PEACHES EN REGALIA ~

I CHING ~

I  N  T  E  R  V  I  E  W

D A V I D     H I N T O N

Farrar Straus Giroux

2015

LUCKY ~

Leaving For Work

I could hold you

All morning like this —

Loose summer dress

In my hands, brush of

Sunburn on your shoulders,

The feel of your waist,

And a game of tip-toeing

Who is taller, as we kiss

And won’t let go

That's Her

doing farm chores, lugging

water she hikes through a field

of wet grasses in high boots

old pants & cap, a red tee

shirt she slept in & much

earlier in bed I raised this

                                                                & kissed her kissed her

Wait

All evening

A swallow has

Swept the grassy

Farmyard for one

Shed goose

Feather to stitch

Into her nest —

It is easy enough

For me to pick

Up — but I watch

Instead, until

She has it

Lucky

She is right, this woman

I love, it has been a windy

Fall. And her blonde hair slips

Apart in long strands and with

One hand she combs it away from

Her face and she is smiling. For

Lunch she eats an apple and suns

Her legs, a summer skirt raised.

She is a mother. A small boy is

Napping upstairs in the house.

When awake he will chase

Leaves that fall down from the

Sky, that’s how he sees it.

He calls me daddy because I am.

When I was off at work this

Morning up river laying stone

Along the road in the village

A blonde woman and her young son

Visited me. Hands cold gripping

Wet stone, boots chalked. This

Woman carried her little boy

In her arms, his green sweater

Was like the one my son wears

His mother knitted, ah the love

Of mothers! and I gathered stone

By hand and thought of blue sky

Above, day clear as the river,

And why you must love what you do.

_____________________________

                       Bob Arnold

ONCE IN VERMONT

Gnomon

photo ~ "Early Spring"
by bob arnold

RAY LAMONTAGNE ~

ESSENTIAL ~

the bluebird




there's a bluebird in my heart that

wants to get out

but I'm too tough for him,

I say, stay in there, I'm not going

to let anybody see

you.



there's a bluebird in my heart that

wants to get out

but I pour whiskey on him and inhale

cigarette smoke

and the whores and the bartenders

and the grocery clerks

never know that

he's

in there.



there's a bluebird in my heart that

wants to get out

but I'm too tough for him,

I say,

stay down, do you want to mess

me up?

you want to screw up the

works?

you want to blow my book sales in

Europe?



there's a bluebird in my heart that

wants to get out

but I'm too clever, I only let him out

at night sometimes

when everybody's asleep.

I say, I know that you're there,

so don't be

sad.



then I put him back,

but he's singing a little

in there, I haven't quite let him

die

and we sleep together like

that

with our

secret pact

and it's nice enough to

make a man

weep, but I don't

weep, do

you?





——————————————————————————————————

C H A R L E S      B U K O W S K I
E S S E N T I A L      B U K O W S K I
Selected and edited by Abel Debritto
Ecco /Harper Collins UK 2016

JOSEPH A. ENZWEILER ~

JOSEPH    A.    ENZWEILER

The Doorway

There is the moment of the day

in early June, when yellow light

falls on the equisetum and the ground

breaks out so luminous, so green,

could winter ever fall atop

such beauty and lie so foreign,

so deep? I watch from my doorway

how the light moves off,grows pale

finally, the way a face falls

out of memory. Behind me,

through the door are all the things

I have, part of the world grown

used to me. And beyond at the twilight

woods, what will gather me

tomorrow. But now I let go

in the gentle, given night, unearned,

and settle in the door

(while the unmoving part of me

still turns to you to speak love

always). But soon we must be still.

For a rain begins to fall, so fine

that the woods fill up

with silver light

but make no sound.

——————————

Joseph A. Enzweiler