BURYING MOTHER
All that time in the womb
mother and baby exchanging cells
mother to baby and baby to mother
from one to the other and back again
One becoming two becoming one
becoming two and the two always one
It is not the same with the father
invited pleasure or invading pain
there for a moment and gone again
When you bury your mother
the worms eat you too
FOR MAIA AND ZOLA
After my mother’s funeral
I take a long quiet drive
across her beloved prairie
then fly across the country
to the home of my grandchildren
It is one thing to say that “life goes on”
something else entirely to hold it
EULOGY
My mother passes
from the womb of this life
to the new life of the next
It has been a difficult journey
My father is waiting for her
with two saddled horses
She is happy to see him
while still nervously scanning for Jesus
who she thought would be there to greet her
My father laughs
Plenty of time for that
in a place with no time
Let me help you up
onto this gentle roan
there’s a sunset I’d like you to see
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SECOND HONEYMOON
It is my mother’s birthday
she has barely made it to
88
Not one infinity sign but two
I see her from behind
standing again with my father at the altar
THAT MAKES SENSE
My father comes in a dream
to answer an unspoken objection
with unapologetic simple fact
that it wasn’t capacity he lacked
but the time for introspection
A PICTURE POEM
Mid afternoon, mid December
American Airlines from Dallas
drops into Calgary with the snow
Soft flakes fall as we rent the car
stop as we drive north into
an Ansel Adams world
Sky pillowed gray on gray
Houses and barns and bales
covered in white powder
Trees all a-bloom with hoary frost
both sides of the coal black road
For the next hour
any picture we take with color film
would still come out black and white
Until we top the overpass and see from a
horizon that was not a horizon
the rising of a Mandarin Orange moon
THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG
Scarlet, peppermint, ebony
their harmonious delight
a new dawn of wonder racing
down the highways of my sight
A powerful hilarious tipping
of rods and traffic cones
up onto the sidewalk
by the yellow door
I have never been able
to restore them again
to their simple order
And Catherine Deneuve
didn’t help
WHALE’S TALES
The poems of whales
still rhyme
and are often
mistaken for song
Each year at about this time
a cacophony of competition
disturbs the elders
and the waters
Once the poem for the year is chosen
and all have learned it by heart
they return to their largeness
FOR WILLIAM CARLOS
So much hinges
on a red door in the rain
BIRTH OF HAIKU
Basho oh Basho
frog’s leap kissing water
wakens the prince