BETWEEN BURSTS OF THUNDER, WE HEAR ROBINS SINGING

If we cannot learn the song

of these birds, calling through

the shuddering dark, let us at least

better study their silence.

If we cannot know the secrets

of their flight, let us at least

acquire the stillness they have

perfected on thin air.

BREAKDOWN

 

When my mother returned from the hospital -- the place where I was born a few short years before -- came back after several rounds of what were then known as shock treatments, she didn't come back all the way. Her cool blue eyes seemed to be somewhere else, her words slower and distant, as if trailing behind her from the next room. When she would occasionally forget the names of my brother and me, or get us mixed up, I didn't understand. I wondered who this woman was, and whether the right mother had been sent home to us. She spent much of her time in bed, unread magazines and bottles of pills balanced beside her, monotonous flicker of the black-and-white TV her only window to the outside. But I liked when she played her guitar for us, when whatever had been taken from her seemed to return, at least in part, her voice becoming almost a smile. She would sing those old country hymns and children's songs, murder ballads which I later found she had changed the words to, for our sake. Even within the beauty of such music, she seemed to be saying, the world was a frightening place, violent without warning, and whatever path you chose was yours to walk, and walk alone.

MY MOTHER'S GUITAR

 

My mother's guitar, silent now these

past few years, rests in a corner of the room,

behind that old worn chair, each weary,

each leaning in their separate directions.

I remember clearly the first songs

it offered up: Froggy Went A-Courtin,

Blowin' in the Wind, The Wayfaring Stranger,

remember, too, the warm earthen smell

inside its Bible-black case, the ghost image

of its six strings in that gold plush lining,

long, thin roads disappearing into themselves;

I can see the wooden cathedral hidden

within the sound hole, small sparks

of angled light drifting in and out of view.

The hands that made those chords ring have

flown like birds, far away, hands gone

arthritic, fingers alternately tingling and numb.

But I can still feel the fine ridges wrapped

around each string, how the smallest touch

sounded like a secret being whispered,

a kind of conjuring with no need for words.

It rests here now, between journeys, exhaling

nearly audibly, holds its songs closely,

forever patient in its memories, its history,

its knowing, not forgetting the breath

and blood that rose to meet it,

not letting go of any of it. Not just yet.

HEART

 

I always thought I was simply too shy

for all those dances in the cavernous school

gymnasium, shadowing the tiled wall

while trying to appear casual, prickly sweat

mingled with drugstore perfume,

and the lights never quite dim enough,

young voices rising above the pulse of music,

searching out each other, everyone

seemingly too close and too far at once.

But perhaps it was you all along,

faulty timekeeper, clumsy blood hammer

building your secret rooms, nail by crooked nail.

You never listened well, that much

is for certain, never kept a steady beat,

just made it up as you went along,

always slightly ahead or behind,

daydreaming yourself nearly out of a job.

Heart, those bright-eyed teenage girls

have long since waltzed calmly into middle age,

and I am no jazz poet. Let's sing one

of the old songs tonight, something sweet

and simple, one that begins with barely

a whisper. You know the one.

Stay with me for just a while longer.

WHEN, FOR A MOMENT, I GROW WEARY

 

When, for a moment, I grow weary

from the endless news reports of bombs

dropping from bleak winter skies

and the faceless tanks nudging their way

through streets clogged with rubble,

I turn my mind instead back to that little girl

cradling her ragged doll at her side, there

in the long silence of the subway tunnel

that for tonight has become her bed.

I want to tell her that everything will be alright,

even if that is another bedtime fable,

to sing to her gently, in her own language,

as I would to my own child, who sleeps

at this moment in a warm tangle of sheets,

mouth agape, dreaming, I imagine,

of flight, and of saving this broken world.

I have not yet found the perfect words

or melody to make this promise happen,

cannot quite decipher my own voice

through a distance as immeasurable as this,

this lullaby merely a litany of questions

turning endlessly back upon itself.

Is the lesson simply that we learn no lessons,

that the old names must soon be worn

smooth to make way for the new?

Still, I continue, offering the only comfort

I can summon, the stubborn light of

one still standing, unable to turn away.

TURN YOUR RADIO ON

 

Walking past the small church

on the corner today, so unassuming

that you might miss it, I stopped

to gaze at the radio tower, its thin needle

nearly piercing the chilly blue sky,

a steeple once lit with the living spirit,

or so we were assured as children.

I could almost hear my mother

singing those old country hymns

across the crackling airwaves,

long out of fashion, but reaching out

for whomever might need them.

"Get in touch with God," she would sing

in earnest, "Turn your radio on."

What strikes me now is the silence,

not of reverence but of neglect,

as if the neutral brick and worn boards

were sinking into themselves.

Perhaps it is the quiet of knowing,

the calm certainty of not having

to meet every voice with your own.

But the old transmitter glints brightly

in the sun, reaches toward the heavens,

as if in expectation, and the songs

my mother once sang are now

mine alone to hum as I walk on by.

A CALL IN THE NIGHT

 

What to make, then, of this lone bird calling out, long before the first glimmer of morning light? Maybe she has dreamed a human dream, I think, and woke in a terrible fright. Or maybe, like all of us, she just wanted to make sure that the world was still here. She hears the sound of her own voice echoing, one small proclamation among the silence of leaves and stars, her voice declaring only her own bird-ness. She feels the breeze, the air shifting imperceptibly around her song, feels the breath of something larger stirring in the dark. And she is at ease once again.

USED RECORD STORE

 

You can smell the basements of long ago

here within these cardboard sleeves,

slender spines creased and breaking apart,

can almost feel the dampness seeping through

the cold cinder blocks, stale cigarette smoke

and voices turned suddenly into ghosts.

You can hold the shroud of another world

half-awake, waiting to be rediscovered,

can wander aimlessly the long, narrow aisles,

the way you did when you were still a kid,

hungry for any sign of life to find you.

You thought those songs would last forever,

the way summer did in every chorus,

repeating endlessly into a silence not quite.

You thought that girl who taught you

to kiss would stay just a moment longer.

the sound of her laughter like the incantation

of something just beyond your reach.

You are still searching, thumbing the racks

for something you may have missed,

still looking and listening for a message

that has taken so long to find you.

GHAZAL WRITTEN ON A SMALL PATCH OF WINTER SKY

 

That indescribable blue after a winter storm

reminded me of you, your eyes filled with distance.

What could I have said to keep you here longer,

when what I say now must reach through every distance?

God does not speak our language or write us letters,

our words merely fragments thrown into great distance.

There is a strange joy in singing deliberately off-key.

Any singing we can manage is a way to close the distance.

When I was younger, I walked without second thought.

Now, my bones upon waking remind me of each distance.

It's a kind of blessing to let each loss have its say.

Not all of us live to sign our names upon that distance.

Still, I never meant to say to let go of this world, brother.

Forgive me. You know I can never fill such a distance.

THE NAMELESS BIRD

 

So often we mistake beauty for the light behind it.

We know better, but it's one of our favorite lies.

We long for clarity, seen through the lens of unreason.

Love itself walks between, where all hope lies.

I don't know how the geese find their way back every year,

or what causes two lovers to agree upon the same lie.

These winter crows don't care to know your name;

but they recognize friend from foe, and they never lie.

The bird in your heart doesn't understand that it's caged.

It sings when spoken to, sleeps where its shadow lies.

Death wins the final argument; we understand this.

But that doesn't make the songs we sang suddenly lies.

It's true, brother, that I should visit more often than I do;

but the grave is not where any of our memories lie.

It's no use asking me who is living and who has gone.

If you want the truth, let me begin with this lie.

DAYS OF SINGING

 

In those days, everyone seemed

to be singing. My mother sang the old

country hymns, the simple notes

from her guitar ringing clear and warm,

the mystery of words casting its first spell.

We all sang in church, even those

of us who could not, our thin Midwest

voices graciously lifted by those

whose joyful noisemaking rose to the rafters.

We sang at school to remember

the names of states and presidents,

invented name-songs for the pretty girls

we were still too shy to speak to.

We sang to pass the time, to count the miles

on field trips, and the long, dull drives

in our family's failing station wagons.

We sang in grocery stores and restaurants,

the teenage waiter, surely underpaid,

singing as he brought you your slice of

birthday cake, sparkling proudly with light.

The radio and television gave to us

a seemingly endless variety of jingles,

the housewives, children, and store clerks

filled with sudden musical wonder

brought on by new detergents,

deodorants, and breakfast cereals.

Nearly everything, it seemed, was worth

singing about. And everyone hummed along.

I don't know when the singing stopped,

or if any of us noticed. We had lives,

jobs, worries that we held close in silence.

But these days much of my life is again

narrated in song, measured out

by a spirited daughter, who praises

the sun and the rain without question,

who conjures goblins in hushed, lower tones,

sings the months of the year in Spanish,

and offers a silly rhyme up for her old man.

"Dad, do you like my song?," she asks

from the other room, knowing my reply

in advance; and I call back to her, from what

suddenly feels like a distance of years,

"Yes! Let me hear it one more time."