The Longest Month and Other Poems

iUniverse

Contents

    1. The Longest Month


    Age brings its own small regimen of loss,
    Which sometimes spills its venom as pure grief;
    And something like a fury tries to toss
    Such feelings into limbo for relief;

    Such was the case six years ago when I
    Woke up one morning to an empty bed;
    Esther had gone, but that was no reason why
    I could not be befriended in her stead.

    About five hundred months before, I guess,
    We'd met a couple accidentally
    Who, like us, loved books and beasts, and yes,
    The husband taught psychology, like me;

    They moved away, after two years or so,
    To a new job in a brand-new teaching-place;
    But phone calls and letters and Christmas cards would go
    Unceasingly, year after year, to their address

    For nearly forty years, till Esther died;
    I struggled on another six alone;
    But then the husband crossed to the other side;
    And the wife, by way of talk and telephone

    Began to ease into her widowhood.
    Some days after his death, I heard from her
    On an April day when I wasn't feeling good
    About being an unconfirmed bachelor


    A state of which I'd never been too fond
    I asked to see her, if she could get away;
    She acquiesced, and later, did respond
    That she'd come here, but not till the end of May,

    A wait of more than a month, that was; this wait
    Would seem long, with time seeming slow,
    Involving hours reluctant to accumulate,
    Spinning, instead, their spans adagio;

    And so I wrote a poem with no date;
    It was written on an April day so cold
    That Spring could only be classified as late;
    But then it was that an endeavour bold

    Reared up from the indecorum of my brain:
    I'd write her one or more poems every day
    Until we'd meet each other once again
    At the end of that interminable May.


    2. Hope


    I see my escarpment's landscape fraught with rain
    That lashes at my windows, Chanticleer
    Crowing at vicious Time; but you were here,

    Absent in person, but present on the phone;
    Before the rain began, you spoke, and I
    Felt a move immense of tumbled sky

    And regal hope that life would once again
    Heave and remove all tumbrils out the way
    So that, with death removed, I'm free to say

    All that I'd wanted to say to you alone:
    That what I feel can nothing other be
    Than a magnificent hope to be with thee.


    3. Realities


    If you, inspiratrix, be what you seem,
    Then spur me out from any vapid dream
    And throw realities real into a stream
    Of verses that never fear to sound extreme.


    4. A Cold End of April #1


    Into the brightness of an onslaught day,
    The coldness of the morning seems
    A restful and reliable beginning.
    But it's zero degrees;

    The sun shines clearly and resplendently
    On sloping roots and branchy arms
    And a car moves slowly down a modest hill;
    Its lights are on;

    How trustworthy is this promise of same-day sun?
    It can fold back on itself, contorting;
    It can curl up, like a girl in a sun-shell's clutch;
    Or not;

    My frolicking with Nature as were she you
    Speaks to my want to do what you want too.


    5. A Cold End of April #2


    I must admire what Nature does right here
    When Spring abandons Winter, and the sun
    Outsprays its steady path with overrun
    Of light upon our heady atmosphere;

    I think of you there, away, afar; I grope
    At an image of a solemn courageous You
    Looking at fields from the ramp that steadily drew
    You both to your house-door up its steady slope;

    His walking slowed as the autumn sun grew red;
    And then came frost and a frivolous ice and snow
    That brought you rigor mortis in its slow
    Infilling of the footprints you'd both made;

    I look at your image, then slowly turn away
    To stare at the coldness that dominates today.


    6. Old Photographs


    Old photographs that contrast black and white
    Are all we have of former eras drear;
    And though a family would starve itself a bit,
    They'd still finance a photo every year;

    And nothing seems odd about the way they stand,
    Or old about their bygone vanity;
    The men stare out, their egos well in hand;
    Deftly, the women display their sanity;

    And you have family long pedigreed;
    You would fit well, a hundred years ago,
    Into a family photograph decreed
    To be a modest record that would show

    The unforgettability of their name;
    But you, by yourself, yield the portrait I would frame.


    7. Now


    You're blurry, like a 1960s photo;
    Come now, move into the light of Now;
    Let your long youthful hair of yesteryear
    Float into the world you have right here,
    Where life goes on, though Nature's colours die,
    And your greying hair tells truth that cannot lie.

    From long-gone times, your hair has fallen loose;
    Your raven hair that captured Night-time's noose
    In a falling valley-sphere of youth and light
    Still falls (but with less of black and more of white)
    Down on your dreamy shoulders; I start to shake
    When I think what a treasure it would be to take

    One hand to caress the crispness of one tress
    While the other retrieves the anatomy of your dress.


    8. A Wall


    A wall of passive rocks around a dell
    Whispers to all of me how all of you
    Might lie, luxurious and green, within
    A wall of over-geological hardness,
    Repelling visitors who only want to call;
    But deep inside, you know the wall must fall.

    I stand, humble and entrenched, outside
    That unaesthetic rocky palisade
    That you present to most, impeccably.
    But you must realize that there, beyond
    Your fort, lies a waiting wonderland
    That you can bring to blossom with your hand;

    And as you watch its foliage rise and swell,
    Luxurious green on all would weave its spell.


    9. Foliage


    Blooms that burst through their charismatic buds
    Sing eloquent blossoms of upward-burgeoning song
    Of how the new world of this emphatic Spring
    Mirrors the world to which I now belong
    Where you are Arch-Chief and Excellency.

    I do not want to move to upper heights
    Where golden skies meet cataracts of sun
    In a springtime spread, mosaic, to the stars;
    I'd rather stay, nestled within the union
    Of cup and flower that symbolize your You,

    And see, through the overshading overplay
    Of veined leaves and branching foliage,
    How the light of the sky shades slowly into night
    As darkness's mantle of black falls to engage
    Your beauty and your arch bewitchingness.


    10. You Stand Alone


    O You, to what a depth you engulf and riddle me
    With endless concoctions of all your smiling ways,
    Leaving me nothing to do but surrender and crown you
    With verses dispensing all shapes and all manners of praise!

    You can stand alone in a field, with a darkening sky
    Distilling the start of an evening smitten with cold.
    Your hat is on tight, but your hair has unravelled itself
    And now moves, in a flapping endeavour, to frisk and to hold,

    At moment A, your neck, or, at moment B, your arm;
    You stand alone; the stubble of August lies prostrate;
    The earth breathes out on itself to reduce any chances
    It freeze; you look out at the landscape you dominate

    And see only winter; but, here, I can give you more choice;
    I've told you how much I adore the mezzoish sound of your voice.


    11. May Day — May 1, 2015


    It's May the first, and all the willow trees
    That sprinkle my hillside's eminence shine green,
    Completely out of kilter with the browns
    That mark those other trees still standing leafless,
    Unfruitful still from winter's overtime,
    And days away from what they should have been;

    And here I sit with pen poised here to write
    That, countering drab, those willow-greens stand out
    Just as you, in my mental world of friends and kin,
    Stand out as she who woke me awake today,
    The First of May; her image filled my mind,
    Where it was anchored by a lack of doubt;

    I pray that that other 'mayday' never show
    Where thoughts that came first are also the first to go.


    12. Appearances — May 1, 2015


    I'm getting thin, the muscles loose and spare,
    Not like a ballerina's glorious arms,
    Taut and smooth, so smooth I dare not speak,
    But signalling age, like a woman's underchin
    Or the balladic duct of an overwrinkled breast.

    I must evade new nervousness and rue;
    I must uphold the Chanticleer of youth,
    And never spurn the offered open thigh,
    But traverse, as if remorseless, open facts,
    And cancel dreams to registers of nothing;

    For I know how your ravishing thinness fattens me;
    It lures, with its spread of smooth alluringness,
    Me to the mettle of you, riveted upon
    The tender pliability of your being.


    13. May 2, 2015


    Daylight accumulates, dimly dawning,
    At six, on the hour, of the second of May;
    I quietly think "what a beautiful morning"
    And figure I'll quietly get work done today;

    For mornings that total to twenty-seven
    Stretch to the 29th of May,
    And I think I suspect that "pennies from heaven"
    Will muddle my songs of "where antelopes play";

    So I'll bury myself in my bookworm's haven,
    Eat cheaply to save for the last days of May,
    Pretend to the world that "I ain't misbehavin'"
    And chase any jinxes out of the way,

    Till finally dawns, on May 29,
    The day when your eyes might lock onto mine.


    14. Duty — May 2, 2015


    Twist the lissom ribbons of revenge,
    But subtly, so that when you write them down,
    No one can ferret out their magnitude
    Or claim that you're a coward or a clown;

    Hint subtly of a hidden vein of malice,
    Betray a tiny taste of malignity,
    And barricade with rounded words your anger,
    And all the time display a dignity;

    Keep hidden, if you can (but you cannot),
    What vengefulness seepeth from your inner wounds,
    And hide what would be howls of torrent-anguish
    Beneath a lacy veil of pretty sounds;

    For poets have a dreadful call to duty,
    Where only the Good is stored with sonic beauty.


    15. I Want To ... — May 2, 2015


    I want to trace new writings on the sky
    That state how your many virtues stir my own,
    But I'd fear unfeigned mockery from passers-by.

    I want to weld great sculptures on small fields
    That symbolize how your empathetic artistry
    Inspires a reverence that to no one yields;

    I want to build tall buildings high on the tops
    Of cliffs and mountains, blazoning to the world
    An admiration for you that never ever stops;

    I want to play, to angel's music that breaks their hearts,
    So full it is, full-panoplied, of you,
    Maestro and mistress at once of the musical arts;

    And if you think all this exaggerates,
    So what? Too little only irritates!


    16. May 3, 2015


    I spread a carpet of thick marigolds
    To greet the sunshine of this third of May;
    There's not a cloud in this high and hopeful sky,
    And after winter's furore, one asks why
    A record heat should permeate today;

    No cloud disturbs this high and halcyon blue;
    The lake is paler blue and seems to wait
    For heat to spread its hospitable change
    Out to all edges of the Lakeshore's range,
    Restoring what winter had failed to decimate;

    We have such luck to know we'll meet when Spring
    Spreads its eternity over everything,
    And crocuses with petals widely splayed
    Fade to give way to Summer's cavalcade.


    17. Words — May 3, 2015


    I trust that what's predictable will ensue
    And blatant affection, built over many years,
    Will give to you the credit you are due,
    And I receive what's sadly in arrears,

    The doting recognition I am me,
    With perhaps a hint or thrust of gratitude
    That you cognize my true sincerity
    When I heap upon your head beatitude

    For your being you, a sylph of stony rage
    Supplanted by a wreath of welcome wit,
    And dicta drained of subtle subterfuge,
    And approbated words that you transmit

    In sounds across the telephone when you
    And I discuss what we might plan to do.


    18. People — May 3, 2015


    You — I speak of you — display
    A growing affability
    Which, fern-like, widens every day
    With manifold sagacity
    To tell me what you want to say
    With unabashed tenacity.

    You — I speak of women — show
    Adaptions to whatever is,
    But deep beneath your outer glow
    You seek a future armistice
    "Where men may come and men may go"
    But women will preserve the peace.

    And I — as a man — must sigh and sit,
    Worrying about the cost of it.