SNAP
Goes the can of beans,
The soda-can-dreams
That fizz and hiss
On their way to oblivion.
America is the land
That without irony
Sells both the cigarette
And the nicotine patch.
It was late and the insomniac moon
Played cold music in my ears,
A seashell hum foot-tapping
To the beat of toss-turning dreams.
1
Blades of grass
Waiving in the wind;
Blades of wind
Waiving in the grass.
Why can I not forget when forgetting is the cure?
The warm, wet beach hisses and coos, but her allure
Belongs to those who want to rest. I do not want to rest.
“Listen to your doctor,” they say.
“You are but human! You can’t go on like this!”
Let not the sun emerge and lacerate
The clouds, nor graffiti the sky with light,
That like a cloistered rose I may escape
The bee’s advance, escape the fragrant plight
Of sweaty stars, of wet earth, of erect
Plants and pregnant birds; I seek asylum
Hold me in abeyance, O life! Let not
The bitter waters rush on, nor rusted
Thorns obscure the rose, nor gnarled oaks rot;
I am the bearer of hope, entrusted
To give the Earth her due: to sky betrothed
As I turn its clear-plastic pages, the album
Crinkles its nose like a hound on the scent,
And I find my way—eyes down, nostalgic tears
Leaking from between twitching lids—
To memories stopped dead in their tracks and
Mounted like trophies on the page:
I am nothing. Or maybe a thin layer of snow
On hibernating grass, a just-fallen leaf
Still twitching in the coffin of the frozen earth.
But there is a wind
Skipping like a boulder across the Atlantic, flapping
Like a great migratory bird whose wake will brush me aside,
Will reveal my emptiness to the fog.
Perhaps if every night were so laden
practical life would grind to a halt—
the fields untilled, shops unopened,
schools unminded—for who can bear
mere survival in the face of, dare I say