There Will Come a Time

(I know)
there will come a time
when it is time
to wander off.
Those around me
eat, drink, marry,
but I am no longer with them.

They don't yet know,
with the certainty I am coming to know:
that there will be a time to wander off.

The time for some, sooner,
the time for others later.
We do not know our time,
but suddenly, before us
a shining new sea,
a fresh breeze.,
and a little boat,
bidding us to sail.

Laying It Down 10/24/09

What is my life, my face?
Sometimes they weary me
just as the lives of others and other things weary me.
My house is a mess.
Things drop and lay there for months.
What does it matter?
Things are like leaves,
destined to fall,
to blow away,
to be absorbed,
to mutate,
and become dirt for the trees
to make more leaves.

What is this life
that I keep hammering on?
Adding a 2x4,
repainting the weathered wood.
Whose hands are these,
so busy?
Whose face is this,
smiling, frowning?
Does it laugh?
I'm sure it must.
Does it know grief?
I'm sure it does.
Does it like jazz,
and Paul Klee,
and Rilke?
Yes, and these are the yeast of me.
and I am the least of them,
and destined to become less,
and yet on the scales, we balance,
for now.

What is this life, my face?

Where others touch, I blossom.
And now, still and alone,
I blossom.
Oh, the green fuse that drives the flower.
How helpless we are.
How it plays us,
and then, oh, how we play ourselves.
What is this face, this flesh,
that I would lay them down with the leaves?
Who is this man, confused and
confusing , frustrated and
frustrating, enchanted and
enchanting, difficult,
trying, trying to be good.

More 2x4s, more paint!
The artifice sags, the man grows weary.
What is this life, this face?

Somertimes I would like to lay them down:
Let the late autumn winds
burst my doors and windows ,
sweep through this house of me,
pulling me into the whirlwind,
carrying me out
to meet the sunlight, the clouds,
the mist and rain,
the leaves and lamps,
shirts and shovels,
dust, sticks, feathers...
and me.
And then to lay them down,
element melting into element.
"Blend well and allow to cool"
says Autumn to Winter,
whilst the heat of me
dons a suit of leaves.

There are some processes
only poetry can describe.
This is one of them.

What is my face, this life?
The work of old age
is figuring out how
to lay it down,
and laying it down.
And what of this age?

Everything & Tu Fu 06/28/10

My daughter called to say she misses me,
a nephew beckons for a family get-together.
Up North, friends expect me for a wood-firing.
I have already begged off,
and here I sit, alone, in cool, green Inverness Park
with much to do,
with much to do,
with much to do,
and I don't know what to do.
And so,
I read Chinese poems,
translated by Kenneth Rexroth,
and find Tu Fu
"old, ill, and tired,
blown hither and yon,
lost between heaven and earth"
and see my face
across centuries and continents,
while yet another voice chides me,
"Boy, you just don't know"
and I don't, and
I don't know what to do, and
I am tired.

In West Marin 9/4/11

This old house is decaying, crooked,
but it overlooks the bottom of the bay,
where the tides come and go,
brown mud, then water, silvery blue.
The town has a hardware store,
a grocery store, and a bakery:
my trinity of human existence.
There's a jazz station on the radio for potluck,
and Pandora plays all I want to hear.
This is getting scary,
all my little dreams...
And while I am filled with gratitude and fear
I am already moving away
(though not yet in such a rush - oh that pecan sticky)
and I have to remind myself
that God, in his secret economy,
brings rain and sun
to the just and unjust, the good and the evil.
But leaves it to me to answer the question:
which one am I?

Outside the Cafe Roma (now defunct) (05)

Outside the Cafe Roma (now defunct),
a hearty breeze is pushing the leaves
around the sidewalk and into every doorway.
It's late summer, and the light
though heavy and warm, is looking
a little tired, a little hazy;
a harbinger, perhaps, like the leaves
of impending Autumn.

It's a busy morning at the Roma,
including, I note as I leave,
a girl in shorts, scribbling furiously in a notebook.
Outside, I put on my backpack, pull my bike from the rack,
take a few steps back for one last look at her lovely legs
-and trip,
my bike and I, in a clattering pratfall.
And in front of everyone!
There is a small field of grace
just outside the doors of the Roma,
it won't stand for that;
and the distracted monk receives a swat from the master.

Spanning Time

In the early seventies I crossed paths briefly at Gavilan College with a Japanese student named Sam. He did not speak English very well, but was writing poetry in English. At a get-together off campus, he handed me the poem below, which I present here verbatim (I include the salutation, which he added at the time). Somehow this poem survived the chaos of my life at the time and found a place among my own artistic and poetic detritus. Every few years, I run across it again and never fail to appreciate its sincerity and its truth. Need I add that at the time, I did not appreciate what I was given...

Dear Fred,

Let's have a dream once a day!
working, again working, we go out,
enjoying, again enjoying, we come in,
studying, again studying, we are still,
if we lost the sadness far away.

Let's seek something on how to be tomorrow!
asking, asking to ourselves what we are,
thinking, thinking again what we can,
praying, again praying what we can't,
if we were modest enough, honest enough.
This is our quest,
to reach unreachable star.

Let's make something for our life!
polishing up the skill, morning,
touching the spirit, afternoon,
cooking the gourmet, evening,
if we were craftmen.
Whether be genious or not,
it's our pray, it's our dream.

Let's sink into the bottom of life!
whatever we may say or do,
because we know what we are,
because we know what we can, because we know what we can't,
Life is beautiful, we should know.

SAM