[There Is No Love But Puppies]
Pamela down the street, no,
Up and down the stairs—
Yes, it was Love,
Yes, we were 9,
Of course, we would marry.
My lunch box I kicked for her
Up and down the street,
Up and down the stairs, &
Up and down the Vast Appalachian Trail.
“I will die for you,” I said,
“Like Daniel Boone in Booneville,
Like Mickey Dolenz in Clarksville,
Like that three-time loser Henry in fields of clay.”
“Do I care?” she said. “My ribbons
Are orange. I am a Brownie,
I am no Appalachian Fairy.
I’ll sell you my cookies, but only
AFTER we say grace. You
Say grace, don’t you?”
“Yes, of course,” I said,
Fingering the orange ribbon,
Or was it pink?
Or brown?
The beanie, I know,
Was felt.
Brown felt.
Wet in the rainy day,
It stank. It was clipped
In place, until it unclipped &
Fell to black wet ground,
& then ribbons,
& then tears.
It was our last,
The very last,
The only last stanza
Of our holy days.
(Poem written on ribbon, front and back. Thanks to Enedina Vasquez and Mary Earle)
Up and down the stairs—
Yes, it was Love,
Yes, we were 9,
Of course, we would marry.
My lunch box I kicked for her
Up and down the street,
Up and down the stairs, &
Up and down the Vast Appalachian Trail.
“I will die for you,” I said,
“Like Daniel Boone in Booneville,
Like Mickey Dolenz in Clarksville,
Like that three-time loser Henry in fields of clay.”
“Do I care?” she said. “My ribbons
Are orange. I am a Brownie,
I am no Appalachian Fairy.
I’ll sell you my cookies, but only
AFTER we say grace. You
Say grace, don’t you?”
“Yes, of course,” I said,
Fingering the orange ribbon,
Or was it pink?
Or brown?
The beanie, I know,
Was felt.
Brown felt.
Wet in the rainy day,
It stank. It was clipped
In place, until it unclipped &
Fell to black wet ground,
& then ribbons,
& then tears.
It was our last,
The very last,
The only last stanza
Of our holy days.
(Poem written on ribbon, front and back. Thanks to Enedina Vasquez and Mary Earle)
Labels: A Girl Like You, A Scratch in the Sky, Fellix Cavaliere
posted by murat11 at 6:58 PM
4 Comments:
Paschal: This is wonderful, every last line, but maybe especially those last four. Cheered me up from my recent loss: one page of typeset math equations vanished into ether. Another Mercury retrograde strikes again. Thank God for poetry.
Anno: Written at a very cool poetry workshop at our church. I'm convinced that about 5 minutes into her sermons, Mary Earle channels God - the Celtic God - herself.
Started as a reminisence of fourth grade love in Frankfurt, and then wandered, as expected, into the nether realms.
Damn those retrogrades!
It is such a treat to find your responses to comments on even long ago, far away posts that you almost might be inspiring me to better blogging behavior.
Keep on wandering! It's always good to join you on these adventures.
Anno, you are most gracious, but surely you must know by now that I am one who loves the sound of his own voice (or at least the voices of those gathered herein), about which I will hasten to add that it still stops short of Flannery O'Connor's proclamation that she was about the only writer she could stand to read.
I'm happy to say that there are many writers whose voices I love...
Post a Comment
<< Home