At the steps of Washington
they stood- the people.
I was with them,
nothing but a marionette life
in this sweet land.
Instead of a preface
Can you describe this? Yes I can*
If in the distant future
this aunt still resides in
the mitten
shaped from ice –
if she is still here
and Mitchell asks what was it like?
Can you describe it?
Yes, I can, for good or
not – for it makes
no difference
then.
The words that spill
from my mouth
are a feeble response.
But they will have to
do.
A humble woman can give
even when her heart is dying.
Dedication
Hope keeps singing from afar*
I shall warble anyways –
a dickcissel beat
of two to open with –
or a flicker’s chortle perhaps
that resonates in
a modern age.
A slow lament or
a laugh, either will do.
The capture of a brown marmoset
stinkbug reminds me
all that is old is new.
Prologue
Innocent Russia writhed under bloody boots, under the tires of the Black Marias*
When I see the Confederate flag
hang at a Michigan door
I wonder what the hell
did old Henry fight for?
Bierkamp that is,
taken prisoner in ‘63
at Gettysburg he served
with the 24th infantry.
Oh, Michigan the men
in talk black hats –
they stood their ground
and chose to lead
this country to moral soundness
which is never found when
freedom is based on pigment.
Every slave must be unbound.
I
they lead you away at dawn*
The wilderness path turns
and widens, first bricks then paved,
making way for the spewing of
lead and carbon.
It was not always so, but then,
I have no memory of that –
the time before Europe
cast its shadow
upon America’s floor.
This girl of Europe
has guilt upon her soul
forevermore.
II
husband in the grave, son in prison, say a prayer for me*
The passenger pigeon was less than a crow
but more than a robin in size.
Nothing I observed of course,
but perhaps my grandmother
in her youth one espied.
This once prevalent migrant
through circumstance or negligence
did not survive.
III
no it is not I it is someone else who is suffering*
Carefree and dancing the Charleston
I let the throbbing exist
in another realm –
other places other times.
If I can pretend it is someone else
I am looking down upon
then sorrow will leave
I try to believe.
IV
innocent lives are ending now*
The dust upon the prairie states
lade the flora bare.
Abandoning the farm, they came
to California. Starvation
has a way of setting
priorities.
V
for seventeen months I’ve been crying out*
The battle is on and who can tell
what seed, which egg survives.
It is not just humans who die,
the wreck of devastation
grenades and bombs release.
The poison sits in water that
ibises drink.
The war that seems so moral
when genocide is launched
creates a massive death
in nature’s well-worn cloth.
VI
talking about your lofty cross and about death*
I replay the memory, replay the past,
Replay, replay, replay at last.
Oh child, oh daughter, oh son of mine,
mother and father and brother remind me
of a time when the soil
did not bleed life,
but fed the plants we ate of.
I miss those days when organic
was everything
and not just a name for what is normal.
VII Sentence
and the stone word fell on my still-living breast*
So DDT and eagles
Are incompatible it seems.
Phragmites and loosestrife
have taken over the streams of
Michigan’s watersheds – the
Great Lakes new extreme
is habitat invaded
by ballast water, weather
and garden plants
sold beyond all sanity
oh please.
VIII To death
you will come in any case*
Polluted waters raise a stench,
While Cuyahoga burns
the water is beset.
Psychosomatic awareness –
dead alewives are wrapped
in the scum of circumstance.
A slippery ghost leads me forward
and I so long to follow him.
But catharsis settles in
as I wearily wade in conformity.
IX
now madness half shadows*
They are all innocent of this –
Kirtland, eagle, even cowbird.
No, they did not drench
the land with toxins,
they did not fell
the wood with an ax.
And each new hybrid
human-made quaff
shall litter their world, alas,
work that is so old
it is almost new.
X Crucifixion
a choir of angels sang the praises of that momentous hour*
And when the soil lives
sans insect pest or nitrogen,
devoid of mantis, beetle, flea,
here lies Juliet
lips red smack
taste of salsa –
go tomato
just a memory.
Epilogue 1
Terror darts from under eyelids*
In this new century
we all can see,
Johnny got his gun
Mary had her lamb.
The lamb did die when
the vines dried upon
the arid land.
Come desert turned
from soil treated like dirt,
or flood the cities with
sea and salt,
all this living is worth.
Epilogue 2
Once more the day of remembrance draws near…
And the ships of the Neva sail calmly on*
New century yes with all
the same old threats –
hurricane or pest,
tornado blows right through
the very image of you.
And more of this is better
oh, the more the better yes.
8-9/2017
Anna Akhmatova (1889-1996) was a Russian poet whose son was arrested and spent time in the Soviet Gulag. Italics are her words.
Anne's mediocre poetry 