I would have written this as a letter
I would have used the proper
Format:
Dear You,
Only…
That is the point
Dear you, not me
Not God Himself, quite real
Your appetite for bacon
Recalls to me the reason
Why?
We are not family anymore
Friends with the devil
Need to count the flies
Attending him
I speak the oblique
Because you have a right to be angry
We all do
But only on the pallet in hell
we lie down…
So close to Jesus.
We sleep in boats
Strewn out across
An unending sea
Cling to blankets, shelter, each other
An archipelago of contained air
All that holds us
Up inflatable dinghies,
Flotsam unstable
We call to each other
Sun-drenched dazed
Testing our new words
Like… beach balls….
Flood….
Antediluvian–
post-apocalyptic always
Cup your hands
Across your eyes
Look to the deep
Where the leviathan hides
Home.
There is something I want to put in this box
A new year
An old debt
Things tangled like a net
Dresses I should sew
Miles I should run
When this sadness is the warm blanket
Remind me why
There are no pictures in this house
Nothing so permanent as you.
Always you.
I have been a little off today. Not looking in my side mirror enough, burning the toast–I wanted several times today to nap. Just nap. Today was a beautiful day and I could see myself caved up under a quilt.
The old dude I did not see in his shiny jeep would have preferred that.
This time I know what is wrong. It is more than my usual December malaise. It is more than my customary invisible arrow lodged in my sternum.
No. This was the weight of grief. The unavoidable heaviness that accompanies grief–knowing that ordinary families like mine are facing hell for the long haul, knowing we are not safe.
I do hold my children tight and I am constantly aware of their grace in my life.
It hurts to know the terrible thing we all face in death. The sign of a torn universe, waiting for consolation.
What if there was a list?
Of things no one wanted
The emptiness in a room
Blood memory
An unrelenting ache
my baby/my baby/my baby
Cannot be…
Worse than death
Stalking us at every turn
will we be
Safe?
No.
Not this time the children’s story
Man with a song leading us into the mountain
because our parents will not
What?
What is it we have not done?
Have not paid
To the coroner
To the cops
To the teeth of the dog
Who guards this hell we have
become
a houseful of memory
Of a Christmas most like the very first, second and third
When armed men broke through doors to wrest
Babes from nursing
Women who retain with their inmost thoughts each scrap of life
This child
This child
Don’t turn away.
It is a simple enough word
Cover
A blanket over me
The cleft of a rock
A bit of plastic tenting
as the storm blows in
.
These angels,
Fierce angels
Stretch wings of splendor over our history of blood
Turn your head to the side little girl
To the past where we both came from
And imagine for a minute
A world without cover
The shadow of majesty
Passing over us
Leaving us all
alone
An Adonis-like youth
Your son’s age
Runs past you in the sun
You are not even tempted to lust
About any part of him
But find yourself wishing you had
His perfect
Knees
His enviable
BMI.
Isaiah 42:1-4 (NIV)
“Here is my servant, whom I uphold,
my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him, and he will bring justice to the nations. [2] He will not shout or cry out, or raise his voice in the streets. [3] A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out. In faithfulness he will bring forth justice; [4] he will not falter or be discouraged till he establishes justice on earth. In his teaching the islands will put their hope.”
First of all, I have to confess, I love Auden but disliked Four Weddings and a Funeral. Until tonight I thought this was an autobiographical poem, not a song piece written for a larger work.
I love all the words. I love the heart and passion of this poem which is so integrally Auden. And it seems so essential that it is he being mourned, not she.
Again, the truth we have to face: the sentiment Auden expresses here is so lovely and profound, how can it be dismissed out of hand?
It can’t. We have to acknowledge that this is a heartbreaking poem of irrevocable love and loss.
I know plenty of straight guys who could learn a few things from Auden.
Normally this is the point in my writing where I would head for a wrap up–state an opinion, back it up with something and then conclusion–voila!
But I won’t today.
Today I just want to say out loud how lovely this anthem of love and grief is. It means something to me–floats in my geriatric repository of words lovely in their truth.
How about you?
What do you think of this complex genius? His body of work and life? And love? He says some amazing things about love…
Once
When you were still a boy
I walked with you
Into cool water in a dying light
No deeper than your waist
Although the gulf itself
Stretched for miles
Out forever
When I draw words for hell
I get them from Sartre
Not Jesus
Or Dante
Like lighting a match
To draw fire
This room is airless enough
The faces of it’s inhabitants
Never vary/a rictus of pain
I wonder…
Are you as afraid as I am
Of the little things
That last
Forever?
And the possibility
That there will be
No way out.
Carrying Light 