from The White Room Poems

TONIGHT'S TRAIN

Tonight’s train goes by,
sounds like a wounded beast.
In the heart of the night,
everything holds its breath.

At last,
rain
so soft
it makes no sound.

Then slowly,
leaves bend,
a gutter
rustles.

One tell-tale blur of wind.

JOURNEY TO MY SON

I fly to you

oh so slowly
oh so slowly

and I search each cloud for your face.

I think I see you,
with your hair combed, neat, dressed in white,
looking slightly awake
slightly different in sleep
dressed in white as delicate as cloud
and your hands
folded
as I knew they would be
your long, slim fingers.

Quiet all the strings.

And I dressed all the clouds in your white.
And I dressed all the clouds with your face.
And I carried you with me as I flew to you.

But you were already there, in that faraway place
where the waves and the sea and the planes
and the clouds carry people to
when they go so far away.

More clouds,
more waves,
waves.
How is this so?
What can I make of this journey?
Will you know I saw you out at sea
on the waves of the world
as you dream
in the cloud of unbeing?

How will you make that journey
home? How foreign are we now,
all apart,
me in the sky,
you in the heavens,
your brother on one continent
your father another
and your lover
journeying home
to grieve you.

We are fractions of ourselves
factored out into cloud

not seeing
not feeling
being cloud-light.

NARCISSUS IN NEW TOWN IN YOUNGBERRY TIME

In the casuarina-soft sky
– your face.

I am your mirror words
– left waiting wondering
pinioned on the banks
and staring back

– not the poem you wanted to write
yelling out
with its yellow cries
its purple walls
its tissue paper
globes
lost planet halves
balanced in the netted air
in the planet wheel garden.

Clematis coils spurl seaward glances
at the empty panes.

Don’t touch, eel bird, child.