Quintet

These have been posted separately on this blog, but they tell a single story and so I wanted them together. -- KJ

#1:

Mt. Auburn Cemetery, August

I want to be that willow at the water’s edge

To find myself floating over you

Face to face

Gravity making of strands of my hair

The willow’s graceful downward drape.

I want my hair to fall down over you

Sweeping your skin in the tenderest of ways

To hang down to your belly

Tickling and teasing to just that point --

Up to but not including that point --

That annoys and vexes you.

I know that what I have to offer you now

Is only somewhat similar

Perhaps not very much similar,

not near exact in the least little bit

I know that what I have to offer lacks the grace

the timeless wisdom

the steadfast nature

of that willow at the pond.

The peace I offer is intermittent,

sometimes sporadic,

assuredly inconsistent,

Seen on the periphery,

sometimes inhaled with eyes closed,

but rarely grasped & never held.

I do present you other gifts:

A ready, real smile,

a certain sense of your true beauty,

the offering and satisfaction of my flesh;

The chance to risk a good-bye,

the opportunity to lose me,

the possibility to remain whole.

I want to offer you the peace of that willow

I want to be the peace:

all that sway without weakness.

all that strength without rigidity.

Instead, for now, I will hover just above you,

My hair cascading down, caressing your cheek

Our bodies the pond that slakes the willow’s thirst.

~~~~~~~~~~~

#2: Flawed Aim

On the cusp, you

teeter between

hunger & true self.

Maybe not an addict

(though I remain unconvinced)

the craving inside

is the same that

drives the dope fiend,

shadowy, stunted, greedy.

Through the third eye

and in the swiftness of minor denials

I can still see who you were not so long ago,

Earning the title that makes you wince:

Selfish says spurned lover

mimicking daughter

inner voice

Still see the tormented introvert of an adolescent,

Shifty for survival, all zips and secrets,

Feeling rage, seeking numbness.

Still see the battered resignation of childhood

that makes of your skin

an ill-fitting suit.

This is what I believe, what I sense is true:

Today and with each step forward,

You are the fob at the end of a pocket watch chain

hypnotically swaying back & forth

weighted towards truth.

You are the diviner’s wooden rod, your

nose stretched uncomfortably before you,

pointing you in the right direction.

You don’t always start there.

Sometimes you miss your mark,

Yet eventually you come round right.

Flawed aim towards light.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

#3: Timing

In what would be our last tender moment

I called in the sensual grogginess

of barely ended bad dream,

one infused with sweaty anxiety

and pathetic,

urgent need of you

at the wrong time.

I felt ugly, exposed

yet you didn’t scold or hang up.

Instead you listened sweetly, cooed at me,

rocked me in the lap of your long distance words.

Dream drifted to memory and

I slept soundly.

Three nights later you re-created my nightmare:

I ring your number at the time we said we’d talk,

but you don’t answer.

I pull at uneven threads

in the sweater of your next-day responses,

the knit unravels,

revealing your choice of

her, not me.

We have always said

you need to improve your timing:

jokes suffer when you tell them.

This time, I beg to differ.

This time, cruelly,

you got the timing perfect:

This time, sleep is no relief.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

#4: MISSING

~~~~~~~~~~

#5: Postcards

“How are you?” in silky Irish brogue

“Fine” in my rather Unconvincing.

“No really, how are you?”

It would be better if you ask

“Where are you?” or

“Where have you been?”

You mollify me, repeat word for word,

barely disguising annoyance.

Ignoring your tone, I inquire

“Didn’t you get the postcards?”

Me, fiddling with the whole stack

Each one scrawled with rants and recants

Each one with sufficient postage yet no postmark.

First I checked into a Self-Indulgent Inn.

By day, sobbing in lakeside Adirondack chair;

Otherwise, nocturnal scribbling of minutiae,

shallow addlement seeping off the pages,

staining characterless bedcover

in this tedious room.

Next I revisited the canyon breach

that expands the space between

your words & actions, my hands

straining to grasp what you have said

as my feet lose hold on the oily residue

of what you have done.

Then an unexpected side trip to

raunchy, hormone-driven Desire

collecting every word with even the slightest

hint at sex & attaching them all,

making of you a pheromonal kite

airborne on ocean winds with colorful,

uneven tail that trails behind &

sets me chasing.

I had hoped to have a rock hound holiday,

seeking in the rough some diamond facet

that sets this one apart from the

long line of lost loves.

But something got mixed up,

the reservation or the timing.

I’m not really sure what happened

or if I’ll ever make it there.

My intended final destination

(As final as any gets in this life,

so not really final but something like it,

maybe a place to pivot, a chance

to end this journey & start the next):

Ancient stone Buddha in conflicted land,

crumbled Taliban pieces

still able to whisper tenderly in my ear

pain is inevitable; suffering is not.