The Job

 

It was going together according
To their prescription, their plan,
But I didn’t trust what I saw,
What I was seeing and said so –
Wouldn’t sign it off, told them
To taste it if they didn’t believe
Me and some of them did.

That changed things; slowed them
Down and brought them to a halt.
I sat there while they procrastinated
And searched for someone to blame
Knowing they wanted to blame me
Despite my being the one who drew
Attention to the problem. They wanted

It to belong to someone else.  I sat
There knowing the problem was
In the composition, the lack of
Knowledgeable sense during the
Combining of the ingredients,
The use of inept workers instead
Of sensitive artists and technicians,

But I had no credibility being
The one who voiced the criticism.
“Bring me solutions not problems”
Was their dictum; so I sat silent
And still while they revisited
Their plans and schedules
Looking at each other, seeking

To shift the project away, down
The hall and out into Assembly.
I wouldn’t sign off on that either so
They dithered till it was time to go.
I went too, like them, all of us
Obeying the rules.   I rode home in a
Blinding rain, smiling inside my helmet.

On Dying

 

Our dying isn’t contingent, but
If you say it is I might concede
Though not for long.  Susan grew
Tired of waiting and abandoned
Her hope.  Once when I had been
Upstairs she feared I had gone
And yelled my name in her weak

And debilitated voice.  Ever after
As long as she lasted I whispered
My nearness, on the couch, on the
Floor, and after a long while she sang
Herself in her morphine dream away. 
It is easier in combat, even if terror
Precedes death it is of short duration.

Dying in battle would guarantee
Passing to Valhalla where those who
Fought and died in earlier days waited
With mead and welcome.  Anthro-
Pologists avoid considerations like these,
We live as animals and die the same
Way, but which animal anticipates

And speculates?  What is to come
Next we wonder?  If Christ was
Not raised from the dead Paul
Said then he was the most deceived
Of all mankind, and in our metaphors
We are never content to merely die.
Some think it a shameful act. 

Others want to call and hear an answer
And have someone watch even if it takes
A long time in protracted pain.  I feel
Fit enough to fight.  A violent death
Would suit me now – carried out with
Knife or gun as long as it was a
Long way from medical assistance.   

Happily ever after

 

We got married and lived
Happily ever after always
Hoping that meant forever
But not worrying about it
At first and only afterward
Considered the implications
Ever might have for eternity,

But in a practical sense
It meant a long time.
Were we happy that long?
Not if happy meant
Unalloyed delight but if
It meant as good as can be
Expected, then yeah, sure.

She had delightful looks and
Ways.  She could have been
Scheherazade if she tried but
She took me for granted and
Leaned back into the joy of
What remained, and I was happy
To enjoy her one smile at a time.

Congestion

 

Mary tried but ended dying
In childbirth.  Years later a
Relative got a bogie on the
Seventeenth.  The TV cameras
Caught her chagrin, but she
Went on and finished well,
Setting a new course record.

And when she later dies it won’t
Be from childbirth.  She is not
Even certain she wants one or
Anything beyond a great career.
In future years women won’t
Be dying from liver or kidney
Failure.  Dying will be from

Congestion, cramming them-
Selves into smaller and
Smaller spaces, breathing each
Other’s air, swearing that some-
One is taking their place in the
Long lines stretching from
Hemet to Loma Linda.

The Fan

 

Take the fan, fanning no one
Now that I’ve moved across
The room to my easy chair,
Duffy needing in my lap
After oral surgery yesterday,
But it could be anything,
No over-arching system,

Anything, everything being
Connected and leading to some-
Thing else, perhaps Duffy,
Perhaps my electric bill, sitting
Here with Duffy in my lap, I might
Struggle over whether to let
Him rest or get up and shut it off,

Or Ben flapping his ears unlike
The fan which is quiet.  I was
Notified yesterday where Susan
Was buried.  I’d asked for
Advance notification but they
Forgot, quietly going about their
Business as though I wasn’t here.

Reaching out

 

There might be muggers and killers
Outside in the dark, most people
Think; leave the dogs in back
And stay home, but in my case
Taking the dogs to the river before
Dawn when coyotes are all done
Feeding and heading for

Their dens – except I haven’t
Heard them in some time nor
Have we seen rabbits.  I hear
Lynxes are now protected in
This state.  I’ve never seen
One.  The brush now, because
Of the rain, reaches out and

Closes our pathways.  I need
Ben and Duffy to find the way.
Whether an attack in the dark
Or Bobcats in the brush they are 
In the mind – But if one reaches
Out long enough one is bound
To touch something eventually.

Susan Howe and Emily Dickinson

I've never liked the idea (obtained from critics) of Susan Howe's poetry and so have never read it, but I am interested in Emily Dickinson (at present) and so acquired Howe's My Emily Dickinson.  My inclination to skim stuff I'm not certain I need often works against me.  In this case I didn't immediately get a very clever juxtaposition.  On page 15 she presents a poem of John Milton in which he dreams of his wife who died in child birth.  On the next page Howe presents a poem by Emily Dickinson who writes of a pregnant wife who anticipates dying in childbirth.  I had to go back and read it again and see that Howe (who uses history in many of her writings) had prefaced these two poems by referring to the high risk of death during child birth (in Milton's and Dickinson's times), and if the mother survived, the child most likely wouldn't survive its first year.

 
After figuring it out, I found Milton distasteful (unfairly so, for the poem is a 14-line sonnet) for not representing his wife's point of view, using a classical reference to Jove, emphasizing his own sense of loss when on the next page in Dickinson's poem we can hear the wife (Milton's wife presumably was unable to articulate her thoughts and fears -- or if she did Milton ignores them) anguishing over the dangers of childbirth.  "I'm tempted half to stitch it up" Dickinson writes, and concludes her poem with "And so I bear it big about / My Burial -- before / A Life quite ready to depart / Can harass me no more --"  This last stanza isn't crystal clear, and Howe doesn't offer an exegesis, but it is clear enough I suppose.  She can't very well "stitch it up" and so must bear it.  The "About My burial" must mean thinking or worrying about the upcoming childbirth and anticipating a bad end, her death.  Then if we think about the timing, the anticipating she is doing (which Dickinson's words don't clearly convey) we can see that she is doing this anticipating "before" the baby is "ready to depart," for when it does depart it can "harass" her no more.  People who read this poem must get something like that although a quick check of the internet doesn't back that up.  Several people quote it but without any attempt at interpretation.

This is Emily Dickinson's poem:

This Chasm, Sweet, upon my life
I mention it to you
When Sunrise through a fissure drop
The Day must follow too

If we demur, its gaping sides
Disclose as 'twere a Tomb
Ourself am lying straight wherein
The Favorite of Doom

When it has just contained a Life
Then, Darling, it will close
And yet so bolder every Day
So turbulent it grows

I'm tempted half to stitch it up
With a remaining Breath
I should not miss in yielding, though
To Him, it would be Death

And so I bear it big about
My Burial—before
A Life quite ready to depart
Can harass me no more