The Virgin Mary repeatedly appeared
to these three children, terrifying them
with bloody visions. The crown worn
by the statue of Our Lady of Fátima

is encrusted with 313 pearls, 2679
precious stones, and the bullet that
pierced the body of Pope John Paul II
during the 1981 attempt on his life.


12 Perfect Equations

(1) young children
uninterested in math
or parts of speech
are defective, and
(2) if they can't sit
still for very long while
bored, highly defective.

(3) parents who can't
motivate their kids
to do these things
are highly defective,
(4) which elegantly
explains why the kids
are highly defective.

(5) school isn't defective.
(6) the curriculum isn't
defective, (7) no
teacher is defective,
(8 ) math itself certainly
isn't defective, (9) nor
parts of speech.

(10) the other children
who are interested
in math and parts
of speech (11) or who
sit as if interested
aren't defective, (12)
nor are their parents.


To Our Dear Delinquent

At school you're in trouble,
at home you're in trouble,
with friends you're in trouble,
and with a million other parents
we ask where our sweet boy is
with all that sweet potential,
we balk at changing adjectives,
putting arms around disaster,
saying yes to your implosion,
yes we love this who-the-fuck-
cares boy because you're fine,
ours, and desperate to see it.


canada

canadian
is bad whiskey

canada dry
good ginger ale

canada goose
a goose

that's about all
you can say


Little brown bird
in brown leaves
under the trees,

it looks as if you
forgot yourself
for a moment—

I've done that,
gotten taken up
in the things I

was rustling in,
thought I was
a day laborer

only trying to
make ends meet
under my feet.

Watching you
come to and lift
back up into air

to go or do who
knows what or
where reminds

me to get up
myself and do
something, anything.


Gunner

My nom de guerre is Iron Man
but in the mirror I see
forty or fifty black mallards
straining toward the sky
while some kind of targeted
drab exhalation reduces them
to sparks and comb-like bones.
This is what is happening.
The iron is not, the man is not.

Plantain Flower

You're a Seattle Space Needle
Coney Island Parachute Jump
George Jetson co-op high-rise
up-burning tiny white spikelet
dizzy spinning wheel fireworks
Giacometti trumpet dispensary
skinny Venusian tonsure monk
Seussic mule-face Eiffel Tower
tall Panoptes blooming stalk of
gaudy-hatted ever-loving herb.


blessed soccer boy

twinkletoes
the coaches call him

for he lightfoots
up and down the field

dipping a toe in here
and there

edging the ball
into a teammate's path

or easing it
past the other goalie

such a grin
on his face as he flies

doing to all
appearances what he

was born to do


That poem not a tale told
or phenomenon described,
but one mood petrified,
a mummy transubstantial.


Nothing Left

If I look at you—
bent, boring, absent—
instead as a god who called me
from my tomb and fixed me,
then my choice is clearer.
Though I never imagined
you, wonder-worker, failing,
wouldn't I have said okay?

When I accepted love,
the agreement was implicit.
When you ran dry as an overused well,
I would pump
what I could back into you—
beg, borrow or steal
the wherewithal to wet your lips,
like it or not.

It's you who would have said no.
That's why I have to say yes.
Pass me your glass
and take my handkerchief.
You gave your all.
There is no shame
or cause for blame
in having nothing left.


New Gulf Oil Spill Idea Rejected

“The danger,” BP spokesman Jack LeMona said,
“with filling up the Gulf of Mexico with crude oil
is if nations on the rim start helping themselves
to it. That would wreak havoc with the markets.
So no, I don't think that's a good solution at all.”

Paeonia anomala, which grows two feet tall, came up the first six inches looking very healthy this spring, then just stopped. The damn thing still looks so healthy—just short. A Shetland peony? Should I just have faith and ride it out? Get help? A plant whisperer? Herboanalysis? What's going on in there? Homesickness for the Urals? Pituitary glands on strike? Acting “anomalous”?

The zig-zag asters surrounding it try not to take advantage, but soon I have to cut them back or let them over-shade the peony. That will be its death warrant—which may be what it wants. I have religiously followed all 12 of the tips for healthy growth detailed in Wyman's, the gardener's Big Book. So now, the Serenity Prayer suggests that I just put the whole thing out of my mind.

But let me go have one more look. Bring the clippers, just in case. Besides the asters, little sprigs of honeysuckle are growing up, and some kind of grass. I cut all the competition back. If you want to kill yourself, Anomalous, go right ahead, but don't expect me to cooperate. I won't give up on you until you're brown and dry, and even then, until another season's passed.


Brown

Your iced tea is brown,
your skin is brown,
your eyes brown,
shoes brown,
hair brown,    each distinct but
brown.

Your name is Brown.

Shallow of me but this is one
of the things I like about you.
Right now it's everything
I like about you.

When you speak I can't say
that your voice is brown
on any good authority
but it sounds brown.
And certain parts of your body
are not brown
and I like some of them
especially.

Still, your brown hand
on the brown iced tea
is just annihilating me.


You have insomnia,
I have hypochondria,
the kids hyperactivity
and all of us anxiety.

Keeping this treadmill
oiled repaired and running
fast is more than
we can manage.

Grandma prays for
earthquakes she says
God needs to stretch
his wrathful hand.

I'd settle for a twister
or a soaking rain
something to flush out
the leaf-clogged brain.

Your macaroni's boiling
over I know
that burnt smell
that exciting sizzle.


Lily at 10

“You married yet?” Aunt Mary asked.
Lily answered, “No, I'm single.”
Cousin Steve said, “You're too young
to be single.”
“No,” she said, “you're too old to be
single.”
And everybody got a laugh from that.

After everyone went home, she said,
“Am I really too young to be single?”
I said, “Most people think you'd have
to be an age when you could actually
be married.”
“I like being single anyway,” she said.

At Christmas, Aunt Mary got drunk
and asked again if she was married.
"Still single,” Lily said.
“I'm married,” Aunt Mary declared,
“but I wish I was single.”
Uncle Stuart took exception.
“What about me?” he protested.
“Do you think I like being married?”

After everyone went home, she said,
“Are the Supreme Court ladies married?”
“Sotomeyer and Kagan, no," I told her.
"Ginsberg's been married over 50 years.”
“I'll be one of the single ones,” she said.
“That will be up you," I said.
“You see?” she said triumphantly.


He was enough of a logophile too
that when I said I was a logophile
he understood the phile  part fine
but a wide grin seemed to connote
he thought the log  referred to his.

First Day

the petrolatum on her teeth
then lipstick to the lips,
blush on the cheeks,
mascara to the lids,
roll-on deodorant to underarms,
a dab inside the underwear,
nail polish on the pantyhose
to staunch the tear,
some hairspray to the hair,
a shake of talcum in the shoes,
perfume spritzed onto one wrist
which then dances on the other,
and presto-change-o, oo-la-la:
mother is ready for her pumps
and coat (on sale) and purse,
and let evil dragons beware,
her sallying forth is not to be
trifled with, and even dad
stops in his tracks and looks
her up and down and
whistles once, shaking his head.
you'll knock 'em dead, he says.
her eyes glow as
she stoops to deliver a kiss
but I protest, No, stop, ma,
don't ruin your lipstick.
we're all so proud of her,
as marvelous as Jackie O.,
she is the first and only
working mother on the block.


On a bloop
you lose—
that's baseball,
as they say—

but what do
you say about
a slipped gene
or an asp bite—

that's life?—
when it isn't.
It's something
else.

It's only life
if you court
radiation
or milk venom
from vipers,

but if you are
just walking
down the street,
it's a cheat—

there's nothing
else to call it—

life cheated
by bad luck
escaped
from someone's
card game

and expatiated
to run loco,

a pain-crazed bull
who sees red
but wears black.


Self-Portrait as a Child, James “Athenian” Stuart

You wasted nothing on self-love
and showed an aptitude for classical
proportions by subverting them.
The face is one size larger than
the head, the frame one smaller
still, the hands an adult woman's
right down to the polished nails
and necklace held like worry beads.
Your ear's misshapen, eye keen,
nose bold and strong, lips as full,
curled, greedy as any in England.
You saw you're unlike anyone else
and you will let the chips fall
where they may, on evil or beauty.


A Blessed Mother standing unassisted
in her ruined grotto of chipped plaster
seemed a miracle at first, considering
the traffic of mutts, careening children,
squirrels, tomcats, and lost tree limbs;
now it would be miraculous if she fell,
overgrown as she is nearly to the chin
with spider ivy, myrtle, and houttuynia.
My own strength deteriorates quicker;
not even tree of heaven will outlast her.


This Morning's Love Advice for You Ladies from Harrison Forbes, Professional Dog Trainer and Author of “Heart of a Dog: What Challenging Dogs Have Taught Me About Love, Trust and Second Chances”

Dogs wipe the slate clean many times a day.
If an owner is grumpy and yells at a dog
then waits a minute and acts like he never did,
the dog will immediately forgive him.

Dogs offer truly substantive relationships.
Most people don't. Regardless of a dog's personality,
you pretty much always get the same behavior
unless the dog is ill. You can imagine how a similar
consistency could add to your romantic relationship.

Dogs want to have a good time, keep things light.
The harder you go at it in a training phase,
the more you have to counterbalance it.


If sport or film, or even sport on film
brings us to tears
what chance has anyone
against the future
and the simulacrum of the future
it will gull us with?

What chance have I
today against your feigning of desire?

Some are rag dolls, some the shepherd
dogs who shake them
in their canines
and then drop them, soaked in drool.

Your teeth pierce me
and don't pierce me
at the same time.
It's a pleasurable, half-muffled pain
as is the sand on your tongue
and the happy saliva.

Yes I'm weeping as a sprinter tries
to keep tears from her
hard unblinking eyes
so unsuccessfully.

Yes I'm weeping over you
as well.

As virtual ice extends its reach
and human hand retracts its touch
it will not matter much if we
are here or there,
pre-programmed
as we are
so hopelessly to care.