I know something of making, and I’m here to tell you
If the world was made by some grand carpenter
Somewhere there’s a corner
To which all the error has been pushed
Some joint not quite square
Some depth not quite plumb
Some dark unknown fluke
Covered deftly with cosmic caulk
And one hell of a paint job
Out of the Mexican blue
Huddled beachless against
The Houston boxcar night
Begging for breath
Hope a dwindling dim
Names already lost
Against the standing dead
Elsewhere a coyote counts his take
Baying at a cloven moon
Big noises drift and blend and bend
Along the big-bosomed beach afternoon
Pelicans snag the wind and troop off
Into the indifferent sky
The snag-tailed grackles call
“Sweet pea! Sweet Pea!”
Or, if Russian,
“A drink! Come have a drink!”
And then the people, in solar gratitude
Lined up, eyes closed, skin offered
Without reservation
To some unseen eternity
Gods for the moment
Is the world wearing you down?
I pined for it.
And still, despite long years
Of falling short, I still do.
So easy to sink into bitterness
To collect reasons, to blame
This or that, to stand upon contempt
As if it were a fit foundation
As if it weren’t just envy
Of other lives grasped whole
And lived without restraint
Right or wrong
We’re instruments, finely tuned
To one another
So all our joys and disappointments,
Trials and victories, lapses and vindications
Are funneled willy-nilly
Into dreams of each other
Nothing to be done; it’s what we are
It’s how we see what’s real
How we hold it up to available light
How we learn and unlearn
How we cling to threads
Ever unraveling
An old, recently forgotten story
The bear retreats, licks his unmortal wounds
Sleeps fitfully, sulking, dreaming
If only this had been that
A bit more or less of one thing or another
The fight would have gone another way
Claws would have sunk deep into
Another hide, teeth into
Another neck, just so
The small crack of the cervical vertebrae
Unhealable, would have ended
All doubt and misconception
Made dreams of winter sweeter
Spring comes, and a darker healing
A hesitant thrust, a feint
The bear looks over his shoulder
No one there, a few sheep
He scratches old scars
All the doubt spills out
The fuming pustule opens
It was just a lack of will, after all, he thinks
Out from the cave
Comes lumbering death
exiles child 