--from a poem by Robert Sward
Anthology of poems, big jazz band
aren’t dancers beautiful as boats in a fog? Muscular
and sweaty, stubble in their armpits, and pubic hair.
Smelly as fish in a net. O it is good, fit
wherever you go, as Buddha said, the clarity of your own dream follows.
With a bitch
at every other can.
My dream is passing into fog-covered land.
Hard as I struggle to make the committee work significant
I am only passing time until my time is spent. Abstinent
but cognizant, so cognizant, of Dawn’s body
from her knees to her whirlwind hair, smooth tan skin, even her feet which
are like a man’s. A lady
I will love if I can.
Everything I try to do is sand,
a laughing leaf in a joking wind. Our particular war
forgotten on CNN, in a file cabinet with old car parts,
baseball cards, the instrument your dad played
(he wasn’t Pan), chickadees, woodpeckers, flycatchers, catbirds, Spring!,
the kids’ training potty before they
learned to use the can.
I’ve got lists of things I’ve done and
lists of things I never did but they don’t matter, do they? Right.
Singularly unhandsome, I can give a fright,
but I’m amazed at beauty hiding in plain sight.
The cranky saxophone, creaky trumpet section, ham-fisted drummer or the
wild edibles I’m bending over, tasting. Such dreams shall sustain me
when my coffin lid’s on tight
and I’m living in a can.
Copyright 2007 by Robert Ronnow.