Questions with Wrong Answers

notes from a middle school field trip

How many people are you going to fit in that tent?
Was it a good idea to buy yourself a hot chocolate
     and a Red Bull at 7pm?
Did you actually leave food in your tent after two others
     got torn open by foxes?
Did you stop to think that you might not like to walk around
     in wet sneakers and jeans all day before you waded into the ocean?
Are you still hungry?
Do you know any other words besides “thingy” and “hi-yah”?
Do you really want to hike six miles of mountain in flip flops?
     Is it because your shoes are wet?
Were you going to tell a teacher that our shuttle to the ferry
     had arrived? Or just let it drive off again?
Are you still awake?

Songlines

after Lauri Astala

The continents sing to each other,
the coastlines harmonize.
Alaska trills forth a glissando
flowing down California,
Mexico, Panama, Peru,
to land a triumphant bass chord
right on the coast of Chile,
only to launch upward again,
flying from the tip of Brazil
to West Africa,
with a Greenland descant
soaring above,
until the whole world
at last resolves
into a single,
neverending
cadence.

Wonders

for Bennett

What would the world be, I wonder,
without curiosity? Without the whimsy
of wonder itself? I wonder. Would the world
whirl on without us, weaving its miracles,
its marvels and magic, a maestro of surprises,
of singing silences and dazzling darkness?
I wonder. Or would it stop, with none to see,
none to sing the questions, none to seek
the answers, none to wonder at the wildness
of it all? Are we the ones, in fact, whose wonder
creates the wonders of creation? Are we
just the universe caught up in delight,
astonished at its own attentiveness?

Soldier of Distinction

from the WWI diary
of Julius M. Riddle
December 15, 1917

Later in the evening
we had an inspection by Col. May.
As he came thru,
I was standing beside the aisle,
at attention.
He stopped in front of me
and for a moment
I thought he had recognized me
and was going to extend the glad hand.
Instead, he said,
“How long
since you have had a bath?”
I told him,
and he walked on.

ceci n’est pas un poème

after René Magritte

The destiny of this wood,
grown and shaped for fire,
is held now in the hand,
its heart a smoldering pyre,
its breath a ring of smoke,
ascending ever higher.

[after Pablo Neruda]

“Once again my words / turn to the waves.”
—Pablo Neruda, “Ode to Waves”

I took inspiration, once,
from the sea, and once again
from the sky, my
poems, my words
offered back to them in turn,
shyly, humbly, hoping merely to
see, if only from afar, the
muse as she turns, and waves.

Nine Ways of Looking at a Pebble

after Wallace Stevens

          I
A pebble on a beach:
one galaxy among many,
in a universe of sand.

          II
What do you see under your feet?
The gravel, or the quartz?

          III
A pebble on the ground
is a rock.
A pebble in a sling
is the fall of a mighty warrior.

          IV
The eye of the mountain
watches each of us
through the pebble.

          V
Within each seed
lies hidden the mighty oak
of a boulder.

          VI
Infinite shades of gray
in an infinitesimal space.

          VII
Erosion,
the ultimate egalitarian,
reduces us all,
in the end,
to pebbles.

          VIII
Fully present in every moment,
I am held in complete awareness
by the mere existence of a pebble
beneath a thousand mattresses.

          IX
From what mountain,
what lofty peak,
has this pebble fallen?
From what heights
has my own soul
descended?

Ode to the “S” Key on my Keyboard

after Pablo Neruda’s “Odes to Common Things”

Do you know,
brave captain,
what is in store for you?
Both leading
and following your
soldiers
into battle,
you will be
the first to fall
beneath
the hammering blows
of the enemy,
your face
worn away,
unrecognizable,
slain,
since you never
surrendered.

I would
save you from
sacrifice,
and yet
cannot
do even this
without
your help,
my steadfast
scribe.
What can I
say
without you,
or how even
say
that I
say it?

Your sound,
so sibilant,
soft as a
snake’s sneakers,
a susurration
of simple
sequences,
sliding and slippery,
snows gently
upon
my senses.
And yet, too,
you scintillate,
a sequined soloist
shining
in splendor,
seeming to
surprise
even
the startled
stars.

And so…
and so
you see
that even here
at the
end
of all things,
of all plurals,
of all ones
that would be
twos
and threes,
I need you,
I savor you,
I seek your
supreme
summation of all
the seeds of life
into the
superlative
super-plurality
of the cosmos.

The Dragon, the Lady, the Knight

To be enjoyed as: 

1. Choose Your Own Adventure 
2. Mad Libs 
3. Poetry 

1. The Dragon 
2. The Lady 
3. The Knight 

1. did flame 
2. did flee 
3. did fight 

1. upon 
2. unto 
3. before 

1. the castle 
2. the lair 
3. the moor 

1. but when 
2. until 
3. unless 

1. despair
2. defeat
3. distress

1. enshrouded
2. exposed
3. dispersed

1. the fortune
2. the armor
3. the curse

1. the white knight
2. the woman
3. the wyrm

1. discovered
2. forgot
3. confirmed

1. its tail
2. her dress
3. his steed

1. was burnt
2. was torn
3. was freed

1. forever
2. but never
3. and so

1. the fearless
2. the fair
3. the foe

1. was vanquished
2. was honored
3. was praised

1. in glory
2. in shame
3. always

Antipodes

for Patrick

When the world is upside
down around me, I sense
you there on the opposite
side of the sideless globe,
a pinpoint of precisely calibrated
connection, on which the entire
planet is balanced, spinning around
a single plumbline of gravity
connecting your feet to mine,
leaving us rightside up together.

The Best Worst Poem

A green cow went Moo—
and Trampled me.
-M.A., 7th grade

Do you really think this poem
—all two lines of it—
is in the style of Emily Dickinson,
per the assignment?

Let’s compare it to our notes.

Emily is fascinated
by the mysteries of nature
—why is that cow green?—
not to mention Death. Check.

Dashes and Capitals—yes and Yes.

A surprisingly elegant
slant rhyme of Moo
and Me, leaning into
absent consonants.

Short and untitled—those are gimmes.

And to top it all off—
the drama! Action!
Mystery (again with the green?)!
Even dialogue!

Could this be, perhaps… a masterpiece?

Do I Have To?

for T.S.

Do I have to do the assignment?
Do I have to do all of the assignment?
Do I have to show an interest in something outside of myself?
Do I have to put out actual effort for my own benefit?
Do I have to develop my inherent talent by improving my skills?
Do I have to expand my awareness and appreciation of the world around me?
Do I have to transcend my self-imposed limitations?
Do I have to achieve true ownership of my body, mind and will?
Do I have to have complete freedom to act for the best in every situation?
Do I have to attain everything my heart truly desires?
Do I have to be a blessing to everyone and everything around me?
Do I have to realize my full potential as a human being in this world?
Do I have to fulfill my ultimate destiny as a soul?
Do I have to?

Fully Named

“Real names tell you the story of the things they belong to.”
—J.R.R. Tolkien

My name is written on pages and pages, turning and turning, being read as they are written
My name is a secret that I tell to everyone I meet
My name is a temporary permanence, always the same and ever-changing
My name is brother, son, uncle, friend, lover, student, teacher, gurubhai
My name is artist, writer, musician, dancer, singer, yogi
My name is monk, and not a monk, and perhaps both, or neither
My name is inscribed on the side of a mysterious tollbooth
My name is the drips and blooms and splashes of a watercolor in D major
My name is a jig with brown hair and blue eyes
My name is a mandolin calling to a fiddle singing to a guitar
My name is a G9 suspended chord, capo three
My name is the ubiquitous underlying hum of a harmonium
My name is a silly saga of sibling Christmas letters
My name is I don’t dance becoming May I have the next waltz?
My name is I love you, and As you wish, and Don’t panic
My name is the sound of Muppets dancing the Big Apple on Erin’s Shore
My name is the sound of Shiva’s footfalls pirouetting across galaxies
My name is Anachoron, Nataraja, Lord of the Dance
My name is two miles long in waltz time, 160 beats per minute
My name is Expecto Patronum and Felix Felicis
My name is employee number eight hundred and thirty one
My name is scattered across nine translations of Cyrano de Bergerac
My name is the complete works of Shakespeare as adapted by Gilbert & Sullivan
My name is the steps of a clandestine polka ringing through an empty church
My name is a serious parody of a silly song
My name is chocolate chip cookies and chai ice cream
My name is a rhyme for silver, ninth, purple, month, and wolf
My name is alternating feasts and famines of poetry
My name is Aum Namo Bhagavate and Aum Namah Shivaya
My name is Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me
My name is a pilgrimage through holy lands, within and without
My name is a tiny bubble of laughter joining the sea of mirth
My name is an inhalation, and an exhalation
My name is a mantra repeated exactly once, forever

The Mashed Potato Song

for Natalie and Eric to sing to Eli [video]

Mashed potatoes make me smile,

Mashed potatoes make me grin,

Mashed potatoes by the mile,

Mashed potatoes for the win!

Bring… some… 

mashed pota-

toes, mashed po-

tatoes, mashed

potatoes,

mashed pota-

toes, mashed po-

tatoes for me!

[repeat until hungry for, or sick of, potatoes]

Submission

“Joyful submission, indeed, is the way to pay off
one’s karmic debts without incurring any new ones.”
—Swami Kriyananda, The Promise of Immortality

Do we have any choice but
to submit to the will of God?
What else can possibly happen?
But within our submission itself is a choice:
a choice between giving up—and offering up.

I respectfully submit my résumé,
which will thoroughly enumerate
my more than adequate qualifications
for anything You might throw at me,
as well as my clear promotional potential.

I submit to the ladies and gentlemen of the jury
Exhibits A through Infinity, demonstrating,
beyond a shadow of a doubt, the fact
that it is our very trials that have given us
the strength to become who we are today.

I submit myself, joyfully, to every opportunity.

Eyes of Light

If thine eye be single,
thy whole body shall be full of light.
—Matthew 6:22

Looking into the camera lens
I draw my own focus
to a matching single eye
and feel the light rising,
filling, flowing over and out,
to all eyes of light,
where all I’s are one.

Palm Sunday in the Time of Covid-19

“I tell you, if these hold their peace,
the very stones would immediately cry out.”
—Luke 19:40

Which Pharisees have rebuked us,
and whether we deserved it,
we may never know,
but we are holding our peace.
Some hold it gingerly, some lovingly,
as though we have never held it before,
or as though we always have.
Our peace teaches us how
it wants to be held.
And in that peace we find
the world whispering to us,
sweet seismological nothings
from the very bones of our planet,
no longer drowned out
by droning self-importance.
The birds rejoice in the spotlight
of our shared sun,
sea turtles bless the beaches
with their eggs and their trust,
and our Mother Earth,
as we don our masks,
slowly pulls her own aside,
beaming through the clearing air.
The song continues
though the singers change,
as together we await a savior,
await the day that our voices
will reunite in the new harmony
that our peace taught us
when we stopped to listen.

Sri Lanka, Easter Sunday, 2019

“Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”
—John, 2:19

His kingdom was
not of this world.
His temples stand
in our hearts’ potential
to love all of creation.
If any heart finds
its temple shattered
by fear or by hate,
it will be raised up again.
Whether it take
three days of a human life,
or three Days of Brahma,
all will someday be reborn
when finally they turn toward
the light and promise
of Resurrection Day.

Permeability

“[Poetry] makes us permeable.”
—Jane Hirshfield, interview, March 20, 2015

The more I sit still, the more I become
aware of how still it is impossible to sit.
My outer motions yield to a silent thrum
of atoms, each one spinning, embracing its
Einsteinian truth: energy subtler than air,
vibrating back and forth, into the space
occupied by the atoms of the chair
I sit in, such a rapid interlacing
that I can no longer tell where I end
and it begins, both of us melting into
atmospheric spheres of atoms, blending,
expanding, and I find myself sky-skinned,
Earth-footed, galaxy-eyed, exquisite—
a single cell throughout the infinite.

The Time Tuba

[inspired by an autocorrect of my name]

Warning: This tuba will self-destruct in...

...5
The Time Tuba™ is guaranteed to provide many happy and satisfying hours of music to both practitioner and audience. [Actual hours sold separately. Not compatible with any other spatio-temporal dimensions.]

...4
The Time Tuba was created by an evil sorcerer whose neighbor’s son would practice at all hours of the night. With every note the boy aged a year. By the time he noticed, he was 87, arthritic, and had to give up the tuba. The evil sorcerer lived quietly ever after.

...3
The Time Tuba uses valves to change the length of a note, rather than its pitch. This is very convenient, as the musician can simply play all the notes ahead of time and trust them to come out with the correct timing. Unfortunately, all the notes are the same.

...2
The Time Tuba exists in its own dimension. No matter how long you practice or perform, you will finish at the same time you began.

...1
The Time Tuba has an extra key on its side. When combined with an E-flat, I found that it played slightly sharp while at the same time transporting me 156 years into the future. The F-natural remains perfectly in tune, and returns me to the present. B-flat, however, took me back to a date preceding the invention of the tuba. This has turned out to be a problem, as the Time Tuba itself has now disappeared. (Note to self: Make way to Germany, find Johann Gottfried Moritz, see if he can speed things up a bit.)

...0