Arriving

Thinking too much

About time these days,

How it builds,

Delivering its rewards,

Silting in bittersweetly,

Remembering how

You arrived 17 years ago

On a day like this,

Clear and crisp,

Returning from Boston

In the old Volvo station wagon,

Coming in "the back way"

Of the Cape,

How I made sure

My mind took a snapshot

Passing the town line 

Into Pigeon Cove:

Precious cargo in the rearview,

A small bundle swaddled,

Slumping slightly sideways

Sleeping in your car seat,

Driving with such care,

With little idea

Of what I was

Doing, but

Knowing where I was 

Taking you:
Home.

Woods Walk, Late October

Ice in, steam out.

The scratch of air

Spiriting the lungs,

Fogging the trail.

Blue sky blazes a path

All the way

To the stubby

Bone of moon.

And at your feet,

Below the decay,

Gray fists of granite

Knuckle up 

From the ground

Immovable, difficult, intractable,

Like these darkening days.

Filling Out Forms at Fifty

This was not my idea.

I had something else in mind —

Not this scramble of codes

And hodgepodge of names and dates,

This alphabet soup.

This was not in The Plan.

Or was it?

This is how to get better:

Accept the assignment,

Follow directions,

Complete the task,
Move it along.

Halloween, 2006

Two daughters,

The younger a pirate,
The older a witch,

Together,

And yet their own,

So much their own,

Scurry up the walkway,

Little voices announcing,

“Trick or Treat.” 

Mine. Ours. Theirs.

Moments. Days. Years.

The time ticks — or tricks.

Tonight’s rare, mild wind blows.

Clouds creep across a half moon.

You watch from the curb, 

Knowing, suddenly and sadly,
They are not yours to keep.

One is six, the other is nine.

They’re filling their bags
One house at a time.

October, New England

When you deliver
Your promise,

No climate, no day,

No tropical paradise

Or Provencal locale

Can match your beauty.

Your skies contain

Cobalt blue

And errant wisps of cloud

Placed there to please the eye.

“Sweater weather,” we locals

Call it, noting the cool air

And warm sun,

A perfect pitch and pivot

Between light and dark,

Life and death,

Fecundity and decay,

Keeping the heart on edge,

Enough to call forth

Its truest truths.

Heart Muscle Memory

The heart gets

Ahead of the head.

So be it.

Winding downhill

At the turn of day.

So be it.

No regrets,

To love as you love,

Mushy as it is,
A kind of
Scatteration of emotion.

You gave it away, freely.

There is no subtraction there —
Only addition.

You gave it away in moments,

Little things, swerves of action,

And came up short somehow.

The whole arc of things

Imploring the head

To slow down,
But the heart says: Don’t.

Anonymity of a Tuesday: A Found Poem

Tuesday, February 18, 1964*:

The first 50 French soldiers land

at the Libreville International Airport

    to intervene

    in the political coup

    at Gabon. The rebels respond

    by closing the airport

    but fail to establish

    obstacles.

The Beatles were taken

to the training camp of

boxer Cassius Clay

      — later known as Muhammad Ali —

who was preparing for

his 25 February fight

against heavyweight champion

Sonny

Liston.

On the “The Andy Williams Show,”

Andy’s guests are Dick Van Dyke, Irene Ryan,

and four-year-old Marie Osmond, who makes her debut.

    Andy and Marie

    perform “Lida Rose.”

    Marie sings and

    dances with Andy:

Lida Rose, I'm home again,
Rose to get the sun back in the sky.
Lida Rose, I'm home again,
Rose about a thousand kisses shy.

 *Events on the day I was born.