TWO POEMS FROM
UNTIL THEY CATCH FIRE

So It Happens

Never a child, Eve woke one day
a grown woman beside a strange man
in a land not yet fully named.

No name yet for summer rain,
shadows among the clamoring leaves,
the plunge of bees purposeful in the lilies. 

No knowledge of why flowers open
their colors to morning
or a heron lifts suddenly from the shallows.

Not yet a need to tilt her head back
to an iron sky just to feel
snow licking her face.

Nor, with unfamiliar restlessness,
to retreat beneath a tree that never yellows
and have a good cry. 

But let’s say she did.
And there, beneath that tree, is where
she was found. Where desire wasn’t yet a word 

but was known by her body. A hunger
unsated, in spite of all that abounded,
was within easy reach. 

As was, so it happens, the hiss in her ear,
the apple. And let’s say she knew
exactly what she was doing.

Not falling from but into. Not succumbing
but choosing. And now with the knowledge
to know the difference.

A Griever’s Reference Manual

Prepare pancakes; forget to flip them
until they’re scorched discs.
Eat when you have no appetite.
Compose emails that are never sent.
Realize, with the open book on your lap,
you’ve read the same paragraph three times
and can’t remember a single word.
Kick the shovel that refuses
to stay propped in the garden shed.
Fling a pot lid to the floor
when it won’t fit back into the drawer.
When your printer jams, at last
allow your husband to step in,
save it from imminent destruction.
At your desk: a blank page.
At the mirror: oddly, you still look
normal. Wonder why
the phone doesn’t ring.
Hate it when the phone rings.
Reject euphemisms, a lexicon
of laid to rest and at peace trying
to make death more palatable.
Discover the almost infinite ways to play
If Only. Admit that if only
in the If Only game, there weren’t so many
occasions to use better and harder –
especially in conjunction with the verb try.
Vow never to tell anyone “Time will heal.”
Or “Life goes on.” Above all,
reject the simplicity of metaphor.
A flame, a wall, the sea.
There is nothing to keep alight, climb,
swim through to get to the other side.