Between the Hours

Between the hours
I think of you
You touch me
through a memory
A whisper in the darkness
And I feel your hand
Just as it was
When first we met.
Our hands did all the talking then.

It's the beginning
I think about most
The way you looked on the street corner
When I suggested
We meet
To talk about
Old times.
I had no idea what I was saying.

You knew I was crazy
But then so were you
I smile as I remember this
It's like an old song
Always playing
Somewhere in the corner
Of my mind.

Alone in my room,
Sometimes I wonder if you hear me
I talk to you so often.
And then I feel your hand on my shoulder
Or I dream of you
And all the things I didn't say,
Are pouring out of me.
Like water.

And I'm so grateful.
Because if I had another chance
Or a million chances,
I would tell you what you already knew.
That I never stopped loving you
Either.

Silver Satin

Did you love me then
When all the world was blue
And I danced in silver satin
Whispering ancient stories
Of things I didn’t know.

Or did you see me as what I was
A figment of your imagination
Treading lightly on your feelings
Afraid to make you cry.

I’m so much older now.
A version of what I used to be.
Remembering so vividly what it was like
To be so young and wise.

And where did you go
Mad lover of forever
Did you catch the rainbows
You vowed to find?

I still see you
Sitting quietly beside me
Or running breathlessly along the roads of time.
Your smile is so worn now
And speaks of countless journeys
In the desert and the forest
Of our dreams of yesterday.

Among the weathered furrows
That speak of things you've never spoken
Like all our conversations
Even now.

Poetry

Poetry is the language of the soul, from that place where reason is not in power--where dreams, memories, sensations set the rules. For me, poetry is a way to express what I cannot otherwise, because everyday language as we know it isn't set up for it.


Silhouettes

Silhouettes
Of broken glass
Strewn about the floor
Remnants of our conversation
From ten years before

You dazzled me with romance
And told stories ‘til the dawn
But it wasn’t you there with me.
You were already gone.

Once I was a princess
In a far off foreign land
You traveled miles and miles
Through sleet and storm
Just to hold my hand.

But that was very long ago
Before the winds of time
Changed my tears to melodies
In the far reaches of your mind.

A hundred years from now
When we are old
Our dreams set out to sea
I’ll take your hand
And you’ll remember
The girl who wasn’t me.

Crying in the dust storm
Our tears falling in the rain
We’ll hold each other like children
‘Til we are whole again.

(appeared in Bewildering Stories)

Still

I was listening to Tom Waits' Alice this morning--an amazing swirl of songs that tug at your feelings, drawing you into the misty cyclone of your memories. You're a willing victim, a captive of nostalgia--for things that were, for moments lost, even for things that perhaps never were. "Poetry is like a memory," my daughter once said. And who is to say that we are not allowed to reinvent our memories? Coloring them with shades of how we would write the play or play the scene. . .

"And I must be insane
To go skating on your name
And by tracing it twice
I fell through the ice
Of Alice."

Music conjures up feelings we usually come short of being able to fully explain, but we go on trying anyway. The missing notes or lyrics are like the missing elements in a line drawing, where we recognize the image in its totality--a result of magic that the brain is trained to perform. A kind of "connect the dots."

So I listen to Alice, full of love and longing for someone who is no longer there or even for someone who is still there, but out of reach.

And I think of Peter.

"You haven't looked at me that way in years
You dreamed me up and left me here
How long was I dreaming for
What was it you wanted me for

You haven't looked at me that way in years
Your watch has stopped and the pond is clear
Someone turn the lights back off
I'll love you til all time is gone

You haven't looked at me that way in years
But I'm still here."

the fawn and her mother

today i rode in china camp. we were there together a month or two ago. as i rounded a corner i thought of that day and looked down towards the little beach where we sat. my thoughts spoke out loud, "show me you are here." and at that very moment i heard a soft rustle in the leaves and twigs. i turned quickly to see a fawn running after its mother. they both stopped to look at me for a moment before continuing on their way. then amidst a wash of sunshine, a song of insects. i don't even know what kind they were, but it doesn't matter. i heard you.

floating, gliding, sailing
with the wind, the ocean waves, your memories
you're finding your way home where everything is peaceful
just as you left it.
and i sense you through all the things
that are beautiful in the world
all the things you loved
and i dream them for you

mr. p

i wrote this for peter a few months ago, after he had been diagnosed with cancer of the esophagus. he died last saturday. i'll be writing about him in one way or another for the rest of my life. more than anyone it was peter who urged me to write, who convinced me i was good at it, and who led me to believe in myself. peter, wherever you are, read this poem again. and find peace in your heart knowing that you'll forever be in mine.

mr. p

thirty years ago
it was
when we met
at a street corner
and i said playfully
'let's get together and talk about old times.'
i was younger than you by eleven years.
you smiled and so did i
and so began our conversation.

although as you would tell it
it began in a slightly different way.
you saw me at my desk
wearing a danskin and jeans, seemingly focused on my work,
all the while looking very slyly at you.
you caught it and i knew it.
i was the girl for you.
you were a crazyman, somewhat disshevelled.
a missing tooth,
which was puzzling
for someone as handsome as you.
something cool and a shade of hip
energized, electric, yet a nuance of something tired and worn.
and i couldn't figure it out
how you, with your bagels and chinese food, your
bravado performance, and your sherman cigarettes, would
be the one to steal my heart.

but now i realize it had little to do
with the stories you told, how you made me laugh
your somewhat sleazy smile, your downright wizardry in the kitchen
or the fact
you had my father's nose.
it was something else, something
intangible, illogical, a fact of life,
which was simply
that you loved me and i loved you.
right then and there--forever.

and through all these years
spent together and apart-
laughing, crying,
shooting arrows through the mist
or holding each other in the storm
to brace against the cold,
the love we have
has laughed in our poor bedraggled faces.
for what fools we are indeed
to think we can decide whether to love or not.
love simply is, like the passage of time,
like it or not.

which is what we knew when first we saw each other-
in the shadows of a quiet building on vallejo street-where
we began our conversation.
not quite conscious a thought,
but a melody we both heard.
a recognition of someone
we've known and loved since the beginning of time
before the invention of the telephone.
remember when we talked for three hours?
before the invention of paper
remember the poem you wrote?
seven pages of thoughts, scrawled
on lined three-ring paper
telling me (and you) of feelings
you had stored away for
the winter, as you had
for so many seasons before.

the snow falling outside your window
so cold inside, you shivered
and then--from a time
you didn't yet remember --
my face appeared behind the frosted glass.

and our daughter--the best of both of us.
we dreamed of her.
christmas in july, remember?


i can't go away, nor can you
we're linked forever, we are.
you in me
and i in you.
mr p, i love you

poetry

poetry speaks of
what cannot be spoken
and captures
what cannot be caught.
we read it like a picture
with elements missing
that our minds fill in
to make the picture complete.

a feeling, fleeting and taunting
something that cannot sit still.
because as you try to name or
describe it, it moves
to a different place.
like a wave on a design
drawn in the sand.
so it changes, but
the essence of what you did
remains.

poetry is feeling,
or like my daughter, from whom i learn so many things
once wrote: poetry is like a memory.

maman

there was a time
when the whole world lived in you
when all i wanted was to sit in your lap
and look up at your dark eyes
and touch your chin
with my fingertips

i thought i could never be as beautiful as you
i didn't like who i was and pretended to be others
more beautiful and talented
anyone but me

as i grew up, you stopped seeing who i was
you were busy trying to mold me into something else
like a piece of clay that you soften and work
into a shape that reflects your thought

i pulled away from you. i was angry.
i didn't want to be someone else anymore. i wanted to be me.
i wanted you to see
and to love the person i was becoming
like a flower, with petals that unfold

but you compared me to other flowers
perhaps more fragrant or with colors
more vibrant
i struggled to be and to know who i was

you continued to love me and i to love you
but it was a pained love, full of frustration
and sadness
and then one day--instead of resenting
and pulling and pushing
i softened.

i simply let go to who i was, letting it unfold
like a flower
and you started to like me again
and i to like you

you finally accepted all those things you
wanted to change
and you started to see them in a new light
a bouquet of you and my father
with sprigs of my own
collected from deserts and hillsides
seashores and sidewalks, the wind and the rain.

i love you now like i did so long ago
when i fell asleep in your lap
in the backseat of the car
all cozy like a cat curled up in the warm
when everything was perfect, everything was calm
and you, after all these years, look at me and smile
you see who i am
and you love me more with all my imperfections
than the image all those years ago
you wanted me to be

vietnam

It’s about time
And wanderings
And grass that grows
Beneath your feet

when you smiled
And said i love you and
shared a summer peach

Forty years ago
i saw your father on the street.

his eyes were grey and

emptied of all his dreams.

you had died, he said simply

'over there' in a foreign field

i still see you

young and so believing

smiling in the wind that summer day

Searching for the answer to something
You didn't have the chance to ask

miles and time

can souls speak to each other
in silence
can we believe the
voices we hear
are really each other's thoughts?

like after a dream
when you wake up and believe
the person you were dreaming about
had the same dream as you
or that it really wasn't a dream.
that the two of you were there
together

miles and time mean nothing
when souls can speak
because the truth
is in our minds anyway