The Trouble with Poetry Read Online Free Page A

mindful,
    but in these last days of summer
    whenever I look up from my page
    and see a burn-mark of yellow leaves,
    I think of the icy winds
    that will soon be knifing through my jacket.

Reaper
    As I drove north along a country road
    on a bright spring morning
    I caught the look of a man on the roadside
    who was carrying an enormous scythe on his shoulder.
    He was not wearing a long black cloak
    with a hood to conceal his skull—
    rather a torn white tee-shirt
    and a pair of loose khaki trousers.
    But still, as I flew past him,
    he turned and met my glance
    as if I had an appointment in Samarra,
    not just the usual lunch at the Raccoon Lodge.
    There was no sign I could give him
    in that instant—no casual wave,
    or thumbs-up, no two-fingered V
    that would ease the jolt of fear
    whose voltage ran from my ankles
    to my scalp—just the glimpse,
    the split-second lock of the pupils
    like catching the eye of a stranger on a passing train.
    And there was nothing to do
    but keep driving, turn off the radio,
    and notice how white the houses were,
    how red the barns, and green the sloping fields.

The Order of the Day
    A morning after a week of rain
    and the sun shot down through the branches
    into the tall, bare windows.
    The brindled cat rolled over on his back,
    and I could hear you in the kitchen
    grinding coffee beans into a powder.
    Everything seemed especially vivid
    because I knew we were all going to die,
    first the cat, then you, then me,
    then somewhat later the liquefied sun
    was the order I was envisioning.
    But then again, you never really know.
    The cat had a fiercely healthy look,
    his coat so bristling and electric
    I wondered what you had been feeding him
    and what you had been feeding me
    as I turned a corner
    and beheld you out there on the sunny deck
    lost in exercise, running in place,
    knees lifted high, skin glistening—
    and that toothy, immortal-looking smile of yours.

Constellations
    Yes, that’s Orion over there,
    the three studs of the belt
    clearly lined up just off the horizon.
    And if you turn around you can see
    Gemini, very visible tonight,
    the twins looking off into space as usual.
    That cluster a little higher in the sky
    is Cassiopeia sitting in her astral chair
    if I’m not mistaken.
    And directly overhead,
    isn’t that Virginia Woolf
    slipping along the River Ouse
    in her inflatable canoe?
    See the wide-brimmed hat and there,
    the outline of the paddle, raised and dripping stars?

The Drive
    There were four of us in the car
    early that summer evening,
    short-hopping from one place to another,
    thrown together by a light toss of circumstance.
    I was in the backseat
    directly behind the driver who was talking
    about one thing and another
    while his wife smiled quietly at the windshield.
    I was happy to be paying attention
    to the rows of tall hedges
    and the gravel driveways we were passing
    and then the yellow signs on the roadside stores.
    It was only when he began to belittle you
    that I found myself shifting my focus
    to the back of his head,
    a head that was large and expansively bald.
    As he continued talking
    and the car continued along the highway,
    I began to divide his head into sections
    by means of dotted lines,
    the kind you see on the diagram of a steer.
    Only here, I was not interested in short loin,
    rump, shank, or sirloin tip,
    but curious about what region of his cranium
    housed the hard nugget of his malice.
    Tom, my friend, you would have enjoyed the sight—
    the car turning this way and that,
    the sunlight low in the trees,
    the man going on about your many failings,
    and me sitting quietly behind him
    wearing my white butcher’s apron
    and my small, regulation butcher’s hat.

On Not Finding You at Home
    Usually you appear at the front door
    when you hear my steps on the gravel,
    but today the door was closed,
    not a wisp of pale smoke from the chimney.
    I peered into a window
    but there was nothing but a table with a comb,
    some yellow flowers in a glass of