Poems read at the Hat Factory on 15th December in conjunction with The Peekskill Arts Alliance Art Show & Sale, Suite 10, 1000 North Division Street, Peekskill, New York
(Art Show and Sale: 30th November -22nd December, Saturday and Sunday 11-5 p.m.)
15th December 2013
Natal
Star
His
natal star rises still,
Eastwards,
beacon-bright, burning
through
the fog like a hot
knife
through butter cut into
the
pudding, fruit-thick, we stirred
and
wished upon
and
herself only half-done
with
the Christmas shopping,
moving,
so, from dark into
light,
she loops great
strands,
twinkling round
her
wrists, her reflection tinsel-ribboned
for
the Christmas:
baking
great cakes of currants
and
ginger, fragrant as
the
first gifts to
an
infant child
smiling
upon us after
Adam
stumbling and
spilling
all those apples
upon
the earth
and
bang—go the
crackers
and
bang—go our
hearts
when
we realize
His
saving grace
moving
from the basement
crawlspace
with the boxes,
back
into the light,
bearing
gifts from their hiding place—
and
out of wrapping paper again,
and
down to the shops,
and
the post office,
and
the grocery,
to
pile up gifts of grace,
perhaps,
for Him
Journey
we
come, bearing gifts, across
deserts,
green-brown patchworks of fields, guided
by
those stars we seek out, blazing
away
like the fire stoked in the
furnace,
warming hearth and home and
heart
and
we wait, too, for the
cards
carrying the annual weather report, proud
robin
preening in his gilt border, puffed
out
breast a drop of blood against the
snow
(when seen at a distance), scent
of
balsam and pine surrounding one,
the
ranks of gingerbread soldiers
amassing
in airtight tins, raisin-studded,
crisply
brown and fragrant, promising
that
Christmas will, indeed, return, as
surely
as the clock tolls twelve and the
candles
are extinguished only to be
lit
again, light piercing through darkness,
needle
through the dark cloth in which
we
were shrouded
Seasonal
Photograph
the
image of you, a year
older,
taken in a State park in
the
blazing sun is most un-Christmas-like,
though
bordered by bells, tinsel, and holly
the
green of cactus behind you, the
red
of your pocket handkerchief will
have
to do, the marking of another
year
of lines, told in your visage, of
the
ordinary passage of time
balanced
by the words of some ancient hymn
of
celestial words and promises as
familiar
as your intake of breath, the
tapping,
impatient, of your fingers, as the
days
tick down towards puddings and
roasts,
the blank boxes, bereft again of
their
silken ribbons, their work done
Angel Voices
these
celestial hordes, their angel
voices
disturb the air pearl-thick with fog
obscuring
distant lights, the glowing orbs
strung,
necklace-like, along the dip
and
rise of the metal spines of a
distant
bridge
while
we wrestle with rolls of paper,
order
hampers of food and the
first
snow, potently mixed with rain,
lashes
against the pane, window into
the
world beyond
corners
squared off by telephone lines,
the
demarcation of bordering hedges
overhung
with lights boldly emblazoning the
way
of that jolly old housebreaker,
stolid
redsuited fellow, spreading good
cheer
and leaving a trail of crumbs
in
his wake, the glasses of milk only half-drunk
in
his haste, best of all
houseguests
with his wink and his
waddle,
father of Christmas forgiving even
the
naughtiest of children (so
that
no one, ever, receives coal
anymore)
given the new benchmarks,
progress
reports, and
projections
for the next quarter,
everyone
given the benefit of all our
doubts,
ripe
for self-improvement in six easy steps
Vigil
so
the silks and lace rustle,
perfume
rising, warm on this
vigil
night, the
long
lists gone over twice and
twice
again, the unlovely long
weeks
of January pushed further
from
the mind in favor of
this
candlelight and the petals of red flowers
in
flaming circles bordered by green,
suffused
in pinescent, thickribboned,
again,
in red and the
organ
resounds with familiar
strains
and dark is made light again,
night
made day and
the
gifts are opened with a
snip
of the ribbon the
next
morning, the carpet littered
with
a thickness of paper waded
through
like fall leaves, the
scent
of breakfast still hanging heavy in
the
kitchen, the
pot
scalded, again, for tea
New Year
another
blank copybook opens, waiting
to
be filled with copperplate
resolutions
(before we’ve lost
everything
but a stub of a pencil and
the
back of an old envelope, only
slightly
torn) and the rosy glow of
New
Year’s dinner not yet worn off and
perhaps
a freshclean blanket of snow
mirroring
your newmade soul and
for
at least one moment
all
seems possible, and, maybe,
even
likely
Angel Wings
out
of the Christmas box she
comes,
again wingless, her
angel
wings must be glued on,
glued
on, glued on, every year for as long
as
he can remember, her winsome
red-painted
mouth puckered into a
bow,
about to bestow a kiss eternally
wings
drying, in a safe spot, she
waits
for Christmas roses to
bring
the bloom to her cheeks again, the
hothouse
flowers crowded thick
amongst
the lilies and the hyacinth,
not
for them the four smooth walls of
a
cardboard box—no they are
born
to glory only to die and rejoin the
earth,
while she stares on, blue-eyed,
golden
haired, forever in an attitude
of
arrested flight
Lights in Winter
lighting
lights we remind ourselves
that
the winter is but a long
night
and that the heat of
summer,
spent basking, like a
lizard,
in the sun, will come again
and
the green proliferation obscuring the
blue
of sky, that, too, will return
the
miracle of light that
pierces
darkness,
the
flash of a jeweled brooch piercing a coat,
glinting
beneath an electric light, small
suns
to remind us of
that
largest sun breaking through
the
darkness to light our way
Sugared
tinted
granules of sugar melt
and
harden into pools of
green
and red, the colors of the Spring we
are
promised throughout the
darklong
weeks of winter, the
berries
bloodred against the
white
of snow, the shining snow
glared
upon by the sun, the
sacrificial
dinner of fat-
slaughtered
goose upon the
table,
while the sparrows peck
outside
the door, hungry for a
few
crumbs to drop down from
this
heaven of munificence, the
rick-rack
of apron twitches, striving always
for
perfection, the candy stripes echoing
those
embroidered upon
the
napkins, quick hands arranging
landscapes
of mirror and cottonwool flecked
with
iridescent specks, catching the beams from
twinned
candles, waxy tapers slim, red, burning bright
Virtual Holiday
Christmas
is virtually here.
Santa
has been emailed and his
website
has left
cookies
on my computer and
the
drones have read the bar-
codes
and are preparing, 10, 9, 8,
to
drop the season’s bounty
curbside
instagramming
Grandmas post
virtual
cookies and Christmas
wishes
are tweeted out 140
characters
at a time, and
the
YouTube Christmas card blares out, and
Santa
sends an email back
with
several links and a
“like”
button for his Facebook page
Christmas
is virtually here.
Exodus
the
exodus of the child into
a
foreign land
is
not so strange
it
happens every day, though the
faces
of the tax collectors and
the
soldiers change
the
journey, tiresome and
wearying,
waiting
to see which way
the
wind blows, depending
upon
dreams and visions,
creased
heavily with cares,
last
minute luggage packed hastily, but
the
baby gifts placed carefully
at
the bottom of the case,
redolent
of riches, incongruous,
strange,
yet predestined
So Much…..
so
much to do that even
an
army of elves wouldn’t be
a
help, better, so, to do it
on
her own—who cares if it
takes
all night, or occasions
comment
on her listless eyes,
raised—again,
at the sight
of
the deliverymen, heavy-laden,
striding
towards her door and
the
hundred undone things unspooling
as
the spindle of ribbon loosened and
tumbling
down the stairs
tangling,
finally, in the cat’s paws,
praying,
sometimes, for the
peace
of January
A Chara, Mo
Chroi
and
you said you would be
sorry
were the time to come
when
letters would no longer
reach
your mailbox
and
the annual letter arrives,
white
as snow, ivory oblong, heavily stamped,
addressed
in chickenscratch,
informing
me that the trees,
fallen
to some tree-disease, have
been
uprooted and, in their place,
new
ones, a fast-growing variety, planted
down,
black earth tamped thickly around
their
roots, a promise of years to come
and
now your voice is carried to
me
through the howl of wind seeking to
breach
the storm door as I wait, endlessly,
and
would I could open the door to
receive
you in, to jaw over old
landscapes,
new painted, the honeycomb of paths, squared,
we
once walked, and this is
my
Christmas letter to you, a chara, mo chroi
Grey Pearl
grey
pearl of sky draws
down
around earth so
quiet-blanketed
in white
footsteps
are muffled and
all
quiet save for the
occasional
scrape of
metal
against pavement
shuddering
up
shrubbery
bearded
in
a temporary disguise
of
white, icicles hanging from
the
eaves a toothy grin
of
cold
imperfect
fields of green and brown now
perfected
white, shine
back,
glittering now, under the
sun,
eye-blinding bright
New Year
the
song resounds: another year
done,
another yet to begin
the
muddied pages of the
desk
diaries changed for new
the
scrawls of March and
April
as indecipherable as
Sanskrit
to your tired eyes, the
days
slipped by too fast, tied
up
now with ribbons and good
intentions,
the slipknots wound
round
the needles, fashioning a
new
garment for a new year
when
all
shall
be
in
abundance
Bird of Dawning
the
bird of dawning singeth all
night
long and so
rends
her rest to pieces
shattered
as the curved
metallic
sherds on the carpet
fallen
from her hands
reflecting
on the
bells
tolling twelve
singing,
ringing, then
peace
in the absence
of
sound
needles
fall silently, thick
with
pinescent, unlovely side
pushed
to the wall, garlanded
gold,
crowned with a
single
star
Beneath the
Constellations
beneath
the constellations
bells
are ringing, bells are ringing
beneath
the starry skies
we
are singing, we are singing
of
that night so long ago,
of
those words threading through
this
tapestry of night, blue-
dark,
lit by that singular star of
fire,
heralded by
an
angel choir
Tangle-Thick
this
tangle-thick of corded
lights
confound one, yet we
persist,
determined to
light
the way of others
with
garlands of red and
green
and white-hot
illumination,
pale cousins
of
those new suns perpetually
being
born
while
deliverymen come, bearing
gifts,
to the door
and
the sphinx still stares,
impassive,
across Egyptian sands
under
the thronging stars
Burning Daylight
burning
daylight with those
ordinary
tasks after the season
has
expired and all is quiet:
jewel-bright
ornaments, small
mirrors,
placed back in their
boxes,
egg-fragile, shimmering
crimson,
gold, eggplant-purple, back to
the
attic they go, their
service
done for another year,
each
burnished with a thick
layer
of memory, of that year or
another,
touched with tender hands,
supremest
care
Our Song, Now
Done
and
now that our song is
done
birds
throng on the
boughs,
angels
stir the air
and
all
will be merry
the chill winds
blow
a
fire leaps up
licking
the coals
banishing
sorrows
