|
Repetitions
Long
walks are a tendency for losing things,
for passing and allowing things to pass:
a man strutting in shorts,
a woman trotting in a loose-fit skirt,
each falling behind and out of sight
as if misplaced.
So
I, who stroll for hours,
can't be trusted with keys,
with compasses or maps.
I sometimes think of turning back,
but even then I'd be going forward,
looking ahead to notice
how some face as it approaches
reminds me of another,
and
this new street fills me with deja-vu.
Strange
magic, a loss whose power
compounds in the memory
even the simplest gesture:
a mother sweeping hair
away from her child's eyes,
lover caressing the face of lover,
all hands gracing a common curve,
an arc of intimate regrets
familiar as a falling leaf,
a motion eased by repetition,
and often mistaken for directions home.
|
A
Man of Glass
My
father collected art glass,
vases and bowls from Webb and Tiffany,
some glazed yellow and red, brilliant as sunsets,
others clear as a splash of water.
Carefully taking one down from a shelf,
he’d say, “Notice the enamel finish”
or “Look at the quality of the inlay. ”
Each contained its own beauty and signature,
which he delighted in unlocking.
And
when the cancer started shaping him
like molten glass, it hollowed out his cheeks,
made deep pontil marks in his bony face.
His eyes glazed to a dark finish on his brittle life,
his unique gesture when curiously pleased—
flicking a finger down his nose and laughing—
his own beauty and signature,
which I would like so much to show you
but is on a shelf I cannot reach .
Read
additional poems by Michael T. Young at Poetry
Central and
listen to more poems at drunkenboat.com
|
