recent dreaming

the movement of groups

first, the nuns, running.

they were not fleeing,

though they flew by

night, a pack along the

path below the hills.

i mistook them for monks.

jacob corrected me in

my sleep and said, nuns,

running, not fleeing, but

flying, their cassocks

behind them as ribbons,

as branches, as wings.

and then the two stags, in

union with the four does,

running and fleeing,

through the beets, the echo of corn,

over the remnant of onion grass

and clover, past purslane

and potato skins, muddled in earth.

each leg plucking a string of the cleft,

the sound quick and strenuous,

then vibrating, fleeing,

as ribbons, as branches, as wings.

last night it was children,

skating on the ocean where

it had frozen, somewhere between

the first and second bar.

when the whistle blew, they

turned their bodies to seals

and swam to shore, catching

the still nodding waves of

movement, of salt water.

i was present, up to my neck

in the bob, but unconcerned

for myself. rather, as an onlooker,

i fretted over the kids as they

flew, ran, swam, and fled,

in unison, as birds, branches,

nuns, deer, ribbons tied

about antlers, as wings,

waving.

november horses

i crossed the path of a white cat,

this friday november 13th.

Am I more or less lucky now?

It's the season again when carrots come out

hugging one another tightly,

around the neck, belly, and ankles.

The crops know what's next and

they seek comfort in each other.

Similarly, leaves hurry to take

part of the collective sleep on the floor.

I find myself in the familiar pattern of sucking up

and deriving my own pleasure.

Mack Mead, a farmer, spoke last Saturday of returning home

this time of year, after working outside all day.

You swallow browns and crisps and purples,

decays, endings, mutings and fadings.

Then it's night and it's five and you've finished

because you can no longer.

You walk home. You see light.

and the world is awake and almost too much inside.

The walls are textured, colored, alive.

The smells are wet, comforting, like horses.

Pleasure is standing on the threshold between the two

and recognizing the stern outer angles

and the soft inner auras.

I put one boot inside while I keep my other out.

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