i shall write a poem
and call it "the single story"
and in it there will be only plot
(characters being too messy)
and it will move rapidly
from point a to point b and
employ lots of verbs
and at the end of it
readers will shake their heads
in wonderment, dazed,
and think how silly it has been
all these years
to read emotions,
when there is pure motion to be had.

i am a ladder, built one rung
at a time, and all layers forming
one useful climb.
my fingertips graze windowsills,
brush skyscrapers,
find purchase on steep cliffs.
there is no dream too tall--
no path too steep--
and what is an invitation, without an invitee?

i mustn't
be patient any more,
she said, convincingly unconvinced,
a spider crawling up her spine
and the heart
sneaking back up the sleeve.
mustn't mustn't, naughty!
the idea
that waiting could be clean.
puerile, neurotic, spoiled and splendid,
time and tide and the modern woman
need no transportation
or translucence.
i musn't
just let it meander,
she insists!
i must wrangle it by the horns,
else waive the red flag
of yesterday's dawn.
heavy, overburdened,
a trawler on the horizon:
seaborne, airworthy, earthbound.
mustn't define a sin
till the deed is committed.

reach troubled hands into slow water
sluice through a tumbling stream, ice cold,
fresh from up the valley
till the skin turns pink, turns red,
glows with the unadulterated lust for heat--

a trembling fingerlength closer to fire,
seeking warmth or
adventure or attention,
the great great roaring of the beast
and the coal-chewing appetite of the vision:
just a bit closer, just a bit closer

and think about it later

the attic spawns a clumsy ghost
who rumbles, tumbles, over spokes
and in between the shafts and gears—
he hasn't spoken for several years.
so like the light pouring through the shades,
like sunshine triumphs when they're raised,
he seeks a willing ear to hear:
his jaw cracks open when you're near
and rust pours from his open mouth,
his throat a squeaking, reeking spout.
still words evade his crumbled mind,
synapses shrink from the glowing rinds
that were the words he meant to share,
that form the burden he's meant to bear.
what can't be spoken lies heavier still
on an embodied, spiritual will:
back to the attic, where he'll stay
oiling his hinges for an articulate day.

snapshot of the corner of a kitchen table,
swathed in lace,
and grandmother's china and grandmother's silver
laid neatly and carefully,
and a pear.
(there is a reason why i don't like still life paintings.)
snapshot of the corner of the bed,
clothes and bedding pushed together elsewhere,
dim afternoon dawn
sneaking through blinded windows
and our skin overlaid
like mondrian, like cubism, like portraiture.
sometimes mona lisa shows up
in the corners of your mouth,
sometimes marilyn
as represented by dali
in the heat of the moment:
all red lips, all bright space, all heavy breathing.
we are a gallery all to ourselves,
you and i:
a cornucopia of bright and shining expressions
and the challenge of keeping those images
in the mind,
once the picture has faded.

invest
in the crick between your greedy little fingers
in your old, brittle paw;
invest your age, your wealth, your body,
shove your soul
into the eye of a tarnished brass needle.
where else to find fortune,
where else to cull serendipity?
the only treasures
belong to previous generations;
the only security
was gleaned from overtired fields
by your father's father's father.
what, you don't own a tractor any more?
force your future
to fit the shape of modern discomfort,
mild dialectics, sclerotic finance or
mothballed discipline.

what grace is:
morning sunshine on your face,
the ability to sleep in,
to turn over and find love there.
did i learn to be grateful in these moments?
at least, i have learned to hoard it up:
gather it up in handfuls,
and stuff it under the pillows
for a night that's not as warm,
or a silent midafternoon cry.
the loss of you
is much more peaceful this time;
a simple lack, a quiet burn.
time gathers into a cold, hard lump
at the base of my throat,
a weight to push through for air,
pain for oxygen,
a reminder with each breath
that respiration and rhythm come naturally
with you, in the morning, in the sun.
and tonight, i'll give myself
one glorious heat-soaked moment
to preen in the memory of love:
the gift of waiting, of solar grace.