning to our Susans.
It had been a long week
in a short friendship
that lasts beyond death.
