Of Ruth gleaning barley stalks in the dusk.
LISTENING TO THE SITAR BEFORE DAWN
It is not yet dawn, and the sitar is playing.
Where are the footsteps that were so clear yesterday?
Sometimes stones have no weight at all, and clouds are heavy.
To those who want me to change, I say, “I will
Never stop traveling that road which connects
Socrates to the turtle, and Falstaff to the Baal Shem.”
Every sitar note strikes a bargain with the one
Who arranges things. One note says, “A year in heaven.”
The turgid silence says, “Two years under the earth.”
The sitar players are already pulling heaven down,
While we have hardly learned to carry earth.
Perhaps they remember all their errors in loving.
Some say that Ganesha and Catherine do the work
For us all, but I see a great deal of faithfulness
In the dragonfly with her long, skinny body.
It was still dark when the fingers began to play.
Now we who have listened so hard have nothing to say.
The wavering sitar note is the early dawn.
For David Whetstone
LOAFING WITH FRIENDS AT OJO CALIENTE
Mineral pools remember a lot about history.
Here we are at Ojo Caliente, sitting together,
Soaking up the rumble of earth’s forgetfulness.
Why should we worry if Anna Karenina ends badly?
The world is reborn each time a mouse
Puts her foot down on the dusty barn floor.
Sometimes ohs and ahs bring us joy. When
You place your life inside the vowels, the music
Opens the doors to a hundred closed nights.
People say that even in the highest heaven
If you managed to keep your ears open
You would hear angels weeping night and day.
The culture of the Etruscans has disappeared.
So many things are over. A thousand hopes
F. Scott Fitzgerald had for himself are gone.
No one is as lucky as those who live on earth.
Even the Pope finds himself longing for darkness.
The sun catches on fire in the lonely heavens.
For Hanna and Martín
WHEN I AM WITH YOU
When I am with you, two notes of the sarod
Carry me into a place where I am not.
All the farms have disappeared into air.
Those wooden fenceposts I loved as a boy—
I can see my father’s face through their wood,
And through his face the sky as threshing ends.
It is such a blessing to hear that we will die.
Ten thousand barks become a hundred thousand;
I knew this friendship with myself couldn’t last forever.
Touch the sarod’s string once more, so that the finger
That touched my skin a moment ago
Can become a lightning bolt that closes the door.
Now I know why I keep hinting at the word you—
The sound of you carries me over the border.
We disappear the same way a baby is born.
Some foolish boy with my name has been trying
To peer all afternoon between the thick boards
Of the fence. Tell that boy it isn’t time.
THERE ARE SO MANY PLATOS
The mourning dove insists there is only one morning.
The nail remains faithful to its first board.
The hoarse crow cries out to a thousand planets.
The sun goes down through ghettos of clouds.
There is one Burning Mind and so many Platos.
The Morning Star rises over a flutter of wings.
To those who make up music, and write poems,
I say: Our task is to become a moist tongue
By which subtle ideas slip into the world.
Probably we were born too near the potato bin.
A touch on the thigh displaces all the heavens.
There are more planets than have ever been found.
They rise and set again. Some people say
A painting is a pitcher full of the invisible.
Robert, some images in this poem are just right.
It is probably as good as anyone can do
Who is still living in the old inn of desire.
BACH’S B MINOR MASS
The old Germans step inside Trinity Church.
The tenors, and sopranos, and altos and the horns
Say: “Do not be troubled. Death will come.”
The basses reach down into their long coats
And give bits of dark bread to the poor, saying,
“Eat, eat, in the shadow of Jethro’s garden.”
We all know about the old promise
That the orphans will be fed. The oboes say,
“Oh, that promise is too wonderful for us!”
Don’t worry about the sea. The tidal wave that
Wipes out whole cities is merely the wood thrush
Lifting her wings to catch the morning sun.
We know that God gobbles up the Faithful.
The Harvesters on the sea floor are feeding
All of those ruined by the depth of the sea.
Our oak will break and fall. Even after their tree
Has splintered and fallen in the night, once
Dawn has come, the birds can do nothing but sing.
THE BLIND TOBIT
Why does the prophet climb on the same ship so many times?
Why does the sleeper visit other continents by night?
The ship breaks up, and Kafka is lost so many times.
The high school teacher’s ghost waits by the stone wall.
Why does the ear always stretch toward the storm?
The Pharaoh imprisons and releases Joseph so many times.
Tobit! Tobit! Your eyes are milky white! Every
Father is blind when his son knocks on the door.
The blind Tobit fumbles for the door so many times.
Why do those who died by the stone wall at Gettysburg
Throw themselves against the Germans at Stalingrad?
The novelist writes and rewrites his novel so many times.
The general fights the same war again and again.
The violinist plays the same toccata over and over.
The conductor conducts the same piece so many times.
Why do some love affairs resemble a blow of lightning?
Are you surprised how often Zoroaster is reborn?
The snow blocks the country roads so many times.
THE GREEK SHIPS
When the waterholes go, and the fish flop about
In the mud, they can moisten each other faintly,
But it’s best if they lose themselves in the river.
You know how many Greek ships went down
With their cargoes of wine. If we can’t get
To port, perhaps it’s best to head for the bottom.
I’ve heard that the mourning dove never says
What she means. Those of us who make up poems
Have agreed not to say what the pain is.
Eliot wrote his poems for years standing under
A bare lightbulb. He knew he was a murderer,
And he accepted his punishment at birth.
The sitar player is searching: now in the backyard,
Now in the old dishes left behind on the table,
Now for the suffering on the underside of a leaf.
Go ahead, throw your good name into the water.
All those who have ruined their lives for love
Are calling to us from a hundred sunken ships.
VISITING THE TEACHER
I am the grandchild of Norwegian forgetters.
I am a nephew
of those who stole the onions.
We are all guests at the criminal’s wedding.
Each time we pick up a fallen wren’s nest,
We sense despair and injustice, but we love to feel
The little crackling of the abandoned eggshells.
To drink a drop of water increases our thirst.
Black-and-white movies intensify our longing
That night will come and simply take over from day.
The shadowy cave we live in extends far out
Over the world. It’s dark there. Even Amundsen
And all his dogs couldn’t find the end of it.
Stars have set so often in the woods without
Bringing the Magi, that the badger drinks
Sadness each time his nose touches the water.
Last night I brought my grief to my teacher.
I asked him what he could do about it.
He said, “I thought you came because you liked me!”
For Dr. Nurbakhsh
II
GROWING WINGS
It’s all right if Cézanne goes on painting the same picture.
It’s all right if juice tastes bitter in our mouths.
It’s all right if the old man drags one useless foot.
The apple on the Tree of Paradise hangs there for months.
We wait for years and years on the lip of the falls;
The blue-gray mountain keeps rising behind the black trees.
It’s all right if I feel this same pain until I die.
A pain that we have earned gives more nourishment
Than the joy we won at the lottery last night.
It’s all right if the partridge’s nest fills with snow.
Why should the hunter complain if his bag is empty
At dusk? It only means the bird will live another night.
It’s all right if we turn in all our keys tonight.
It’s all right if we give up our longing for the spiral.
It’s all right if the boat I love never reaches shore.
If we’re already so close to death, why should we complain?
Robert, you’ve climbed so many trees to reach the nests.
It’s all right if you grow your wings on the way down.
TIGHTENING THE CINCH
Hurry, for the horses are galloping along the road.
Our death is being saddled now. They are tightening the cinch.
Just keep shouting, “My heart is never bitter!”
Come, only a moment is left, the sun is touching
The sea at Point Lobos; those waves that Jeffers knew
Will soon wear the Lincolnish coats of night!
You’ve waited so long for me. And where was I?
Whatever pleases the greedy soul is like a drop
Of burning oil to the heart. What shall we do?
While they saddle the horses, just keep shouting,
“My grief is a horse; I am the missing rider!”
The grief of absence is the only bread I eat.
Whatever pleases the heart is like a drop of burning
Oil to the greedy soul, which can’t bear one moment
When men and women are tender with each other.
You know the writer of this poem has a thin
Hold on the reins, and is about to fall off.
Hold on. The horses are galloping toward the night.
CALL AND ANSWER
AUGUST 2002
Tell me why it is we don’t lift our voices these days
And cry over what is happening. Have you noticed
The plans are made for Iraq and the ice cap is melting?
I say to myself: “Go on, cry. What’s the sense
Of being an adult and having no voice? Cry out!
See who will answer! This is Call and Answer!”
We will have to call especially loud to reach
Our angels, who are hard of hearing; they are hiding
In the jugs of silence filled during our wars.
Have we agreed to so many wars that we can’t
Escape from silence? If we don’t lift our voices, we allow
Others (who are ourselves) to rob the house.
How come we’ve listened to the great criers—Neruda,
Akhmatova, Thoreau, Frederick Douglass—and now
We’re silent as sparrows in the little bushes?
Some masters say our life lasts only seven days.
Where are we in the week? Is it Thursday yet?
Hurry, cry now! Soon Sunday night will come.
ADVICE FROM THE GEESE
Hurry! The world is not going to get better!
Do what you want to do now. The prologue is over.
Soon actors will come on stage carrying the coffin.
I don’t want to frighten you, but not a stitch can be taken
On your quilt unless you study. The geese will tell you—
A lot of crying goes on before dawn comes.
Do you have a friend who has studied prisons?
Does a friend say: “I love the twelve houses”?
The word “houses” suggests prison all by itself.
So much suffering goes on among prisoners.
There is so much grief in the cells. So many bolts
Of lightning keep coming down from the unborn.
Please don’t expect that the next President
Will be better than this one. Four o’clock
In the morning is the time to read Basilides.
Every seed spends many nights in the earth.
Robert, you’ve always been too cheerful; you too
Will not be forgiven if you refuse to study.
THE BLINDING OF SAMSON
Don’t you see them? They are coming to blind Samson!
But some of us don’t want the day to end!
If Samson goes blind, what will happen to the sea?
Isn’t it bad enough that the sun goes down
Each night, while children throw shoes at the moon?
I remember my mother’s grief at sunset.
Now I remember my father. I remember
Every father when he is wrestling with his son.
Oh Lord of the Four Quarters—he is destined to lose!
You gypsy singers, make some raw cries!
Call in the crows to fly over the plowed fields.
I want the beating palms to cry out for Samson.
I want rough voices and shouting women
To cry out against the blinding of Samson.
I will always cry—take away those knives!
Isn’t it enough that the Evening Star sets every night
And lovemaking ends at dawn? Please, God, help
The human beings, for men are coming to blind Samson.
THE NEST IN WHICH WE WERE BORN
Have we forgotten the nest in which we were born?
Have we forgotten the scrawny heads and the stickly floor?
Have we forgotten the cries and the wide-open beaks?
How old were we before we forgave those
Other ones in the nest? Probably it is our own
Necks that should be swinging in the wind.
Last night I dreamt my brother drowned. His body
Did not come in, and he had a wife and children.
Waves kept arriving. At last I saw his shirt.
We are in a rowboat halfway over the ocean
With the oars broken. Water is coming in through cracks.
A blind old man is guiding our route by the stars.
What shall we do with the stories old men tell?
Some say a shaggy being older than Adam
Established a prison inside the grain of rice.
One hair left on the goat’s chin will be enough
To bring down lightning on a stormy night
If we have forgotten the nest in which we were born.
REMBRANDT’S BROWN INK
The sorrow of an old horse standing in the rain
Goes on and on. The plane that crashes in the desert
Holds shadows under its wings for thirty years.
Each time Rembrandt touches his pen to the page,
So many barns and fences fly up. Perhaps that happens
Because earth has pulled so many nights down.
When we hear a Drupad singer with his low voice
Patiently waiting for the next breath, we know
The universe can easily get along without us.