Trespass (4 page)

       
was like flight. The second,

       
traffic at the bridge—as if the city

       
said
wait here

       
don't cross the water
.

 

XIII

       
here take a universe     darts of light     a pan flute

       
chirps our ending song     go now to the cedary wield of smooth

       
creatures     of glabrous torsos caprine legs     who am I

       
to clasp seedstorms barehanded     mornings when the surf

       
clung to its mist     stubborn     I will make this break soft as skiff

       
on water     gone in a sprint you sleek windjammer     I give you

       
June's tea rose heat     island's sagebrush     summer and young trees

 

XIV

       
On the radio, bombast

       
of timpani and horn

       
from the Slovak Symphony, you are

       
nowhere in the glissando

       
the piccolo is

       
too bright

       
for you

       
in these passages

       
of fullness

       
you do not live

       
nor on the bridge today

       
midlake birdsong, glottal frog

       
that's when I sang

       
to become hoarse.

 

XV

       
this morning water broke

       
over my shoulders

       
the shower was ice

       
the longer I stayed

       
today is a cold day

       
longer now after

       
the solstice more sunlight

       
and snow I keep you

       
alive even though I try

       
to kill you every day

PART THREE

F
ATHER

       
he's dulled

       
my blade

       
sometimes I could

       
throw hatchets

       
look at me

       
enfeebled pullet

       
offer my beak

       
blunt the hooked

       
end

       
my air empties, ink

       
clots

       
when I think
write

       
him

P
HONE
C
ALL

       
Have you

       
written her?

       
Many times.

       
What did you

       
say?

       
I asked her to forgive me.

       
But you don't

       
have the right

       
to ask

       
that.

       
Why

       
can't I ask her that?

       
You don't

       
have the right.

A
UNT
P
EGGY

       
Afternoon sun on metals, hubcaps

       
flash on Second Avenue, I've been

       
seesawing my feet on the edge of the curb

       
for almost an hour on the phone

       
with my mother,
It just doesn't make

       
sense
, the subject always comes up,

       
I mean she's had years

       
of therapy
, she says
years
with such

       
exhalation her breath gets

       
reedy, I pick threads from my scarf,

       
Why can't Peggy forgive your father?
The city is

       
bright, winter is quiet, a pause

       
on motion,
Mom, look at all she's been through, Pop

       
then Dad, I mean, good god
, her voice

       
tenders,
But Tom
, she ticks her throat,

       
don't you think after all that therapy

       
she would be able to forgive?
I can feel

       
a draft in my sleeve, it hits

       
the sweat at the bend of my arm,
Maybe this is

       
her therapy. Treat Dad like he's dead
.

       
There is a shallow dent in the chrome

       
fender of an old car my image runs over

       
and warps, my mother is quiet,

       
I've handed her something new, she might

       
stand for a while in her kitchen and wait

       
for the dishwasher to end its cycle.

P
ICNIC
, 1988

       
I don't name his niece here

       
but I know she was there

       
by the potato salad. In a notebook

       
I sketched my house

       
and the giant pines, our front porch

       
green-black like lake mud

       
erased until the paper broke, shaded

       
shingles with new colors, signed

       
my name bottom right.

       
I let Aunt Peggy look.

       
I was young but I knew her life

       
was sad, she took

       
in her hands the brittle

       
sketch, her eyes tracing lines, down

       
the charcoaled driveway, her eyes

       
I will name blue, her blue

       
eyes, those glassy

       
empty rooms.

W
ARINANCO
P
ARK

       
Shadows slide over

       
the fields, the sun

       
vanishes I think one black vulture

       
has eclipsed it, but

       
no, it's quick clouds, dead leaves

       
are kites unto the heave.

       
The planes lift from Newark

       
crossing over the park,

       
over the clover leaves

       
of the 1 and 9, from above, the streets

       
are pale laces and the roof

       
of my father's house,

       
a chip, a tiny smudge

       
over those living beneath.

S
ELLING THE
H
OUSE
: I
NGALLS
A
VENUE

       
In the sun parlor after dusk

       
I want to turn the heat

       
on, the tall lamp is shadeless,

       
the new tenant knocks

       
his knuckle to find patches

       
of new plaster, my father turns keys

       
over, they chitchat,
I might enclose

       
the front porch, make it a bedroom
,

       
there's light on bits of lint.

       
Another big family to move in, more

       
quiet pairings, I look out curtainless

       
windows, in a house with rooms

       
and closets that never knew to be

       
unlived in, for this moment maybe

       
a relief to be empty.

A
T
W
INDWARD AND
S
HORE
R
OADS

       
When we sold her house

       
the pine sent down

       
its last dried arrows, the new owner

       
sawed the cherry still in bloom,

       
that holly that always snagged

       
her white perm was pieced

       
and bundled,

                                   
her new condo

       
has fresh paint, no mold in the walls, she's far

       
from the bay where she took me

       
to push horseshoe crabs

       
back in, now she hears waves

       
of engines behind the huge oaks

       
beyond the parking lot

       
where the highway runs out.

W
INTER
B
URIAL

       
When she died, early light

       
turned the curtains

       
to gauze. I wilted

       
spinach for lunch

       
the hours she spent

       
zesting lemons

       
whipping meringue

       
to peaks. We step

       
between dunes of ice,

       
she never

       
liked snow.

       
Its weight on a roof.

E
LEGY

FOR TYLER

       
I know violin strings

       
you have to

       
make them

       
tremble

                    
a quick hand against

       
the steady hill

       
of your shoulder

       
in the shallow valley

       
by your neck

                          
thresh the horse hairs

       
of your bow over

       
the ridge and drag

       
back,     full

       
as a field        released

       
to a hurtling

       
a long falling

       
gallop

D
YING
F
AMILY

I

       
At the church door

       
its heavy wood

       
in the treeless lot

       
I take my father's

       
hand we move

       
over the broken rocks

       
turn their broken

       
sound we move

       
within the shadow

       
the spire makes

       
on the lawn away

       
from the door those

       
slate steps rain-dark

       
he passes his sisters

       
seated in cars

       
headlights on single

       
file I move my hand

       
over his back

       
another funeral

       
my father's brothers

       
are dying his sisters