Ken Weisner's beautiful 2010 edition of The Red Wheelbarrow includes three poems of mine, available from DeAnza College: Prince of Disks; A Taste of Light; What It Means To Be A Hero
Prince of Disks
Across the small wooden table between us
I spread the Tarot cards she has chosen randomly
from the pile, turn them over one by one. She reveals
her family lineage, many generations in Mariposa,
once proud, now poor: my mother wasn’t a drunk,
just unlucky. Now it’s her turn to be strong,
raising two children, waitressing at Miner’s Inn,
saving tips to buy the broken-down house
she was raised in, caring for her boyfriend’s son
with cerebral palsy. She is young—almost worldly,
almost angelic—and for a moment, turning over
the Prince of Disks, not looking as she removes her sweater,
reveals her elegant collarbone, hint of breast, I want
to marry her, to save her, some lost part of me. Instead,
we look at the prince’s steel chariot drawn by his snorting bull,
rippling flanks obstinate, unflinching to pain, and I say
this is you, nothing can stop you, not the fatigue,
not the man who takes and never gives, not the endless hours
of serving eggs, beer—endless hours. Because this
is how strong she has to be. And when we are done,
her twenty-dollar bill laid on the table, her lips curve
into a smile, saying Yes!
The Taste of Light
Last night, on a balcony just north of Venice,
I could almost believe the world was becoming
light. Four glasses, a decanter, Italian wine—
dinner with our former nanny Jen, her new husband Andrea.
They met in Germany speaking Spanish together
over beer steins, settling here in Jesolo, Italy,
speaking with us now in a mix of Italian, English—
Jen pregnant, Andrea a master chef yearning for America,
to start a restaurant, raise a family. They are so young,
have little idea of the dark underbelly of dream.
But tonight, the warmth of the night,
the Italian hospitality, the food, the wine,
the balcony pointing towards a Venice you can’t see
but know is there—I can almost believe the world,
its inventive mix of pigment and language,
this volatile fermenting of dream and despair,
the aged flavor of my wife’s eyes,
the nip of decades, exuberant, mournful, pleasing.
I can almost taste in the bottom of my glass
this hidden light emanating from our bodies.
How we are sipped, savored, sung by darkness
for our hint of aural radiance caught
between sad lip and ecstatic tongue.
What It Means to be A Hero
As a boy, superheroes were essential
to my survival, for without
Superman’s x-ray eyes,
who could see the truth
behind bleak walls; without
the Hulk’s naked brawn
one could only cower in the brain’s
hidden hallways. But
I loved the mysterious Watcher,
neither foe nor friend,
but a powerful being
who watched human-kind
in our glory and travail,
who knew, it seemed,
we could neither be tamed
nor saved without destroying
something essential in us,
but who vowed to witness
as a kind of alien-buddha.
I wondered, too, if I was a Watcher,
born in the body of a small boy,
sent to earth to determine
if human life was worth such
outrageous uncertainty.
Years later, turning fifty, I still feel
the tremendous weight of uncertainty,
reviewing my half-century,
feeling each heroic moment
hovering over a black hole,
the Omega point of acquiescence,
that yes, it should never have come
to only this. But
I remember, too, how it takes more
than witness, that Superman
in the face of kryptonite’s green torpor
was far more heroic suddenly human
than when he was speeding as a bullet,
a locomotive, flying over tall buildings
dimpling the ground below. It was
how he’d sweat like any one of us,
how he’d crawl to stay alive, fingernails
scratching in the dirt.