All Was Said

When all was said and done
the town
was just
another place
the train
ran
thr
ou
gh.

We Have A Cloth Filter

It has to stay in water after it is used.
Where is it?
On the counter.
Where is it?
It is in the plastic container.
It has to stay in there after it is used.
Dream and then wake up tomorrow.

The Motions

Frost roasts everything.
lawn's hackles, roses.
against nets.
birds scooting
leftover skies, short flight.

All buds shut, caught.
asking nothing.  Light
upside down, dangling.
mint the cold recipient.
of love and loving.

 

The Black Flame

The black flame is visible
to nobody to everybody
woodpile stained frozen
winter shade winter flowers
smoke following

the mountain, snow-rinsed
cedar and fir underside
frozen air, heavy fog
sun lasting until four

clinging
to the tops of trees
the falcon stays there
watching us point back
where we were just walking.

Tina's Braces And Mom's Retainer

Beautiful teeth
those two
she women--

hair
op-positional

soft pillows.

They of the
overlooking.
Tell me!  Please tell!

What was it you wanted to say?
To me.  To me.  The secret ingredient.
Of long ago Oil of Olay diligence
excluding ordinary anguish.

This Day Threw Me

It threw me to you
magic ache.

Whorl not just a word.

Desire being pants fitting just so
and wearing them
always.  Let H. D. deal
with all those fruits

all those flowers.

Rosy Dawn Of The Corporation

Grazing land.
Wool,
Impoverishment,
Displaced.
Traumatized.
After serving terms--
English Angels.  Irish Devils.
Taken from indigenous farmers.

Lazy commoners!
Suppression of women--
1550-1650.  Thanks.  Giving.

Split Moon With Onion Idea

One was wild under the pear tree
The other was, well, the other

It was impossible to decide
If it helps any--

One was a clown
And the other clownish

All this went into daylight
Part of the mix

We could be deciding this forever
Look up, the moon dividing itself

Splitting again, which part is better?
Before or after

Almost crazy to write about a painting
but there it is with its three parts

Farm To Fable Direct

Halfway across an ocean.  Still
was not far enough away.
Then, direct statements:  too much
not enough.  Her thinking.
What does she envision?
Grains, roots, hard cheeses.
Parsley, kale, mint
from the garden.  Should she
continue the nightmare.  Trying.
Dr. Oz would like the effort.
Dr. Phil weighing in a solid no.

Friends

Yes, they have dissolved
been patched up again
then seem as something else
entirely.  What  I count on.
But who can live inside a collage?
Trees, rivers, hawks and eagles
along the freeway corridor.
I sought Salem and found
a velvet pin cushion
felt more comfortable
thinking of their wings.

Untangling La Tengo

When all is said
and done
there are no words
sad enough
plain enough
for meaning so

listen.  Hear
where
you just
were--

the W.O.W. Hall's
Scorpio quiet.

Flash In The Pan

The miners sat at the table.
Long legs of the wolf.  Same stare.
Give my regrets to the airport.
See all my friends.  The curious buildings.
Preserved as Nome.  The place

with no name.  Give my regards to
Front Street.  To my kith and kin.
The musk ox is a small buffalo.
The one that got away.  But there
are others.  See them?  With the others.

Working Away

He pointed to a white wolf.  The bear
was caramel. Up there, four months
is your life.  We weren't supposed to talk
but we did and I asked about everything
that I had encountered.  The point wasn't
there anymore.  Wasn't taken.  Not
as I remembered it.  All worry

and bumpy.  The divide
in the distance.  Plus, my mind
was focusing on the willows, still,
and not those short flowers and their path--
purely imaginary until they made it
to camp all these years working.
Slaves in the summer
winters quite royal.

More about the berries, the people,
the animals, and the town
to be continued.

Breathing, Seeing The Sun, Having Somewhere To Sleep

What we get.
Alive in air.
Seeing

where to sleep

breaking

river
trees

sun climbing out
only months away.

Worshipping Mars

Do we have enough bullets
bombs missiles?

Do we have enough
hate outlasting hate?

Is blood really gold
inside the red planet?

When do we put away
silence and begin seeing?

Why is it called daybreak
heartache's  dumb turning?

The Town And The City

Around the corner 
daylight all business
night is when Eugene

is pulling

that citizen.  The one holding
an imaginary key
opens volcanic knobs
the swollen river

Living on smokes
Metropol bread and brie. 

For Awhile

Only down the road
reading stories of trees
mynahs bedding down
so loud

after fifteen minutes
puddles long gone
I made it home

There are words
just before the moon
indicating

mattresses and couches
all soaked through but still
belonging

Levis And His Couches

                      let's say
we travel along with him
let's say
                       we love the twilight zone

where should we park our bones

strapped up on top is the old mattress
the old couch my idea of Eugene

the grime of the mill turning out
beautiful shapes

                         Meet me there
nervous I'm anxious
our tea is growing
hot house flowers

marrying trees
birds outside this place?

Crisis Garden

This is called
My Crisis Garden

and this

The Lily At Home
Changing

Dripping
Into the earth
The land into other spaces
The lava alive
Then cool
Our love and the memory
Windows

My mind ate the cheese
but I did not

Klimt's Poppy Field

Remember
so much fruit
grass
wild flowers.
Counting
points
buttery.  Little
glowing stones
in trees

and how they
spoke to her.  What
they said
she was lost
disappearing
into blues
into twisting limbs
corkscrews
dancing

another shape.  Trees
green flowers!

They moved wind.

Clouds spots
on the sky animal.
They prayed
into.

When I Was 13

No matter what
my favorite things
were cliffs and edges
figuring out the way down
how hard I tried (worlds) (strange)
words familiar (close)
Shumagin, Schurz
looking so difficult
to decipher--I could not see
Hand, heart, life, eye
this way?  No.
where they were going
at all.  Up. Down.
Western Nevada:  the spirit
hiding in the grass
I could not interpret
no matter what.

Silence

Clouds sit on the ground.
False eagles find food.  Angels
whipping up the air
attempting the same flight.

What we said was true.
The white cat creeping
along the fence line.
Death is two syllables
only one symbol.

Embroidery Pattern #1972

Lots of work in the principality.
Orders from Albert:

Mend the aprons, hoist the sails, we never use aqua, pink, or brown
in our embroidery our design is of the caribou
and they’re always on the move.

 My own project was building a round stone

somewhat like papier-mâché
from Die Sieben Geisslein, The Seven Little Goats

they sewed a stone into the belly of a wolf

when he was sleeping so he couldn’t move--

 only heavy as lead a small planet or moon with layers.

 They say life is like an onion or is that art?  

 

I made

a miniature of the bomb nobody knew about

until Mom began telling us up in Nome

while the TV channel showed footage of Vietnam

while Dad was gone on trips to frozen villages and their  small islands.

Tina

got the parts about surviving but thought those

came with instructions whispered by Albert only she could hear

because they were coming from nowhere else.  Dad didn’t know

until a decade later when Mom decided to tell him. 

Corine

pointing to objects in the air only she could see dropping.

Then falling down in the snow fort built of blocky chunks

right by the shipping container I made into a play house

tried my hand at sleeping there at forty below

giving up and going in only at pitch dark. Our neighbors

were into Elvis and Evel Knievel.  We let them play.

Their Bomb Shelter

I just remember it home made
so we didn't have to go over to the church
my dad thought we would drown over there
because of the water pipes he was right in a way
where the paters lived it did flood another bomb

damaged their place that part
it goes all the way down to the cellar
that was the official bomb shelter you can't explain
helter-skelter you would be trapped rubble dirt cement
things falling over

I remember when my dad and (and Polish prisoners) went and took
a wardrobe, a Kleidershrank into the bomb shelter the nice clothes
of everybody it was a bomb shelter supposed to protect you my
beautiful red dress was in shreds after I was really sad about it

I really have the dark hair my cousin had dark hair also and her
sister hated her didn't speak to her and her son and my dad
was the blond one there was so much seething hatred
even royals got bombed had to fight warriors to the end

Fear Of Frost

The fig tree needs covering
whole thing
even its sides
branching
under the green tarp.

Frost will fall tonight
from up the Umpqua--

Mt. Scott's shaggy mane
clear cut slopes knobby protrusion.

To say bathos is quite popular
but I took the road travelled
less by red-tailed hawks
more when I was a deer.

Memoir So Far

The day was bad the horse ran away.
My memoir had to wait to live--
brambles and poison oak
were its pages.
Sticks the birch shed.  What I wrote it with.
And the cover!
Clouds mixed with two parts dog
half dew
half cat
half fattened calf.

Didn't you run away once?
Fans ask this frequently.
I remember it more like chasing
in my memoir.  It is my memoir after all.

For Your Fable

Swale sunset precisely at five ten

egg mc muffin made with real fable
hen sitting in the dark answering
branches cracking 

living room cave 

kitchen a clearing 

rusty copse

no officers 

we did not see him 

running away

Rain Securing Dust

Even the sweet foal next door
Noticed the sheriff his deputies
Tromping up and down the road
After the attempted robbery lights
Flashing a coal-black shepherd
Leading the way to Marney's trees
One officer held up a syringe locating
Douglas County on a Sunday morning
Weak fog Ravens too high overhead
To solve this puzzle remember how
Empty the fish ladder is appearing
The little house no good for fugitives
But they looked and searched anyway
For anyone hiding our hearts shrinking
Dad flat on his back the rest of the week
There were glitches in FaceTime happening
Those worked out depending on minutes