James Koller
reads
Looking for His Horses
at
https://jameskoller.bandcamp.com/

Happy birthday!

Listen to James Koller read at:

jameskoller.bandcamp.com

THAT SAME OLD OWL

THAT SAME OLD OWL

Walking up to the window
winter gray first morning light,

I missed him, didn't see
he sat atop the garden fence post,

then did, & stopped, & he knew
I'd stopped when I saw him,

& he was still, no move
until I moved, took one small step back,

& he turned, flew straight away,
passed into the gray & white trees

James Koller
15 Jan 09
from A River I Couldn't Find

hello from Dianella

hello from Dianella; here my little poem about european memorial day for Jim with Thea and friends in august in Seggiano

Dianella

https://poesiaprosaspontanea.wordpress.com/2016/09/29/seggiano-monte-amiata-memoriale-per-il-poeta-jim-koller-1936-2014-agosto-2016/

Happy Birthday from Ida Rose & Katherine

Hello from Placitas, NM

Here's a recording I did in (I'm pretty sure) 1986 in Albuquerque when I was setting up readings at the Central Torta.

Thank you for "Crows Talk To Him." I liked the song and I'm asking who wrote the lyrics -- is it Jim or his son?

https://duende.bandcamp.com/album/jim-koller-in-albuquerque

If you happen to know what books Jim was reading from let me know and I'll add it to the information.

Sincerely,

Larry Goodell, 

a direct contemporary and long time friend of Jim Koller's.

Some older videos collected here...

On the Poet's Cafe July, 2011

https://vimeo.com/26735098

At RISD 20 Nov 2007

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myX_mX5hRMA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rNPaphtN40

In Rome April 2008

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GpXUdaHwo4

Performance di Stefano Panzarasa alla vernice della Mostra di Collage di James Koller tenutasi 6/11/2010 alla Grafica Campioli , Monterotondo ROMA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MzsnMa5Q_I

Recent Bone Show Excerpt May 2011

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHDNnGe5SRE

Traduttologia's new issue with a commemoration of Jim is available

dear friends

Traduttologia's new issue with a commemoration of Jim is available.

a. V (n. s.), n. 9-10, luglio 2013 - gennaio 2014

Per James Koller. A un amico, in memoria

It contains my translation of Wilderness by Carl Sandburg with Jim's short biographical note

 my translation of a slight  different version of "A river I couldn't find", worked by Jim and Stefano to be played as a song - we already sent the link - 

http://crowstalktohim.blogspot.it/2014/12/from-mariagrazia-and-stefano.html

my translation of "From the Hotel Alba, Pescara" and brief comments on Jim's and Sandburg's poems. Some consideration on the term Wilderness and its translation into Italian.

a big hug 

 

Mariagrazia

remembering the poets

We moved by water, slowly
found our way in the dark, through the canals,
around the tight corners. We moved slowly-
circled out & in, put it together
like some kind of needlework. Some places
folks don't live their lives in a straight line.

James Koller (1936-2014)
15 Oct 87 Venezia

***

One Journey

Moths and other sacred wings
Butterflies and bees whisper
In breath of the wind
Blessed way blessing way things

Dreams are the minds streams
Thought pictures of the spirit
There are dreams of the day
There are dreams of the night

Thinking and dreaming are related
Dreams of the day we make our own
Dreams of night part eternals stone
There are dream takers
Taking from dream worlds
Taking dreams as a way of
Stealing thoughts

Turning minds inside then out
Dream slavers want to change
Our connections to ourselves
Mess with our dreams make us unsure
Unclear about right and wrong
Feed our dreams and instincts
To industrial profit machine

Difference between dream and fantasy
Reality and illusion center and no center
Dreams of the day keep our spirits alive
Our creative mind who we really are

With dreams we can create and heal
Follow our original purpose
Dreams are protection good medicine
Blessed way blessings way things

Sun and moon continue
We are all on one journey

John Trudell (1946-2015)
from Children of Earth
Childs Voice

 

For Jim

10 dicember 2014

10 Dicember 2015

dear Jim we remember you

Dianella

hello from Dianella in Italy

Ciao, with the permission of Jed Koller almost every day I put in my blog one poem of Jim  from "A river I could't find":https://poesiaprosaspontanea.wordpress.com/2015/11/21/a-river-i-couldnt-find-di-james-koller-2/

I love so much these poems of Jim and I remember him as poet and as person. In few day is the 10 dicember, as you know naturally

all the best from Dianella

A River I Couldn't Find

Bertie Koller - Searching For Blue Sky

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YrFn_2pPhNw

Another song for James Koller. Love, Bertie

Searching For Blue Sky
 

my father died an old

man coyote crow

face to the open

window sky road

we gathered around

the world together him

a lifetime of

children lovers friends

searching

for blue sky

oh joplin missouri

wind & clouds & rain

a poet died in your arms

but to you it's all the same

we're all just passing through

nomads drifters tramps

on our way to somewhere else

black coffee & maps

searching

for blue sky

set me loose on the

highways back-roads trails

let my heart

open love wail

for the days yet to

come be pass

from now until my

final closing last

searching

for blue sky

my father died an old

man coyote crow

face to the open

window sky road

beneath a mid-day sun

whiskey feathers bells

together we bade him

fare-thee-well

searching

for blue sky

23 Jan 15

our Love, Bob

from Ida Rose

There is a chair in my kitchen where you've always sat
I look over
and see you there
watching me.
You smile. And with your same eyes,
I smile back.

2/4/2015
(I love you, dad.)

M. Swift - For Jim, on the 49th Day

For Jim, on the 49th Day

Thus shall ye think of all this fleeting world:
 a star at dawn,
 a bubble in a stream;
 a flash of lightning in a summer cloud,
 a flickering lamp, 
a phantom
 and a dream.

— The Diamond Sutra

After reading " from a daughter" - Dianella

After reading " from a daughter"
 
Ci sono persone
che rimangono sempre fuori di noi
anche se le tocchiamo
ci parliamo
ci scambiamo parole
e ci auguriamo belle cose -
altre le vedi due volte
ma intensamente
altre non le hai mai viste
sono morte da anni e decenni e anche più -
eppure le senti ogni giorno dentro di te -
sono i tuoi maestri -
oppure
le hai viste quelle due volte
intensamente
e quando ti dicono è morto
senti che è venuto  a stare da te
dentro di te -
è una cosa strana ma vera
---------------------------------------
Dianella

from John Lane

Thank you for sending me this link. I was so sad to hear of Jim's passing. Please accept my sincerest condolences. Peter Garland had emailed me to let me know that Jim had passed. I wish we had been able to mount a production of The Bone Show for them, but I just couldn't get it together.

It is lovely to see all of the tributes pouring in from various poets and friends. Thank you for sending me the link.

I have a picture of Jim and Peter. Perhaps you'd like to put it up? It is from 2011. And here's a link to excerpts from The Bone Show: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHDNnGe5SRE

All the Best,
JL

from a daughter

Poem title: "Because I told you that you would live on through me"

When a person dies

   many say that they leave

      an emptiness

I have been looking for this emptiness

   under rocks, in the sky, in city bricks and on train tracks

      in sounds

         like the tea kettle whistle, or the winter rain hitting the window

Disconcerted

   I can't find the emptiness

I keep running into You

   here, there

       here, there

Even the prism through which I see and hear

   all of these things

      has your hand so firmly in its blueprint

So why should there be emptiness when You are everywhere

   and the world has become so full of You

that my heart intermingles its beats

   with Your own?

in this and of 2014

Dear Jim, in this and of 2014 we think to you
with love from Dianella

Jerome Rothenberg - The Sky that Harbors Heaven

The Sky that Harbors Heaven

                                 for Jim Koller, in memory                

into the

homeless state

the lines

of poets

move

not hardened yet

into belief

& other acts

of cruelty

their voices

lost to us

signal a silence

sure as death*                                   * as breath

& louder

even now

I hear

& treasure

like a cry

the greatest

cry

is silent

as the wise man

says

& turns

facing

the future

still behind him

mysteries

we love

only because

they break

the world

apart

enough to let

the faintest light

shine through

the sky

that harbors heaven

is no sky

the darker world

enfolds it

waits there

mindlessly

until it swallows

mind & body

leaving scarce

a trace

behind

once &

for all

20.xii.14

Harry Hoogstraten - Kerst groet

sad   so sad  ....

***

Dear Maggie here are some of the poems I know Jim liked, wishing you and the children all the best , love Harry

https://soundcloud.com/sloowtapes/harry-hoogstraten

Bertie Koller - Old Black Crow - song for James Koller

Performed at a Winter Solstice celebration at my neighbor's house.
Accompanying me are Jamie (bass) & Sean (percussion) Oshima.

***

Old Black Crow

cold cold river

cold cold ground

I'm gonna lay this body down

but I can't stay

no I've gotta go

I'm gonna fly away with that old black crow

old black crow

old black crow

I'm gonna fly away with that old black crow

I've got rye whiskey

& cold ice cream

I've got all that I need

but I can't stay

no I've gotta go

I'm gonna soar away with that old black crow

old black crow

old black crow

I'm gonna soar away with that old black crow

these nights are long

cold & dark

but there's a sliver of moon & so many stars

to guide my way

andiamo

let's go old black crow

old black crow

old black crow

let's go old black crow

hey blue sky

I won't forget

it is what it is

you get what you get

& that's just fine

it's the way things go

I'm gonna fly away with that old black crow

old black crow

old black crow

I'm gonna fly away with that old black crow

19 December 2014

for James Koller

Theadora Koller - Finishing the Road Trip

 

Homage to poet James Koller...

Homage to poet James Koller on the Web site of the Regional Nature Park of Monti Lucretti (Italy), where James had frequently visited since 2002 and shared his poetry with students from local schools. A heartfelt thanks to Stefano Panzarasa and Mariagrazia Pelaia for their years of working with Dad in sharing poems about nature with those children. This work meant a great deal to him. 

 

The homage includes videos and translations in Italian.

 

http://www.parcolucretili.it/addio_poeta

Bobby Byrd - BIRDS for Jim

BIRDS

Winter Solstice 2014

El Paso, Texas

—for Jim Koller

Couldn’t sleep. Reading Gary Snyder.

“Essential nature is not female or male.”

So surprising, so obvious, so revolutionary.

Woman and man. Good and evil.

Like golden aspen leaves fluttering to the earth.

It’s been years since I lived in the mountains.

I woke up at 4:30 and waited until

The night skies began to turn

Pinks and blues. A grey cloud

Stretched across the Rio Grande to Juárez.

We moved to this house almost 40 years ago.

We have grown old inside these walls.

Blood pressure 133/86. I am 72 years old.

My friend Jim Koller died last week.

Room 124 of the Motel 6, Joplin, MO.

A stroke scrambled his brain into darkness.

A few days later the rest of his body

Followed to the other side.

A road runner stared at Cirrelda

Through her Albuquerque window

That same morning. The bird

Preened its beautiful feathers.

“Jim Koller,” Cirrelda said.

Her body warm under the covers next to J.B.

She makes those connections.

A very human gift.

We have a mockingbird always

Screaming at me to open the gate.

“Nothing to it. Just let go.” Jim

Killed an elk on San Antonio Mountain,

The horses snorting and whinnying

At the crack of his rifle. It pierced

The peace that passes all understanding.

That morning likewise was years ago. Was ice cold.

Death steam rose fresh from the elk cavern

As Jim, kneeling like a priest,

Sliced into the dark center of life,

The bloody knife razor sharp,

Hands trembling in the terrible cold.

“CAW, CAW, CAW,” the crows screamed.

CAW, CAW, CAW, CAW

Beauty at the beginning

Man and woman. Good and evil.

Aspen leaves rotting into the cold earth.

Beauty at the end

No beginning. No end.

Beauty all around

That day and for weeks to come

Jim, his lover, his friends feasted on elk meat.

“Delicious, “he said.

Goodbye, Jim. Goodbye.

We’ll keep it real as long as we can.

Giuseppe Moretti - Remembering Jim Koller

Remembering Jim Koller

I came to know James Koller thanks to Gary Lawless, who told me “you must know this guy” and he gave me his email address. I wrote him and he answered sending me The Bone Show text, one of his masterpieces. I answered back “whow, this is good medicine!”. And there it started our friendship which lasted till the day of his passing away. Before that I knew him through occasional reports from the Sixties & Seventies’ counterculture press (he had a few of his things published in Italy, thanks to his friend Franco Beltrametti, in the rather famous Fernanda Pivano’s anthology “L’altra America degli Anni Sessanta”) and the perception I had of him was of a man hard to locate, perpetually on the move.

Eventually we met, during one of his frequent visit to Europe, and we started journeying through the Italian watersheds for poetry readings and talks. He has been very instrumental and supportive to our work of promoting the bioregional vision in Italy and I owe him lots of discussions and deepening on the concept. His points were always acute and accurate as they reflected years of study on culture and nature. Although at ease in every context he was perfectly comfortable when he was on the road (a pleasant anecdote: every time we were about to leave, we approached the road singing “On the road again / just can’t wait to get on the road again…” of Willie Nelson), I would say the road was his daily bread, an open door to new possibilities, alliances and new territories. His bioregion reflects the map of his travelling and spoke in terms of poems, landscapes and stories around the fire. Over the years he build up an extensive network of people and situations over which he could count for hospitality and a chance for sharing poems and thoughts, and I’m very proud to have been a little nod in his net.

Thanks Jim for your art, your exquisite poems, for the little Coyote book of mine “Watersheds of the Mind” you did (in three languages!!), for hosting me in your home in Georgetown and for the walk in the Maine woods to see the beaver dams and later along the shore of Walden Pond in Concord, Massachussetts, to visit Thoreaus’ cabin site. For the journey along the northern coast of California to see Mount Tamalpais, Bolinas, Point Reyes and up to Mendocino County, and before that the ride to Kitkitdizze where I attended to a memorable conversation between you and Gary Snyder on the good old days, and thanks very much for offering your time to edit the translation in English of my writings. This is the first without you… and the difference is evident. 

Giuseppe Moretti

(on winter Sostice’s day)

Winter's coming - from Stefan Hyner

THE PILLION-RIDER’S BLUES

There never was a more honest place to be
as when Jim was riding 
the road of this Saha-World with me

these photos for Jim from Dianella an Livio with love

Dear all,  these photos are our "gathering in time"
Dianella and Livio from Selva Malvezzi ( Italy)

James Koller (winter solstice 2014) - Bob Arnold 21 December 14

Rita degli Esposti 19 December 14

part of a poem I really loved to hear from Jim's voice, for Dario Villa, and now, sadly, for Jim...

(...)
...immacolato, spirit
from il cielo
an immaculate
segreto della notte
agitates the secret
agitava the stars
la brezza della night
my passion
fuso con luce
in this country

(...)

Fred Wah 19 December 2014

From the blog, Red Log, by Fred Wah:

"I met Jim, after many years, at the 70’s event at Orono several years ago. His attention and energy seemed still as he had been in the early 60’s when he and I, at Robert Duncan’s suggestion, talked of publishing a book of his poetry as a SUMbook. We were living in Albuquerque and had just published Duncan’s Writing Writing. Though Jim and I explored the possibility of doing his book, it didn’t happen. It was published as Two Hands in Seattle in 1965. I was attracted to Jim’s poetry in pretty much the same way I had taken to Snyder’s: northwest, mountains, rivers, trees, animal spirits, etc., a poetics of place I felt aligned with. We published Jim in SUM #2 (February, 1964) and in the final issue (#7, 1965). I’d like to honour Jim’s poetic presence through the years by offering these pages of his from SUM #2."

Giuseppe Moretti 14 Dec 14

... Thanks Jim, for all the journey through the Italian watersheds we had together. For all the books and booklets we did together, for all the poems shared and the readings you generously gave for us all. You’ve been such a good friend and a great poet.

I’ll keep you in my heart forever.

from Po river watershed to the Blue Sky...

Giuseppe Moretti

From Mariagrazia

http://www.cucinaecozoica.com/cucina-ecozoica/jims-soup-potato-kale-and-garbanzo-la-zuppa-di-jim-ceci-patata-e-cavolo-riccio.php

oval hugs

from Rita Degli Esposti

"...Gonna miss you more when you're gone"


Supenova edizioni in Venezia (John Gian who organised Jim's very first reading in Europe, Armando Pajalich, Rita Degli Esposti) published "Fortune", by Jim, in 1987,( translated by Franco Beltrametti) and this iconic poem was in it.

"Gonna be worst than now"

With love, Lily Bruder

I had the privilege of sharing this dance with Jim at my wedding last year. It was the last time we were to see each other.
I will miss him and continue to be inspired by him always.
With love,
Lily

with love and gratitude, David Schneider

Jim strode towards me the first time we met, holding a creased sheet of paper bearing my picture. I’d sent him the image by email, so we’d recognize one another, and he’d printed it out. I stood at the head of the train in the Cologne station, where I said I would, and he came right on, and held the sheet up next to my head to compare. Then he extended a hand. We’d been exchanging emails for some time.

Jim—chiefly through Coyote Books—had been one of Philip Whalen’s principle publishers, and I was at work on Philip’s biography. Jim had also served as one of Philip’s editors, especially on the large compilation On Bear’s Head. Philip was grateful for all of Jim’s efforts, but beyond that, he also admired Jim’s poetry a great deal, and he enjoyed Jim’s company. He said this repeated. Philip also often leaned on Jim for transport—of himself and of many assorted belongings—because Jim usually had a truck, and Philip usually needed a ride. 

On the day we met, Jim had taken a slightly longer route to Germany, kindly coming through Cologne, so I could interview him. We had lunch first, at a brewery close to the station. After I translated pretty much all the menu items, he said, “If they really have a liver-dumpling soup…well, I haven’t had that in a while.” As a source, Jim was precise, and when he couldn’t be, he restrained himself from speculation. He was surprisingly talkative about what he knew, and he knew an awful lot.

As I worked at writing the book, Jim would graciously look over chapters, query some things, point out others I hadn’t seen. He and Maggie Brown published one long chapter about Philip and Gary Snyder in the online Coyote’s Journal. Jim was a tremendous help and friendly, generous, guiding spirit.

I attach two pictures: 

— one the day we spoke, at a cafe near the Cologne main station;

— one of Jim’s name, copied out in a formal hand. 

Partly because Philip Whalen was a buddhist, because I am, and because Jim seemed at least respectful of buddhism, the card will sit on my shrine until the traditional seven weeks have elapsed since his passing.

 

 

from Patsy and Sascha

Koller,with his buddy Jean Paul Belmondo, 1966

Video: Last Will and Testament

Last Will and Testament

Monte Matano, Moricone, Italia - 2006

Un abbraccio,

Stefano Panzarasa

Love, Giona Beltrametti

LOVE

 15 Novembre 2008 - Como Train Station.

1979 - Wolf dog, Franco and Jim, Monte Generoso near Riva San Vitale.

Love, Ida Chapman

Me and my dad.

for our Wild Bardo James

I am Gino from Napoli, south Italia.

James was here many times...was time of poems and heart..big heart.

so..i am with You and with all your family this time of His journey in the eternal Nature of Bliss...

Him is always Live...eternal heart poem.

Yours in LOve

ginOM

love from massimo and corine

Jim  in Selva del Lamone (Maremma- Italy) - September 2004 for the second Festival of Reistent Literature

Love from massimo de feo and corine young

 Jim in Roma, May 5- 2010, with his daughter and Corine Young

Jim in Spoleto with massimo de feo, in the morning of May 5- 2010

too young - Rita Degli Esposti

Crossing the corner,the shop  where we used to laugh and watch the window , those clothes " for retired people"...no you were too young to die, your soul was young your poetry your heart your pure presence...maybe those who die so young, like you, never die
 the sense of love and sobriety you took into my  life

OM A HUM

from Judy Goldhaft

Dear Folks,

I had hoped to post this on the blog for Jim. It took me awhile to put my thoughts into words, so here is a weeks worth of thoughts.

I send you all my best energy to deal with this difficult time. Such an incredible loss.

Please keep me updated and let me know if there is any way I can be of help or support to you.

Judy Goldhaft  (Judy Berg)
San Francisco 12/11/14

***

Dec 5

So good to see so many of your friends writing on the blog.

Brilliant silver sky full of rain.  Thinking of you water dripping from my eyes too. 

Thanks for the twinkle in your eye. Loved your conversations with Peter Garland. Loved even more our conversations together with Peter Berg – us three rolling in the grass at night, drinking Old Overholt, howling at the moon.

Many thanks for WIND, Fragments for a Beginning. We’ll sing it when we give Peter’s ashes to the fire and the sky on the beach.

Loved your response to my pointing out how many wives you’ve had. Ingenuously, “Well, it wasn’t my fault.”  You are such a lover. I love you Jim.

Judy

Dec.6

Driving out to Pt. Reyes predawn
    Your presence is with me
    Your laugh
    & smiling eyes

The sun’s orange glow warms the fog at the rise into Olema. Ravens take flight.

The shimmering water on the road reflecting brilliant winter light recalls wet and snowy streets in Bath

We visited in the nowever as I drove through fog mists along wet highways.   
Recalling other times, another trips, some poemized by you – captured moments in time.

.… Dreamtime visitin’



Dec. 9
In the dark
You transport me
Wrap me in your reality
I breathe with you
From you
For you

Dec. 10

Sadness overwhelms me

Big wind coming tonight

perhaps you’ll blow through

A VENEZIA per Jim Koller, in ricordo

A VENEZIA per Jim Koller, in ricordo

In questa città
dove tutto fluttua, dove siamo stati vivendo,
come hai fatto notare, in cerchi concentrici, sono
andato a letto tardi stanotte e come poche altre volte
ho sentito dentro il cielo grigio una stella respirare
alta nel suo pianto. Una nuvola a forma di lupo
poi è corsa qui sopra ad essa vicina, libera, in questa città
dove come scrivesti la gente non vive la vita
in linea retta. Un' ultima cosa, si procedeva lenti,
girando per strade d'acqua nella sera improvvisa.
Non c'era per forza qualcosa da fare.

dicembre 2014, Francesco Giusti

"From my perspective"

"From my perspective"



Outside in hall squeaky soles

machine to lift move muscles drained

lights on paper wall attempt cheerful

smiles over cataclysm



Knock open door reveal words

tearful life words singing family

root-tight togetherness walking

him through to new life.





Love and peace to you all - Chaplain Justin Coberley, S.R.C.V.

Jim super Jim

ti pensiamo e ancora una volta ti abbracciamo, un abbraccio anche a tutti coloro che ti stanno vicino
cita mimi e miguel

from Thea - Last Will and Testament in Spanish

Sólo quiero que me cubra un cielo azul
quiero nubes, tantas
de ellas, cambiantes, pasando,
cambiando al pasar.

Quiero las noches más oscuras
repletas de estrellas girando.
Quiero que me encuentren los pájaros,
quiero el aliento cálido de los animales.

El viento también ha de pasar,
en su camino a los lugares
en los que estuve.

love from Dianella

Dear Jim,

guardo il giardino
l'erba più verde
sei tu

from Laurie Burhoe

Fare thee well Jim.

Love, Bob & Susan

It's all a great loss

But the greater loss

is not wanting to have

a world without your dad

I've never been in

this world

without him

James Anthony Koller Jr.

30 May 1936 - 10 December 2014

LAST WILL & TESTAMENT

I want only blue sky over me.
I want the clouds, so many
of them, variations, passing,
changing as they pass.

I want the blackest nights
filled with turning stars.
I want birds to find me,
want the hot breath of animals.

The wind too shall pass,
on its way to places
I have been.


                                            30 Nov 95
                                            Battle Mountain

from Cirrelda Snider-Bryan

here is another photo from that June of 2006 time in New Mexico … along the walk we found this sculpture

solidarnösc, cirrelda

 

 

from Richards Burhoe

From Patsy to Jim

Dearest Jim,

almost 50 years of knowing you

loving you

missing, greeting, apart,together

connecting, missing again and again

don't know where to start

can't get arms around you not there

not here

your voice

that precious voice on the phone

instantly making me smile

all is forgiven

all is just right

all the letters

later the emails,

filled with your narratives,

your poems

we married others,

had our children with others;

this was how it was

some things are never completed.

now you are getting ready to fly away

this is how it is

all who love you are trying to let you go,

to cheer you,bless you on your journey

I know I should too.

Am working on it.

For now am sending you all love

on every sparkling channel

I can dial in:

love to you

and to your dear family, encircling you.

In the woods I looked up,

saw two Flickers high in a tree.

Watched them a while.

Suddenly one took flight.

There was a little pause,

then the other flew after.

They were calling to each other.

Love, Peter Coyote

Ceremony

Shrouded in coast fog, the chitter

of Nuthatch and Junco

crisp as a  shaman’s rattle. All morning

late plums drum my garden

steps. I am mixing my mother’s ashes

with birdseed, elbow-deep

in a galvanized pail.

I am swishing the whispering

seed with ghostly flour

ground in the flower-blue bell

of the crematorium’s roar

pollinating each grain

with her smoky voice, the ghost

of her elegant pearls.

Plunging my hands into the seed

her flesh a gritty surprise

more sand than smoke.

The seed, the chaff, the hazing vapor

stirs memory --a downy puff dusting her angled cheek

the glow of her in a child’s eyes---

the scented fog,wobbling motes

                              hopping, waiting, head-cocked birds and songs

flow through my fingers,

ticking into the tinned tub

These powdery seeds offered

to couriers carrying her

through the dilated iris of the sky

rustle the tips of the grass,

slough off her exhausted flesh,

with acrobatic abandon

and detachment.

Rising from this meld of future and past

my spooky hands.                                         

                                                                                   

                                                           

August 17, 1999  revised 2003, 8-14-2013, 03-24-14

***

Lethal Grain

                                  for Daniel Pearl

Insoluble grit stimulates nacre

shielding tender oyster flesh from pain

creating the splendor of a pearl.

Suffering is lodged in the heart of beauty.

Conducting an interview

he never suspected the story

featured his assassin. A few quick strokes

sketched a plum-colored tulip of his throat.

Wide-eyed at the final instant

did he understand

the debt of red-ink pooling in his lap?

His head drops like a petal.

The camera he assumed would guarantee

a ransom, scooped him.

He became the last editions

of himself. He became:

“the Jew”, “the Journalist”, “the American”

and finally “the Patient”

in a straight-to-video snuff film.

Had he no notion that he would be held

responsible for the deaths to which others

had signed his name? No notion that rocks for

the Jews of Nablus and Ramallah were also pitched

at him? The ‘doctors’ struggling to vanquish

foreign disease mock his wife

compound bitter ironies from gall,

 inoculate their own hearts against remorse

 with homeopathic doses of their own

dismembered wives and children.

They cannot claw pilots from the sky

 so slice this Pearl

 or whatever they can catch.

 Feed it to their God, Kalashnikoff.

 The robed men milk poppies--  

calculate his life an overdue bill

resent the shade he casts on the goat

they’ve staked for slaughter. Their parched lips

calculate goat and reporter equal.

And the pearl is passed from hand to hand

the hand of the giver shadows for an instant

the hand of the receiver, passing

the darkness with the gift— the sharp-edged grain

disguised, transmitted through time

as an accumulating viral load.

                                                Feb. 25, 2002

                                                rev. April 14, 2014

***

Earth is a Woman, Sure

                        I.

Earth is a woman, sure

but most beautiful when

she weeps. Tears shining, falling

from fluttering ravens lashed

to the cheeks of the sky.

Soot-streaked hills

softened by mist and stinging rain

the cries of wild geese singing

                     Avalokiteshvara’s pity for the passing world.

                                

                                             II.

                    

And you who know me well

who question my proclivity

for women in perpetual shade

hiding their flesh from the sun,

Beside the mystery of myself

I can only add that tears

are the heart’s juice, some balm

against the diamond chill

 of beauty.

                        III.

A young boy safe in the fragrant loft

of a tin-roofed barn, wrapped

in the blanket sheltering his sleeping father

from the fury pelting the roof—  

the heaving flank of mountain--   his chest--  

an unusual comfort.

                                                                        April 25, 2014

***

The Dogs of Bucharest

The dogs of Bucharest are dusted

with crumbled mansions, ash

of red flags. They doze

in ruined dreams abandoned

by their masters. They bark

whelp and die without

plan or permission. Occasionally,

like thinkers, like poets,

they are rounded up

and shot.

A bitch with flapping teats

haunts the ruined foundry

where I film an entertainment

for my country.

This feral dog eyes the roll I proffer

trembles, intention whittled

to a point. The whimpering

pups beneath a wrack of ruined iron

cannot soften her stiff legged fear.

Sad and sooty sumacs,

tattered sorrel, small luminous, lavender flowers

conquer the twisted rubble

vanquish the iron track.

Seed, stem, and  bramble

trump the stained concrete

trump all, except

the gnawing hunger of the dogs.

                                    June 26, 2004

***

Hunting Rubies

Empty even of hunger

the bones of your heels

are restless to leave the rail.

Loss is in the air

and underfoot.

A cord has snapped.

My love once sought

her rubies in the deep pile

of our scarlet carpet.

Eyes shadowed by loss,

Owl’s keen sight piercing the dark

She anticipates the finish

where pavement and clear sailing end

and her feet will seek mercy

between the stones.

My beloved,

my hands too are empty

dusted only with the pollen of your body.

Can you not follow my tracks

to where I’ve dried and stored the corn?

“You give me champagne and I’m starving.”

Has all of me been refused?

Have I stolen your portion of the bee’s gold--   

the bird’s songs from your throat?

Have I taken the best of you?

Oh, wait! Please just wait!

Can’t you see how feverishly

I am tying feathers.

to your arms?               

             June 30, 2008

            rev. April 14,2014 

***

The Dogs of Bucharest II

Romanian dogs have drum-tight skin.

Hearts slap the ribs drumming loss

through jungles of ruined concrete.

Heads down, clustered like jackals

scanning the broken streets

they are afraid of men.

American dogs shine like gold.

Are sleek with oil, have energy

confidence to burn.

They have vitamins in their feed

by law, are better fed

than  our own poor.

                                    June 26, 2004

                                     rev. July 11, 2014