Footprints in the Snow
These are French footprints,
leaving the road north of Beauvais,
disappearing into a Norman wood.
Boot size and tread say—a man.
Category / Poetry
A Poem
This broad plank of a table,
wood warped and wavy,
pitches the most familiar things —
cups, bowls, my orange thermos —
The Family
There are four of them: two solid sorrel horses,
and two spotted goats.
Some permutation of patterns is always grazing
side by side. Or sometimes playing—
Advanced Lesson of Boats
Land is where the dog pees,
the crew rests their achy
sea legs, and the boat is hauled
for new bottom paint. Land is good.
The Apostle
I want to know, are you happy?
It’s been too long.
I’ll admit disappointment.
The white horse died centuries ago
and the sword rusted before
I ever held it in my hand.
The Sound of Rain Outlives Us
My grandfather, ninety-two, wakes and sleeps again as I read him Keats, but Li-Young Lee holds him for a while. I read, “The Gift,” where the father pulls a splinter from his son’s palm. I read, “Eating Alone,” where the son mistakes a spade for his late father waving in the garden. I read, “My Sleeping Loved Ones.”
Continue reading… "The Sound of Rain Outlives Us"Occasional Mornings
In the darkened kitchen I press down on le piston;
feeling resistance as the screen seines the coffee grounds.
Out on the terrace I take a lawn chair abandoned last night
as we dallied beside the Vézère finishing the Bergerac rosé.
A pair of swans pass by. They nest up river in the reeds
where Eric rents his canoes to people like you and me.
The Small Sculpture Speaks
I like to think
that my conception
brought her pleasure—
this trinket-box body
and blond doll’s head.
Twenty-Seven
Looking for myself again
and also trying to lose her
when gray began ungathering toward morning
I anchored my body to beach beside the river.
Chattooga
In the river, the water moves
swiftly over moss-covered stones.
On the banks, rhododendrons and magnolias,
their branches dragging in the current.