Friday, December 14, 2012

More from October


October poems-2012



Beyond the window,

evening chill settles,
outside darkness
reflects the lighted room,

and the moon, 

reaching for fullness, lingers
high above the roof top,
as unseen as tomorrow’s faces,

yet to be known
and yet as readily recognizable
as our own.


**


Su Tung Po lived on East Slope,
looking west, just as I do.  

He took his name from that slope,
but I’ll stick with my own, Gummo,

and imagine that he too
sat among the many weeds

setting summer suns pull
from hills like these,

imagine that he too, in his time,
sat like this, looking west..


Su Tung Po is one of the Chinese ancients. His name means: Su of East Slope. “Gummo” is the name I took as a follower of Buddha’s way—it means “weeds,” a most common form of life. The wife and I have made our home on the east slope of the small valley that holds Brisbane, California.


**


The first of the newly hung bird feeders
gets some attention, but the second hangs lonely,
unattended, hummingbirds busy elsewhere
around the yard. Perhaps when winter comes,
unattractive offerings, such as this one,
may show different colors for those then
passing by.



**


Buddhist Temple of Marin

The flowers from the altar
now rest in a vase
on the kitchen counter,

memories 
of gathered beauty
spread of itself, 

friendship in worship
deepened over tea
and togetherness,

the way made concrete
on considered words,
petals transcending time and place.


**


Winter rains arrive
without equivocation,

arrive with little room left
for even a lifted eyebrow,

arrive in the steadied flow
of movement of time

as certainty—winter rains.


**


And so there are others, recognized now,
who’ve walked this way,
and breaths come less the lonely
because of it.


**


With the great eucalyptus down,
a constant presence
all these years,

now gone,

the curved shock of night sky opens,
the horizon’s comfortable-usual
giving way to wonder.


**


I woke groggy
and aching
this morning,

peered into the fog
that revealed
everything.


**


Elizabeth Street

Elizabeth Street in San Francisco
is one-way, runs parallel
to 24th, that somewhat upscale stretch,
there between Delores and The Castro.

It’s quiet here, sitting in the car,
under trees, looking down-slope,
with housed hills in the distance,
a block and a-half up from morning traffic.

Balding men in slacks
and short-sleeved shirts
enjoy the sunny sidewalks;
all seem to carry folded newspapers.

The most straight-forward
of explanations, if at all necessary
in the wider scope of things,
is that this is where, right here

is where life is right now,
as I wait for the store to open at ten,
right here now, where as best I can,
I watch, and listen, and try of its taste.



**



Freedom happens
when others
are allowed theirs. 

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