ALWAYS FOR THE FIRST TIME
for Andre Breton
Mary Oliver has written another great poem,
That is to be expected you say
she is a great poet after all
It’s only Houdini
getting out of his chains again
no big deal, he is Houdini isn’t he
Oh no my friends
Notwithstanding there might be
a little less effort each time
a little less pain and pushing
at the beginning and the end
a miracle is still a miracle
no matter how often it happens
Take birth for instance
JOHN AND MARY
John Berry writes a poem
for his dear departed Mary
and reads it at all the open mics
It is a lovely poem
about parallel universes
and all the other ways
they might have met
or never met at all
He tells me that it changes
every time he reads it
which makes sense
since it is well known
that you can never step
in the same poem twice
I hear that it is also true of rivers
THE LITTLE DUTCH BOY WRITES POETRY
Only a drop or two
and only from time to time
but you can feel the weight
of the whole North Sea behind it
GALVESTON ISLAND CALM
Palm trees bending to the right
two birds flying to the left
Palm trees rooted in the sand
birds break even with the wind
Nothing moving for the moment
quick now snap the picture
It will stay that way forever
FROG BASKING IN WATER
The old pond;
A frog jumps in
The sound of the water
Basho
Basho oh Basho
I too have a frog in my pond
At night he sings
many times his size
In evening he sits
still as a haiku master
on the wide stone ledge
where water flows before falling
splitting it
around and over his back
head above the water
big eyes smililng
TEMPIS
In the caves there are paintings
thirty thousand years old
and the Sistine Chapel has been
around for a while
In Tibet and Arizona
they paint with colored sand
A Cordon Bleu feast
beautiful for a moment
then brushed away
For those who would judge
one as better than the other
I offer
a poem or a psalm
in a long remembered book
Reading it is in column one
hearing it in column two
Or how about a whispered
“I love you” in the ear
is it gone or is it here
A LITTLE TO THE RIGHT
How does the heron
learn about refraction
and that the fish is not
where the fish appears to be
It is a matter of survival I suppose
Like me learning the difference
and the angle of intent
between what you said and
what you meant
WHAT THE HELL VILLANELLE
I thought, oh what the hell
Since everything is but a dance
I’ll just write a villanelle
Though I may not ronde half so well
As the spinning peasants of old France
I thought, oh what the hell
Left footed stories I can tell
Though you may laugh I’ll take a chance
I’ll just write a villanelle
Though it may not cast young Dylan’s spell
around his father’s fierce-teared glance
I thought, oh what the hell
Though it may not a million copies sell
It may win your love perchance
I’ll just write a villanelle
It may not toll Gray’s churchyard knell
Others have failed in that romance
I thought, oh what the hell
I’ll just write a villanelle
IF YOU CAN HAVE YOUR OWN TALK SHOW
IF you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs for the blaming that you do,
If you can trust yourself when wise men doubt you,
But make offensive all their doubting too;
If you can wail and not be tired by wailing,
Or being lied about still deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t blame it on your hating,
And yet still look too good, and talk too wise
If you can talk down to crowds and call it virtue,
‘Or walk on Kings – nor lose the common touch,
if neither foes nor losing friends can hurt you
If all men count with you, but not as such;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of drivel spun,
Yours is the air and everything that’s on it
And – which is more – you’ll be a rich man, my son
LEFT BEHIND ON THE CONCORDE
You get to DC an hour and a half before you leave London
and Rod and I talked most of the way
Maybe it was the ‘69 Dom Perignon
they poured as soon as you took your seat
or the Chateauneuf-du-Pape and Pouilly-Fuisse
they served all through the meal
I do remember there were Arabs in
flowing white, and Burgess Meredith the movie star
and I showed the pretty brunette
my pilots license and got invited to the cockpit
where the pilots greeted me as brothers
even though the fastest thing I’d ever flown
was and Aero Commander 68OE
Maybe it was the Taylor’s Special Reserve
twenty year old port they served with
the Cuban cigars (it was 1978 after all)
Maybe it was going more than twice the speed of sound
but I can’t remember a damn thing that either of us said.