UNCLE WILLARD

 

Uncle Willard's hands were shaped much like

my mother's, though larger, with flat-tipped fingers

able to reach and find what my mother called

those fancy chords on the neck of his red guitar,

hollow-bodied -- a box, some players called it --

beautiful and mysterious to the eyes of a young child,

too shy to sing but eager to gather those secrets.

He'd come by on Saturdays, or Sunday after church,

to our place in the housing projects, asking

if she wanted to do some picking, over coffee,

knowing already that she did -- of course she did.

It was only later, much later, that my mother

told me how he had made the trip to the hospital

when I was born, after Dr. Sergeant -- the man

who had delivered her other four babies

and remembered them all by name -- told her

that I was dying, unable to gather and hold

enough oxygen, that I would not last the night.

He arrived, mom said, well past visiting hours, with

his guitar, and his worn and annotated Bible,

anointed my head with oil -- for he was a preacher

as much as a player -- reading passages of scripture,

praying the long autumn hours into morning;

and I am sorry now that I did not speak to him of

this during his lifetime; I am sorry that I have waited

all these years -- decades of unintended silence --

simply to thank him for drawing from my small lips

those first few gasping attempts at song.

By Ear

 

Sometimes, when I am writing, and I can't

quite hear the words in my mind, I speak them --

quietly -- so as not to frighten them away,

listening for the gentle resonance

of vowel sounds repeating themselves,

calling out to one another in a language of air,

their small sheltering caves echoing.

I listen for the well intentioned but uninvited,

the idea lacking grace, the bum note;

and I am reminded at times of my mother

who learned to play guitar this way,

listening closely to the Grand Old Opry

and the Hit Parade coming through that old

wooden radio, like a temple glowing,

pausing her mother's 78s again and again,

lifting its needle and setting it down at the start

to catch what didn't want to be caught,

to pull forth a sound she could already hear.

Sometimes I need to be reminded of

how to listen deeply, of the line that runs

directly from ear to heart, bypassing

all else, the sound of a single strum and a single

voice alone in a room, as simple as that,

the way all good songs begin.

NAMES

 

My daughter's name was discovered by

her mother in a crowded bookstore,

as though it had already been

spoken for years, her middle name

crooned over the car radio

en route to the hospital through

a fresh dusting of December snow.

Some of our ancestors had names that

were changed and changed again,

anglicized by those who claimed

to know best, while others were deemed

unworthy to be recorded at all.

My aunt gave names to her stillborn,

keeping their sacredness to herself,

while our mother taught my brother

and I that our names were known

to the angels, and could be removed

from the Book of Life if we lied or

took the Lord's name in vain.

I thought of this whenever I wrote

in my Big Chief notebook, or read from

my children's Bible, as I thought of

my earthly father, who too remained

faceless, refusing me the family name.

But today, the winter solstice just

behind us, I can hear the gentle swelling

of choral music from the next room --

something that could only be

expressed in Latin, voices so light and airy they can only rise -- as my daughter

calls out one request or another

that I can't quite make out.

But, of course, I answer; I answer

without hesitation, as if this too were

a kind of song I stumbled into,

and must somehow learn on the spot.

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.

BROTHER SONG

 

Brother, have you at last earned

the peace and solitude

which somehow eluded you

on this side of the earth?

Perhaps you speak now in ways

I cannot hope to understand:

the repeating parentheses

of gently falling snow,

insistent pulse of a birch tapping

against the window glass,

sudden shock of a crow wing torn

and frozen to the sidewalk.

You, who saved up your words

like trinkets for a rainy day,

offer no reply but this,

the space you have shaped

in your former image.

Or perhaps your silence has

become your song at last,

the one you had been secretly

rehearsing all along.