An Evening Sipping Tequila

I’m thinking...remembering.
The Ides of March had only one hit,
“Vehicle”, an attempt to run with Chicago and
Blood, Sweat, and Tears.
You know, the big horn section,
nice and brassy. They weren’t that bad.
After Blues from Laurel Canyon
John Mayall seemed boring.
There was Strawberry Alarm Clock’s
“Incense and Peppermint”, which was fairly silly.
Surely you remember the rambling,
incoherent, “American Pie”, which everyone liked,
and that ridiculous “MacArthur’s Park”
sung by Richard Harris.
We saw the Berlin Wall built, lasting
from 1961 to 1989.
It was a failure. Even in 1961, we knew
it would eventually be that.
Nice try, Nikita.
But, thank goodness,
Leonard Cohen became better with age.
Jimi Hendrix’s rendition of the
“Star Spangled Banner” still reverberates
the pain of where we have been,
and where we are again.

A Moment Of Kinship

Some have said life is short.
Yes, if you waste it.
Or if you can’t be bothered
with something because
you think life is too short.
But life is long so we can accomplish things,
build things, and worry, fret, stress, feel joy,
and spread some happiness.
Is there anyone
who can say that 70 years
is a short period of time?
When we were ten, anyone
over forty seemed unbelievably old.
My mother lived to almost 90,
and she thought that was too long.
Galapagos Tortoises can live
over 100 years.
Horses live to about 30 years.
And dogs and cats come up short.
But there was Spock’s
“Live long and prosper.”
I always loved that moment of kinship.
A wonderful way to wish us well.

Parts Unknown

Remembering Anthony Bourdain

There is a hole in the Universe.
No one has stepped in.
There was no place in the world
I was uncomfortable when he was there:
passionately curious, sensitive,
a consummate teacher.
Did you see Houston? Montana? Vietnam?
Congo? Armenia?
It was the people, the same everywhere,
and wonderfully different. He let them speak.
Their food, their stories, their histories.

But now, in remembering what
he stood for, I hope more of us
make time to annihilate those parts of ourselves
that are a sham, to uncover
our true nature;
take time to walk in someone else’s shoes,
eat their food, to become more human,
to shine a little light on darkness;
take time to recognize one truly heroic person
in our lives;
take time to listen to winds that blow
across our borderlands,
ruffling grass, messing our hair,
speaking truths that have no limits.

On the other hand,
I'm mad as hell he did
what he did.

Old Tree

It stands near
the corner of my yard,
mostly leafless,
limbs thinning,
many stubbornly hanging on,
remaining perches for the birds.
Handsomely gnarly,
a kind of character
for those
who take the time
to see beyond
its weathered complexion
and find stories in its
cracked and wrinkled prose,
to hear its melancholy songs
coaxed out and
caressed
by breezes and winds.
Its shade and climbers are gone,
as are its older companions.
It has stood steadfast through
lifetimes of seasons from
the gentle to the terrifying,
hot and cold,
wind, fire, and rain.
Now struggling
with withering roots,
eroding soil, and
barely
available water,
still its days cannot be numbered.
In Nature’s time,
its bark and limbs
loosen slowly and drop,
and the roots give way
until the Old Tree falls,
finally,
in its return
to Mother Earth.

Starry Night

Past and present wrestling,
as usual.
My creaking house builds
into a roar and drags in the noise
of coyotes, roosters, dogs, and crickets;
road noise from those past traveling,
seeker days,
meaningful and empty,
finds its way in.
Leaning back in my chair,
dream crashing, softening,
starry, starry skies,
coyotes gathering for their
nightly yelping fest.
An owl is perched on my shoulder,
an Elk is standing
outside my office window,
looking at me from ten feet away,
chewing, chewing, chewing,
pausing—staring.
One of the horses stepped out
of the painting in the dining room
and made a mess of things.
It let itself out.
The owl is now a cat named Zeke.
It’s late October, window open.
I’m shivering.
Nearly paralyzed.
I need a blanket, but I can’t reach it.
I can’t do anything but gasp,
stretch my legs,
force open my foggy eyes.
My companions have moseyed off, finally.
It’s peaceful.
Getting, stumbling, up.
The laundry needs folding.
But mostly, here now,
I am blessed.

At My Age

it seems the beginning
of the age of hazy memories,
but the places of unattached things,
the vastness of my unknowing,
neither no longer held in check,
have begun their unraveling.
Clarity is rearranging itself.

If we could recover our first language,
the one we had at birth,
what would we remember about first light?
What questions did we ask?
That language
let go when we started speaking.
It’s still somewhere
in the convolutions of our brains.

There were voices that began
speaking to me
before my birth, telling me that
whatever is, isn’t;
whatever isn’t, is.
I still take that to mean
that I am not of this place.
Of what place I am is where I am not.

But no matter the time or place,
or the clatter of planting, building, and untangling,
I’ll continue my stumbling ways,
entering reluctantly another ramshackle,
bewildering place.

Our Mother's Mother

Memories fade.
A life’s history is slowly erased
by age and condition,
unresolved disappointments,
frustrations, and dementia.

Mom always asks if we have heard
from her mother.
It is either a cruelty or a blessing
of my mother’s
old age
that she doesn’t remember
her mother’s death, but
becomes upset
when told Grandma died in 1961.

On the other hand
she longs for her mother.
Whether it is for protection,
a comforting voice, or gentle,
reassuring hands that would cradle
her face, it makes no difference.
Perhaps it is enough simply to tell her
that even though her mother can’t be here,
her mom loves her and is proud of her.
There are some things old age cannot drive away.