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LYRIC POEMS
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Birthday Poem
A green acorn with two leaves attached,
Still wearing its little crown
Plummets to earth
In the midst of hot, dusty August.
Even when summer seems eternal.
Harbingers come
Loud like this acorn,
Our soundless as the first blossom
To fade on the oleander.
We have seen sixty-four Augusts,
And how many are left to us?
There were summers when we seemed the King and Queen
And other summers when sorrow parched the long dry days.
Time will take our diadems away,
And even pain will fade
As winter’s mists descend.
Stand closer beside me now
As we face together
What is to come.
Los Gatos, California, August 28, 2008, for Wayne
A green acorn with two leaves attached,
Still wearing its little crown
Plummets to earth
In the midst of hot, dusty August.
Even when summer seems eternal.
Harbingers come
Loud like this acorn,
Our soundless as the first blossom
To fade on the oleander.
We have seen sixty-four Augusts,
And how many are left to us?
There were summers when we seemed the King and Queen
And other summers when sorrow parched the long dry days.
Time will take our diadems away,
And even pain will fade
As winter’s mists descend.
Stand closer beside me now
As we face together
What is to come.
Los Gatos, California, August 28, 2008, for Wayne
For Joan on Your Eightieth Birthday
Where you are, the manzanita must be just starting to bloom--
Maybe even some mountain azaleas in the foothills.
The pines will be clean in the spring air,
And ducks will land in your pond.
Soon, tiny ducklings will swim behind their brown mothers,
Making little ripples and small sounds along with the frogs.
Like the lovely casita where you now live,
These creatures have just been born,
While you count eighty years
As you ring the new bell in your tower.
Both of us in old age have sought a change;
Here I look out at the foamy waves
Far across the peaceful sea
From your place of re-birth
In the ancient golden land of your origin.
Alone now, you are back among the echoes of the Ohlone,
Of the caballeros and the Franciscans.
We both wake with the sunrise--
Yours through the cottonwoods
And mine through the palms.
Here the plumeria are just blooming,
Just starting to scent the salty air.
The fox watches you from the underbrush
And the barn owl eyes your tower
As a place to nest and rear her chicks.
I live with the descendants of the seafarers
Who navigated to this island following only
The tides, the stars and the starlings.
The people here still dance and sing,
Cast their nets into the sea
And plant the purple taro.
The girls in their flowery dresses
Call my old husband, “Uncle,”
And he has found his home at last.
They are kind to me, though a stranger,
And I am at peace.
The egrets land in the damp grass between me and the sea,
And I think you, my precious friend,
In your adobe home, far from the tides.
At this moment on our new journey,
We listen to the soft breezes at sundown,
Hear the birds before they settle in for sleep,
And breathe in the Spirit
That binds us together always.
March 26, 2015
Where you are, the manzanita must be just starting to bloom--
Maybe even some mountain azaleas in the foothills.
The pines will be clean in the spring air,
And ducks will land in your pond.
Soon, tiny ducklings will swim behind their brown mothers,
Making little ripples and small sounds along with the frogs.
Like the lovely casita where you now live,
These creatures have just been born,
While you count eighty years
As you ring the new bell in your tower.
Both of us in old age have sought a change;
Here I look out at the foamy waves
Far across the peaceful sea
From your place of re-birth
In the ancient golden land of your origin.
Alone now, you are back among the echoes of the Ohlone,
Of the caballeros and the Franciscans.
We both wake with the sunrise--
Yours through the cottonwoods
And mine through the palms.
Here the plumeria are just blooming,
Just starting to scent the salty air.
The fox watches you from the underbrush
And the barn owl eyes your tower
As a place to nest and rear her chicks.
I live with the descendants of the seafarers
Who navigated to this island following only
The tides, the stars and the starlings.
The people here still dance and sing,
Cast their nets into the sea
And plant the purple taro.
The girls in their flowery dresses
Call my old husband, “Uncle,”
And he has found his home at last.
They are kind to me, though a stranger,
And I am at peace.
The egrets land in the damp grass between me and the sea,
And I think you, my precious friend,
In your adobe home, far from the tides.
At this moment on our new journey,
We listen to the soft breezes at sundown,
Hear the birds before they settle in for sleep,
And breathe in the Spirit
That binds us together always.
March 26, 2015
Gabriel
The moon must have been full, Gabriel,
The night before you came to her
With news that would change the universe.
You wandered the dark sky,
Starlight, the sacred snow of heaven,
Fluttering in your wings.
Moonglow shimmered on your face
Like the flashing fins of a great fish
Turning in the dark water light years below.
In your flight you pondered:
Would fear overwhelm her?
Would she claim herself unworthy?
Would she tell you to choose another?
Would she laugh and turn her back on you?
Would she pretend that you were not even there?
Was your angel heart heavy as silver stones in water
Wondering how to woo her,
How to make her hear?
When you wheeled one last time
Past the dark side of the moon,
Waiting for the world-candle to awaken her,
Was your descent full of flutter?
Like a holy stork
Shining in white light
You land at her bedside.
And settling there you whisper to her
In the voice of a man
Who has come to a woman without weapons,
Your heart unarmed and beating,
Like a bird’s who hears the onrush
Of hungry hounds.
In one breath you say it all,
Everything you practiced a thousand different ways
In the long night of the full moon.
Then, unable to look
Into the dawn of her round awakening face,
You hear her tiny answer:
“Yes.”
The moon must have been full, Gabriel,
The night before you came to her
With news that would change the universe.
You wandered the dark sky,
Starlight, the sacred snow of heaven,
Fluttering in your wings.
Moonglow shimmered on your face
Like the flashing fins of a great fish
Turning in the dark water light years below.
In your flight you pondered:
Would fear overwhelm her?
Would she claim herself unworthy?
Would she tell you to choose another?
Would she laugh and turn her back on you?
Would she pretend that you were not even there?
Was your angel heart heavy as silver stones in water
Wondering how to woo her,
How to make her hear?
When you wheeled one last time
Past the dark side of the moon,
Waiting for the world-candle to awaken her,
Was your descent full of flutter?
Like a holy stork
Shining in white light
You land at her bedside.
And settling there you whisper to her
In the voice of a man
Who has come to a woman without weapons,
Your heart unarmed and beating,
Like a bird’s who hears the onrush
Of hungry hounds.
In one breath you say it all,
Everything you practiced a thousand different ways
In the long night of the full moon.
Then, unable to look
Into the dawn of her round awakening face,
You hear her tiny answer:
“Yes.”
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