The French House
is not in France,
only filled with people
who long to be there
&
in it, French poets read
English poems
turned French
then American poets
read poems
born in France
a vast forced immigration
of words
“wasted, wasted, wasted”
“wasted”
“like silence
love”
as we shift in our
folding chairs.
Though there
is also a Victorian settee
so worn
its color can only
be said to be sad
it stands on
industrial carpet—the kind
designed to match the sad sofas
of any period
A picture window
frames a day outside
vivid w/ spring
the lake blue/cold
green leaves lit from within w/ happiness
that winter is over
“the darkness situated
in the trees”
the sun turns the
lake outside to mercury
the sky turns
the tricolor, that fresh, that free
‘like the deer dancing
through the umbrella pines”
“why did you leave all
that?”
“I didn’t. All that left me.”
we are in the middle—
of the country
of the day
of May
of my life
maybe
At 48
I am said to be middle aged
but that implies
a lifespan of 96
when my parents were both
dead by 65
we seek surety
we seek connection
“that sense of
hope & possibility”
In poetry
in each other
in the French house
Later, there will be wine
Later, the moon will rise up from that lake
****
a poem is not a novel
but seeks to be—
sequence series
& there in lies the difference
****
(To hear) the poem in French is (to hear)
the waves of the
Gulf—small
regular sincere—
push onto the sugar sand
(push pull push pull)
unceasing—variation
on subtle variation
on the very idea of water
****
When I was dying
last fall
I missed none of this
no, I missed it all
but pretended not to
when leaving this life
its best to think of the next stop
on the train
of possible better
destinations
now, reborn—
10 inch scar fresh across
my chest—
even being bored is
unbearably delightful
there is no “killing time”
time is what kills us
****
Child’s Doll
legs facing backwards
in a poem
in this room
Somewhere, for real
somewhere, a child, too,
that broken
****
outside—
my son, 7, at soccer practice,
runs
&
runs
but never lays a toe
on the ball
inside—
8 Poets in 1 room
no, more, maybe 20
& this is not a joke
esp not one that involves
the screwing in of light bulbs
Rather a hurricane of words
a village of ears listening
for the coming of rain
****
Froid [which] is more than
cold
[which] in this room
in May
Froid say the poets
& we are frozen
we are désolée
Winter in every corner of
the room
****
Last winter
I was always cold
so sick
I lost 50 pounds
&
more & more
I was the skinny kid
on the jungle gym
&
the class bully
was about to plant his palm
hard on my chest
&
I would fall backward
knowing how hard the packed dirt
of the playground
would feel when I landed
it would knock the breath
out of me
&
I would never get
it back
But I didn’t
fall
I didn’t
****
On the table
beside me
a pink plaster rhinoceros
why? pourquoi?
No answer in either
language
His horn broken
at the tip
no longer sharp
the scar bleeding
a dusting
of plaster
& at the other end
a cute curled
tail—more pig
than rhino
which is more embarrassing?
Blunted horn?
Pink ass?
****
I am suspended from life
listening to The House of Schiaparelli
a poem—artifice/art
about a dress—artifice/art
more beautiful than
any of us
here in this room
art works that way
we are in life
we are suspended above it
it is life
plus a lobster & a
telephone
****
The lobster dress
in English—staid stately,
as if seen in a vitrine case—Schiaperelli as social history
in French—a
cascade/ a romp
a lobster dress
dancing once again
tight on Mrs. Simpson’s
slim ass
click clack
the lobster dress
click clock
in French
****
listening to
a French poet w/
red lips red ring
her
black glasses
a touch
of Marxism left behind in youth
a youth bound up w/ ‘68
in a way impossible
to explain here
in another century
We translate the poems
– the lives we
leave behind
untranslatable
lost
to those who follow us
even in our own language
****
so sad the “r”s
so sad the accent grave
spoken so far from home
in so warm a room
in a city settled
a hundred years ago
by unpoetic Germans
****
Poets
who cannot keep time
in any language
read
read
& the ones waiting
to read wait
nodding
smiles tense
tenser
What about the wine?
Which will only flow
when words do not
French poets/ French wine
the poets read
****
“His voice would come back”
****
Voici
We are here. I have been
other places
some fine
– back stroking across
a spring pond the exact temperature
of blood in the dead of winter
some not
– my blood in a pool
inside my open body & the surgeon’s
sweat falling on me just as warm
It is that warm in here now
we are born to be warm
we are born to be
both warm and full of
blood the temperature of blood
the heat outside
the blood in
a balance that keeps us here
Voici
****
Writing
act that soils this page
act that records this moment
divides this from thatprobably to no more
purpose
than counting to 100 by 2s
a skill, his report card says, my son, 7,
has failed to master
2, 4, 6
finish if you
can
what was once so impossible
becomes easier in time
Or not
my mother in law, 90,
cannot fill in the hours
on a drawing of a clock—
bunches them, huddled
frightened sheep,
between 2 & 4—
Failing her test—
“Alzheimer’s,” her doctor says
(draw the clock)
Finish—if you can . . .