for goat's goodness

i dig my hand into you, goat,

for softness' sake and my own.

i look for the determination to smell

as sweet as you, goat,

to find an oil that coats too my fiber.

if only i were to possess horns,

not for gauging but for itching 

the scratch on my very own back,

just as you do.

one week's memory

i read yesterday morning

(while drinking coffee with cream on the backporch)

of how human's capacity for memory has changed.

and i say changed, not evolved.

in this book, they talk of images and memory.

no mention of solidity, but viscosity.

this past week, since returning home from the west coast,

has been all images and experience.

i stepped out of the shower and was wiping the mirror

clean of condensation to look at how blood shot my eyes were.

jacob stood on the other side of the door, somewhere

about where the large mirror leans.

he had found lassa, the ram, or the remains thereof,

buried his skull in the compost, marked it with grass.

a hot air balloon landed by our onions yesterday,

the sound of gas pulsing.

a van came and pulled up along the drying stalks of corn,

the image of a balloon painted on its side,

bumping along the grass to pick up the riders.

we watched the events from the drive, each with a watermelon 

between our sides and elbows.

the sky filled with grey on wednesday and thursday.

the light would break and hit half the fields.

that finally, after august, are beginning to look neat and tidy,

like paper stacked and organized on shelves.

neat plants growing in the deep colors of autumn:

all purples, hunters, almost blue.

certain trees have decided to turn, 

all purples, hunters, almost blue.

i picked apples alone on thursday;

i ate bites from five and my belly burned.

he said yesterday that we shouldn't be scared to try the new.

that we should take our collected images and apply them to the

present, shift and change them, pour them, viscous,

like syrup, over the situation, and delight in the sweetness

of what was, memory, and what is, the image.

soil not sand

Have made it now to the west coast.
Why, look at all these rocks.
If I were a geologist, I'd drool
(if my mouth were not dry).
This landscape homes the language of
'from dust to dust'
Were we once?
I always imagined us as soil, not sand.

an answer to the events of a rainy thursday:

a phone call, the gardener, and the first ever

gift of 'stay home this morning; i'll go in myself

and turn over the onions'

so now, books letters blankets

wet morning

it's difficult to imagine what will happen today,

this rain and yesterday evening's, all these weeds

to pull but not from mud, 

not from the wet leftovers of some previous month

it's easy, once away, to forget the grip of fields, how

they own us here, how horse nettle and pigweed snicker

and even purslane blows hot air around our ankles,

setting traps of inconceivable work days. three days of

virginia and my palm was reading tidy, what amendments?

what deficiencies? what sorting and planting and cultivating?

i was enthralled in social relationships and upper lips,

shoelaces and breakfast bills. 

now, back, we lean over our crops. 

the land group asked

the subtle bowhunter to triple his shots, peppers are

blushing, onions clipped, heavy, curing, and now, it's

raining, and where my feet touch, the soil will part into

two equal clumps of obligations and  necessities, only

fulfilled partially, the rest will wait till drier conditions.

august first, who remember rabbit rabbit

august

it comes 

and sits, stale and green,

like gingerale from june left

on the back railing of the boat's deck.

friday's harvest brought the finale of early summer cabbage and chard, well washed beets

and carrots, head lettuce separated and washed, lemon basil and thai magic, parsley (which

i can't help but find boring) and others, washed, sorted, in green and gray crates. lael and

sebastian are away in colorado for a wedding and the weight of the acres falls on the shoulders

of jacob and myself. we both worry we will be transformed into killing machines, mechanized

and tubed, due to our inexperience and independence. i fret over the green house, open and 

close it, open and close, peek in, open, glance, close. water, once? wait, two passes? 

jacob uses the tractors and rubs his head nervously with suspicion. wait, too close? too wet?

is it everything? nothing? of course, it's both, and if the two of us aren't careful, we'll pray to

the physical world alone and forget to bow to shadows as well, and the space between the 

objects and the shadows. those realms we make fists for, we water for, we weed.

the routine of the summer and the necessity for carefulness leads to urges of recklessness.

i want to take naps and work on the odd tan lines around my body. i want to take the hyacinth

car and drive to find jackie. i want to make mixed drinks for twenty people and read out loud

prose poetry, set off fireworks and then fall asleep underneath them, waking to confuse

fireflies with sparklers: stale, green, like gingerale, like august, in the palms of my two hands.