Silent Ku

the placid ocean –
tectonic plates
ponder a move

~

Westport Marina before dawn –
the scent of crab pots

~

between Forks and Kalaloch
I tune in the radio
and listen to the static

~

to Jennifer I say
never-ending love –
quiet skepticism

~

at three in the morning
I listen to the moon

~

I have beans with my rice
and break the silence

Painter Spring

A generation of crickets hatch and swarm
across a road, across an alkali flat,
all in the same direction
even if not the same place,
crickets answer to a higher power
embedded in their every cell,
an inner voice that says, ‘not here’.

At Painter Spring there are no homeless,
every reptile and mammal finds a ledge
or tree to curl under, across the valley
a light snow falls, obscuring the salt flats,
crisp air replaces smells of juniper,
sage, alkali dust, it gets cold here,
some turn back to wait the winter in Stinkwater,
the rest pack up and head west in a swarm
that doesn’t make it across the playa
to the way station at Marjin Pass.

In a couple months the Russells bring a sled
and take the debris back to Hidden Canyon,
a wagon with a broken wheel, two buckets
and a shovel, a piano, five boots
with torn-out soles, blacksmith tools, a transit
and tripod, three ghosts and a poltergeist.

The sled glides over dry snow in starlight,
horses vent into the still air,
Brenda Russell blocks the cold with a blanket,
she can’t block the disquiet, not here.

There’s no room in Chicago, Sadie is turned out,
she gets cold, thinks ‘somewhere else or bust’,
packs her bag and buys a one-way
to Saint Jo, turns her back on the east
and faces the great western blank spaces.

Early next summer Sadie’s at Painter Spring
watching a mirage over Swasey Ridge.
She crosses the playa, then Marjin Pass,
gets stuck in Boyd for a decade
before she catches the next swarm.

Get By Legal

I learn to get by legal with math and writing
and art, I leave school with no hat,
no hammer, I get work at the mill,

factory, the plant, mine, warehouse,
I line up uniform with the other schmucks,
I get along because I fix things,

my special skill is sucking up,
they pay what I’m worth, I get by legal.
Buddha even cares about one like me.

Three Windows and a Door

My cabin has three windows and a door,
it’s easier to look out than get out.

There’s no bookshelf in my cabin,
I never learned to read, I don’t know

Lawrence of Arabia, don’t share
the obsession of Ahab, never see

fantasy through the looking glass.
I never learned to read but I learned to see,

I see the flaws in my cabin space,
understand the plants in the garden,

I know the long-legged birds will return,
I know the door, and my dreams.

I Know

If you can be my girlfriend
then I’m your boyfriend and I know
what you like to do
on a walk to Midway Beach,

I get it that you won’t use
the outhouse at John’s Landing,
I know your order
at Westport’s Thai restaurant,

and I know your fragrance.
If you can be my girlfriend
then you know what I like
for lunch, the curve of my hand,

my claim that time is an illusion,
what I’ll say to the waitress
at Westport’s Thai restaurant,
you understand what the allegations are

and it’s a big misunderstanding
you know I can explain.