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In Sickness

I made a note for the idea behind this poem when my wife was dying from refeeding syndrome in 2018. At the time, I was way too close to the matter to even think about writing a poem like this. But, now some time has passed, and my wife survived to regain her health again.

In Sickness

If I knew then what now I know,
  would I still take the vows?
Would I still pledge my life to you
    beneath the cherry boughs?

      Your arms are like a skeleton;
        your face is gaunt and frail.
      A bag is taped against your side
          collecting what you spill.

Would I still bear the looming loss
  if somehow then I knew
what “sickness” meant so long ago
    within that heavy vow?

      You vomit everything you eat;
        your heart rate will not slow.
      Each day it seems you’re nearer yet
          the place we all must go.

The truth is, I have no idea—
  The man I was back then
might well have taken every step
    to circumvent this end.

      The doctors at the hospital—
        They have no reason why
      you will not stabilize and heal—
          I fight back bitter sighs.

But he is not the man that’s here.
  For all my fear and grief,
I will not turn away from you
    so long as you draw breath.

Turns out there is a fairly high percentage of cancer patients who die from refeeding syndrome—a metabolic cascade failure that ends in death—especially with large stage 3 tumors. This is because the tumor takes all the body’s nutrients, essentially starving the patient. When the tumor is gone, the effect can be just like the prisoner of war returning to a normal diet for the first time after rescue, which can trigger the syndrome.

Unfortunately, it seems most doctors don’t know to look for this. It was pure chance that someone on my wife’s medical team realized what was happening and started the protocol for saving her life—parenteral nutrition. This means being fed intravenously until the body remembers how to correctly metabolize food through the digestive system on its own.

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The Seekers

I am not currently working on any project poems, and I don’t plan to start one any time soon. Hopefully this means my mental space will be freed up for more spontaneous writes such as this:

The Seekers

For as long as I can remember
I’ve watched them grope,
fumbling through dark places
over jagged, uneven surfaces.

I’ve watched them wander long
grey corridors, faces gaunt,
shoulders slouching faded sighs,
feet reechoing short, tired scuffs.

I’ve seen their distorted figures
through stain glass windows, heads
bowed, arms raised, faces creased
with longing for the slightest sign.

I’ve even seen them half concealed
by timbers on their way to peaks
and rivers to seek out some hidden
solace, some priceless psychic gem.

But, somehow I think it’s up there,
slipping between the stars, bits
and pieces sometimes flaring bright
streaks of insight within the night.

This was sparked more by a feeling than a thought. The feeling was invoked by a poem I read in a Facebook group, though I can no longer recall the poem or what it was about. Four of the five stanzas actually formed very quickly, but it didn’t feel finished, so I put it aside for a while. This was a few months back.

Recently I looked at it again and just kind of knew where and what the missing stanza should be and then it was done. Funny how that works.

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Boxcars

During my early 20s I was friends with a man who was also one of the staff who worked at the last residential home I lived in as a teen—not long before I ran away. I was still pretty feral in those days, so I eventually ended up damaging the relationship beyond repair and never saw or heard from him again.

But before this happened he passed on a piece of wisdom to me during a time when I really needed to hear it that involved a new way of looking at and dealing with my thoughts—seriously dark thoughts and intentions that absorbed a great deal of mental space in those days:

Boxcars

A steel-bell clamor echoes through the air
in time with frenzied flashes warning red;
the long arm of the crossing gate is down;
behind it boxcars rumble down the rails.

Some are old, the corrugated frames
bleed rustic patterns through the faded paint.
Some are new, unblemished angles gleam
the colors of a harvest fresh from field.

The doors gape wide, revealing vivid worlds
that move within the spaces as they pass,
each one reflecting back a hope, a fear,
a grim regret, a powerful desire.

The spacious confines beckon one by one—
the broken promises, the lasting doubts,
the things that could have been, the grand designs—
the vengeful plans that ache within the heart.

The cars move slowly—such that if you ran,
you could with little trouble hop aboard
and there within the confines of a thought
be carried off away to who-knows-where.

Nearby a tunnel opens to a plane
of deep uncertainty; it is from here
the many cars emerge to clangor by
and disappear around a far off bend.

I’ve been here many times throughout the years,
the way ahead obscured by vagaries
that mesmerize the mind with strange allure
and goad the impetus to jump aboard.

Sometimes a car would pass reflecting back
distorted visions holding such appeal
the urge to run and climb aboard would quell
all sensibility and self control.

Then suddenly I’d find myself within
a lucid fancy on that train of thought,
so thoroughly immersed in reverie
I soon lost sight of where I was or went.

And drifting through the shadows of a dream
of what could be or what there might have been—
or some depraved indulgence deep within—
I found myself displaced from all that is.

And only after hours, days, or weeks
would I regain my senses and return
to where I was before I leapt aboard
whatever fancy lured me from my path.

But through the years I’ve learned to let them pass,
allowing each to come and each to go
until once more the way ahead is clear,
the red caboose diminishing from view.

What he told me was simple: Instead of denying or rebuking the thoughts that troubled me, allow them to come, and then allow them to go—like the boxcars on a freight train at a train crossing. Let them come; let them go. Don’t hop on and get taken for a ride.

It took a while—many years in fact—but I worked at it and gradually got better at this practice. It helped a lot when I one day realized that the process of rebuking and trying to deny the thoughts and feelings that troubled me was also a form of hopping aboard.

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The Two Gods

The idea for this poem goes back to my early 20s—more than half a lifetime ago. I guess it took me a while to find the brain-space to flush it out.

The Two Gods

The Concrete God and the Abstract God sat down one day for tea
to talk about affairs of fate and solemn mysteries.

“They named this city after me,” The Concrete God began.
“There rising at its center looms my monument by man.

“Night and day they praise my name within the vaulted hall,
beseeching after every kind of blessing great and small.”

The Abstract God was unimpressed by what was said, yet smiled,
“This tea is quite delicious, and the evening air is mild.”

“And what of you,” the Concrete God went on, “Who praises you?
Where are your names reechoed up by altar, mat or pew?”

The Abstract God drank down another sip of tea and gazed
across the sprawling cityscape where spires loomed in haze,

the ones to which the Concrete God referred wherein his name
reverberates from ancient walls of stone with high acclaim.

The Concrete God raised prying eyes, still waiting for reply;
the Abstract God took in a breath and started with a sigh,

“Those who know me also know there is no name for me.
I am the breeze that bends the grass and moves the canopy;

I am the light that shimmers through between the shifting leaves,
the rumpling sound that rises up where wandering waters weave.”

The Concrete God now took a sip and pondered what was said;
And then, “No name! It seems to me the nameless are the dead.”

“Perhaps,” the Abstract God replied, “if you are bound to name,
its absence may induce a state that’s very much the same.

“But I have been since long before the conscious thought occurred
to name each thing the mind perceives or manifests with words.”

“But surely there’s a name for you,” the Concrete God appealed,
“for humankind is wont to name whatever is revealed.”

“They name the things they see and feel,” the Abstract God returned,
“but I exist beyond the reach of what can be discerned.

“They name the grass; they name the leaf; they name the brook and breeze;
they name the very thoughts they think; but I am none of these.”

The Concrete God looked down his nose, “And yet I heard you say
that there are those who know you here among the living clay.”

“Indeed,” the Abstract God again, “but as I said before,
they also know I have no name to worship and adore.”

“And so the ones who come to know me simply let it rest,
an understanding freed from nouns embedded in the breast.”

The Concrete God threw up his hands, “This makes no sense at all—
to be an entity that’s known but none can ever call.”

“Indeed,” the Abstract God agreed, “for reason cannot name
a thing beyond the reach of thought to give it form and frame.”

“Alright,” the Concrete God again, “but surely there are those
who bind their understanding to a name they can depose.”

“There are, my Friend,” the Abstract God said gently. “But, you see,
this is precisely just the way it is you came to be.”

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Specter

I’ve been seeing a therapist off and on over the past couple of years. My goal was to try to make sense of an unnamed trauma that has had a powerful influence on my state of mind and emotion for as far back as I can remember.

The work we did was forensic in nature, looking at what I do know and can remember of my life through the lens of various schools of psychology. It was attachment theory that led somewhere, as this revealed that I likely suffered extreme neglect during my first 3 years of life. I’m unable to verify this, however, because family who still live exist in a state of perpetual attempts to gaslight and deny.

Specter

She made me …
  from filaments of stardust
    mixed with the loess
      of broken dreams

She bore me …
  stark into the light of rage
    and left me naked, crying
      deep in an empty well

She gave me …
  poison fruit from a withered tree
    and i ate, having lost all hope
      of anything more

She made me …
  the imago of her darkest dread
    an ever present specter looming
      deep within her afterthought

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Greensleeves (a retelling)

One of my all time favorite melodies is “Greensleeves”, especially the chorus. Yet I’ve always found it difficult to fully enjoy because the lyrics are so incredibly chauvinistic. The song is basically about a man feeling “cast off” by his love interest after showering her with gifts, attention, and the promise of status—implying in no uncertain terms that she’s a soulless bitch for having a mind and a heart of her own.

Even so, I’ve found myself singing the first few verses over and over again all my life. But something happened a few years back; I began to experiment with alternative lyrics as I sang. This eventually inspired me to go all out revising this song about personal rejection into a tragic lament about lost love:

Greensleeves

Alas, my Dear, you are dead and gone,
your spirit cast on the starry sea.
And I have loved you oh so long,
delighting in your company.

  Greensleeves was my heart of Joy—
  Greensleeves, my one true love.
  Greensleeves was my sole delight.
  And, who but my Lady Greensleeves.

We met beneath an ancient ash.
Her youthful leaves danced in the sun.
A stream ran near with gentle plash.
We talked until the day was done.

All summer long we made our tryst
where oaks grow strong by the garden gate.
When autumn fields were gold we kissed
and vowed our love with eyes elate.

  Greensleeves was my heart of Joy—
  Greensleeves, my one true love.
  Greensleeves was my sole delight.
  And, who but my Lady Greensleeves.

Our marriage was a quaint affair.
I gave to you my father’s sword.
We traded rings and tender stares,
exchanging many a heartfelt word.

For eight full phases of the moon,
we joyed alone in solitude.
We drank the golden mead at noon
and passed our nights in loving mood.

  Greensleeves was my heart of Joy—
  Greensleeves, my one true love.
  Greensleeves was my sole delight.
  And, who but my Lady Greensleeves.

All winter long and through the spring
you carved inscriptions in the cheese
and chanted charms to bless and bring
our unborn child to life with ease.

At night you hummed by candlelight
the songs your mother sang to you
while weaving clothes to soon bedight
the hope that curled within and grew.

  Greensleeves was my heart of Joy—
  Greensleeves, my one true love.
  Greensleeves was my sole delight.
  And, who but my Lady Greensleeves.

But on that day you labored hard
and in the end for all your strife
the sacred path to breath was barred—
Our child was born devoid of life.

For three full days in bed you lay
with burning brow and a will undone.
On that third night you passed away
and went to join our stillborn son.

  Greensleeves was my heart of Joy—
  Greensleeves, my one true love.
  Greensleeves was my sole delight.
  And, who but my Lady Greensleeves.

Alas, my dear, you are dead and gone,
your spirit cast on the starry sea.
And I have loved you oh so long,
delighting in your company.

The original version repeats the chorus every other verse, but here I decided to come back to the chorus every third verse—though I lead and end with a single refrained verse before the first and after the final chorus. I liked the idea of the opening verse acting as both prologue and epilogue. The last two lines from this verse are the only part of this revision that remain entirely unchanged from the original. Over the years, I’ve encountered several variations of the chorus, so I felt pretty free about creating my own variation, one that more closely fits the story as I’ve reimagined it.

Since the original song seems well rooted in Medieval Britain, I studied up on Anglo-Saxon traditions around courtship, marriage, birth, and death as I explored this recreation. I’ll run through what I used from top to bottom.

It was customary for the groom to give the bride his father’s sword during the marriage ceremony. She would later present this sword to their firstborn son as he passed into adolescence. Rings and vows would also be traded much as we do now. In fact, our current tradition of trading rings and vows stems from this period.

I was surprised to learn that our current use of “honeymoon” is rooted in medieval Britain. Once married, the bride and groom would promptly retire to a remote location for one full cycle of the moon—so 28 days, or “eight full phases” as I put it—every day drinking mead (fermented honey) and making love. It was thought that the mead would bring good health and help ensure conception during this time. Perhaps this worked, as the bride was usually pregnant by the time they returned.

Pregnant women of the period were wont to inscribe charms into the cheese and/or butter they ate. These charms were thought to help ensure full and healthy development of the fetus. One such charm popular at the time was the “Sator Square,” which didn’t even have anything to do with pregnancy or childbirth. Women would also recite charms throughout their pregnancy, often while enacting elaborate rituals, such as stepping over the body of their sleeping husband in bed a certain number of times.

Turns out there was good reason for all this superstition, as today’s anthropologists have determined that as much as 50% of deaths among females in their 20s and 30s occurred during or shortly after labor or miscarriage. The risks would have been well understood at the time. A similar percentage of infants died during or shortly after birth. While pregnancy would have been a time of great joy and anticipation, it was also one of great worry and uncertainty.

Now, I’ve been singing these lyrics ever since deciding they’re finished, and I don’t feel at all weird about it.

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Dislodged

Last year I bought a journaling application for my PC that I planned to use for drumming up ideas for poems and for logging lines and fragments that could later be expanded upon. The seed lines for this poem were among the last entries made in the journal prior to my finding out in November that my wife has cancer.

Dislodged

Your raucous call is the sound
    of an old friend knocking
        at the door. One not seen
                    in many years.

    I look up and my lungs fill
        with long sighs of affection
as your broad black wings
    flurry lightly north and west.

        Where you go each day
    the moment daylight pulls
your roosts from shadow,
                    I do not know.

    I cannot follow your omens
over street signs and power lines,
        over the tired old grid
    of run-down homes and businesses,

over the brick, wood, and chain-link
    fences that partition every block.
        Yet I swear my heart lifts from its
                    white cage and chases after,

    leaving me just a little empty.
        Sometimes I think you carry
my spirit to me. Sometimes
    it seems you carry it away.

        We are bound, and I know
    you know. Karma is a twisted thing,
involuted with the daily
                    struggle to survive,

    the ancient force of past being
that somehow led to now, and every
        hidden longing that forever
    tugs at my soul.

Sometimes a feather drifts down
    and settles by the curb. Maybe
        I am that feather.
                    Maybe long ago

    I was dislodged from the body
        of my flock and left behind
to settle into the sod. Maybe I am
    fallen feather become man,

        forever grounded, looking on
    as black wings call with stern regard
from beyond the constricting ache
                    of warehouse walls.

I work the night shift at a group home for at-risk teens. This home is in a renovated warehouse in a neighborhood that is zoned for both businesses and residences. Before waking the kids in the morning, I’ll gather my things and take them out to my car, which I park in a gated courtyard. During those times of the year when this coincides with nautical dawn, a massive storytelling of ravens will fly directly overhead.

I’ll hang out and watch until the last straggler flies by, then I’ll go inside. A lot of them will tilt their heads sideways as they pass, making direct eye contact. Once in a while one or two will land on the top of the building, perching at the edge to watch and sometimes interact with me before continuing on. No matter my mood, I’m always in better spirits after spending a few moments with these creatures.

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New Tomorrows

I have recently reconnected with a friend from many years ago through Facebook. He and I were both residents of the Job Corps program in Clearfield, Utah back in the winter of ’88 and spring of ’89. We’ve really hit it off as we started talking again as middle aged men. As is my way, I’ve sent him a copy of my book, an inkling hope. Every copy I give away has a personal dedication. Sometimes it takes me several weeks to decide what that will be. In this case, it was a poem.

New Tomorrows

for Veldon Black Tail Deer

We are creatures of the dreaming
poured forth from the stars
into every shape that roams
beneath these ever changing skies.

Long ages before our ancestors
fought on open fields of battle,
they were brothers who danced
stepping circles beneath the moon.

We are creatures of the drumming,
our spirits joined in a rhythm
that forever intertwines our histories
into the memory of new tomorrows.

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Let’s go down

There was recently a death in my wife’s family. It was no-one I knew. He was close to her father, however, who now lives with us. When something like this happens, my wife will want to visit one of the Catholic churches in town, presumably to pray for the soul of the departed.

Let’s go down

Let’s go down to the masonry
that holds the high-arched doors
and in to the pews beyond them
to offer our inmost prayers.

Let’s go down to the marble font
and cross our heads with the water
as we remember with all our thoughts
one who is no longer with us.

Let’s go down to the heart of the nave
where ancients circle the altar
and bow our heads in the solemn light
that eases the restive soul.

Let’s go down to the effigies
that peer from their quiet coves
and light the vigils with incense sticks
for one who has gone before.

Let’s go down to the redbrick church,
the one where spirits dream,
and kneel at the creaky old wooden pews
to pray for the recent dead.

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the hermit

One who aspires toward greatness will eventually find himself alone, peering down on the valleys from which he began. Very few will ever seek after him, and if he has even an ounce of sense, he’ll dash the hopes of those who do and send them back down to the valleys below.

The imagery here is taken from stories of poets in ancient China leaving public life for a very simple one, alone on a mountain. Friends and acquaintances would occasionally make the hike to visit them, bringing tea, and a few supplies. These hermits often continued their creative pursuits there on the mountain, needing little more than ink, brush and parchment.

the hermit

i have lived here for years now, here
in this alpine vale, high at the head
of a deep ravine that forks and branches like
lightning, scoring a third the southern face.

at this altitude one must face the sun
or a simple hut will bear no comfort
against the cold. one must gather wood
for the night when pines shade the noon.

in those days i left smoke-filled valleys
for vistas that every day catch my breath.
my feet have spun trails like a spider’s
web, spiraling out through the trees.

my hut, a lean-to really, is but the most
meager of commodities. a hundred yards
this way a hole collects my dung. before
long it will be a hundred yards that way.

every few months a face appears, bobbing
amid the trees as an old acquaintance
seeks me out for conversation and tea.
they no longer ask when i will return.

they bring ink and parchment and take
with them what thoughts have occurred
as i dug up roots, picked wild grains and
berries, chopped wood, or simmered stew.

they tell me these thoughts have found
a following. once in a while a new face
bumbles into camp, seeking the elusive
spring that slaked some thirst within them.

i offer what little i have, and they ask about
the old poet who lives on the mountain.
gently i suggest they may have lost
their way and in the morning point to a path.

i tell them it leads back to the world below,
describing landmarks and hinting at failure.
for too many pilgrims would leave me starved
and dying come winter. they only ever come

with palms stretched open—empty. a red
squirrel barks warily, a brown jay swoops
and caws, and i turn back to meditations
that ultimately yield a small fire that warms

my bones and licks inky shadows dry
on a piece of parchment while i nod off
to the sound of wind or rain—or to the all
pervasive silence of falling snow.

In many ways, this forms a half-decent metaphor for the reclusive being I’ve become myself, one who still seeks to continue his work as a poet.

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Lines to My Son

My goal was to have this written for my son’s second birthday. But, although I began working on this poem with six weeks to spare, it is now about six weeks late. This mostly is due to my still learning how to manage and maximize my creative time and energy as a first time parent. Well, first the poem, then a few thoughts.

Lines to My Son

There is a stillness in your eyes
that not a lifetime could disguise,
never mind the mere two years
we’ve shared of laughter, play and tears.

My child, when you cast your smile,
I am compelled to gaze a while
on all the features of your face,
each contour radiant with grace.

I know that sometimes you will cry,
that pain and grief will make you sigh,
but in the end, I hope your share
of peace will far outweigh despair.

I hope that as you grow, a sense
of purpose—meaning—will condense
within your soul until a spring
of inspiration purls and sings.

I know that you will face arrays
of challenges throughout your days,
and sometimes with a heavy heart,
you’ll want to fold and fall apart.

But, son, I hope you’ll come to see
that what is gained too easily
is rarely valued at its worth
and offers only fleeting mirth.

I hope you’ll learn to meet with poise
each obstacle that life deploys
and overcome it with that grace
I see forever in your face.

I know one day that love may lunge
from shadows at your heart and plunge
its ancient kris between your bones
and leave you wretched, wracked with moans.

But if this end should come to pass,
I hope in time you’ll rise at last
and realize deep within your soul
that love is nurtured—not controlled.

I know that fear, with silent tread,
may one day stalk your thoughts till dread
swells acid-like within your chest
and melts all courage from your breast.

If that lean creature ever learns
your scent, I hope that you’ll discern
the way to throw it off your trail,
ensuring all its efforts fail.

I hope you’ll come to see that fear
pursues those thoughts within the sphere
of all the worst of what could be
until it mauls reality.

I hope you’ll learn to contemplate
your blessings and appreciate
the least of things that come your way,
the smallest moments of your day.

I know that sometimes loneliness
may chill you with her gelid kiss
until you crave for any fire
to burn away your dread desire.

But, son, I hope you’ll make your peace
with solitude and grant her lease
within your wide expanse of self
where she reveals one’s inner wealth.

For solitude and loneliness
are only sisters in the sense
that each reflects an attribute
of isolation, but in truth

the two are not at all the same;
one sister lights and keeps the flame
of contemplation, but her kin
instills an anguish deep within.

I know that loss will find your door,
and though you ask, entreat, implore,
he’ll barge into your private place
and carve a lasting, empty space.

I hope, despite the swells of grief
that crash across that jagged reef
of raw emotion deep inside,
you’ll find a way to bear the tide

and build a lighthouse on that shoal
whose spinning beacon may console
with brighter moments from before
you lost the ones that you adore.

I hope that you will find the strength
to mourn your losses, then at length
stand tall, gaze deep into the night,
and let acceptance fill your sight.

I hope with vibrant health you’ll live
till all your hairs turn gray and give
you such a sagely countenance
you’re loved by all with reverence.

I don’t go into writing a poem like this thinking, “This is going to be written in iambic tetrameters using an aabb end-line scheme.” For me, the pattern emerges on its own, usually in mind as I explore the opening lines and stanzas before writing anything down. Once a pattern emerges, if it emerges at all, I usually stay with it. By the end of the fourth stanza, I decided that variations on rhyme suit the end-line scheme just fine, but that I would also still attempt to use rhyme whenever possible.

There are five great difficulties explored in this poem, five challenges that I myself have faced and endured throughout the years, mostly stemming from internal issues—perhaps psychological in nature. These are giving up, feeling betrayed, anxiety, loneliness, and loss. There’s more to the poem than this, but as it has occurred to me that some my overwhelming difficulties with these personal challenges may be genetic in nature, it felt important to me to try to use this piece to pass on some of what I’ve learned about them in the hope that he will one day read and gain insight should he find himself facing similar struggles.

I have no way of knowing if I’ll live long enough to offer him such insights as those I’ve tried to express here by the time he has need of them, and so this poem. Even if I do, it may be that by the time he’s dealing with some of these struggles himself, he’d be more open to taking my thoughts into consideration from this form anyway, written when he was still a toddler.

My father was gone by the time I was 10. I have no idea what insights he may have had for me. I have no real indication that he even thought of what kind of person I might be as an adolescent or as an adult. As my son grows up, I would like him to know that I thought of him—that I thought of him as a teen, as a young man, as an adult in the middle of life, as an old man nearing the end—that I held hope in my heart every single day that he would have a good life and enjoy the bulk of his days clear to the end. It would have meant something to me if my father had such foresight. I hope this may mean something to him.