|
Arts & Letters
SWIMMERS ON THE SHORE
Whidbey Island
Like half a filial circus act
splashing the Y pool shallow end,
I swam about my father, who could stand.
And when I climbed, an acrobat,
diving from his muscled shoulders,
they seemed as solid as two boulders.
Now I can hold his shrunken frame
in my arm’s compass. We’re together
on a park bench in lingering summer weather
before I make the long drive home.
But halfway through some story, speech
lies suddenly beyond his reach.
I see him cast for words, and fail.
Though talking never came with ease,
it is as if my father’s memories
dissolve in a cedar-darkened pool,
while I no longer am aware
which of us goes fishing there.
Has he begun the long swim out
toward silence that we all half-dread?
I hug my father’s shoulders, lean my head
closer to his, yet I cannot,
from his unfinished sentences,
quite fathom where or who he is.
I want to stay. The day is warm,
the salt breeze blows across the Sound
long plaintive cries of seagulls sailing down
to hover over churning foam
there in the docking ferry’s wake.
I want to stay for my own sake,
holding the man who once held me
until I dove and splashed about.
He gives my hand a squeeze. There is no doubt,
despite his loss of memory,
and though the words could not be found,
it’s I who have begun to drown.
–David Mason, posted by permission
From 100 Poems
I have gone West
twenty-three years.
Not strange that,
as I make new friends,
they express surprise
that I have a son
in the East. I tell
them how I go
watch the moon rise
with the evening star
and think of it shining
high in the ecliptic
above the home
he has made with his
young wife there.
– R.S. Bear, posted by permission
This poem (above) was inspired by Abe no Nakamaro's poem below
When I look abroad
O'er the wide-stretched "Plain of Heaven,"
Is the moon the same
That on Mount Mikasa rose,
In the land of Kasuga?
-Abe no Nakamaro
The Survivor
I turned away from war and death,
seeking peace, almost futile
except I had no choice.
Long ago I staunched our wounds
but seeking peace, tried to root out war
I had no choice.
Our weapons are a matter of scale
but seeking peace, scale matters
since I had no choice.
My brothers, my sisters died.
How do we love country and resist war?
I had no choice.
You, my whole, greater than my parts,
You leave for the land of the dead
You had no choice.
I am the last one
like Ishi, who came in from the cold
I have no choice.
Ryan Ramon
Bitter Coffee
Well made coffee used to be a love offering every morning.
The single thing he did after unloading the
dishwasher...another love offering.
We drank it together and talked though morning is my quiet time.
He stole it from me and my writing time as well. All a sacrifice to
the relationship.
Bi-annually we spent a month apart. Then writing could happen and
quiet mornings until eleven o'clock daily. Weekends I work leaving the
coffee and silence.
Men what we sacrifice for one of our own.
He serves me bitter coffee as a love offering, most days.
No longer does he drink it. He's dying one day at a time
Eighteen years investing in my future, down the drain.
I will drink my coffee alone
and have bitterly quiet mornings
in my old age.
– Laeh Maggie Garfield
See The Christian Science Monitor Blog by Elizabeth, Lund The Poetic Life
© Copyright 2000-2004 by West By Northwest.org
Top of Page
untitled
|
