Güd wrtr

In our family, there was no clear line between religion and fly fishing.
—Norman Maclean, “A River Runs Through It”

Let him be
standing just like that,
legs apart in the stream,
one hand on the rod,
the other pulling the fly line
toward him, red filament pooling
in a circle atop the swirls
of water at his knees.

Let him be
there when the chinook
are heading upstream,
when they are ripe with eggs,
when they might be hungry
for the fly.

Let him be
the young man in waders
wearing a dark beard with
reddish glints in sunlight,
his calm hands unhurried
as he waves the wand
over his head in a graceful
arc between 10 and 2,
deftly setting leader and fly
atop water on its busy way
to the sea.

Let him be
aware of salmon
swimming toward him
as the river runs by him.

Let him be
aware of me as I stand
dry-footed on shore,
watching. Let him cast
me a fond smile as I wish
him happy birthday,
many returns of forever.

Let him know
that I’m soon to turn
sixty-five, though
he did not. Now
he is ageless,
my companion
spirit.

Let me turn
and walk away
whispering,
thank you,
and once again,
goodbye.

Let him know.
Let him be.
Let him.

On the 71st anniversary of the birth of my late husband,
Clifford Ernest Polland, May 21, 1952–March 19, 2001

You can listen to Jan read this poem here.

So much right now, on every corner, the blocks
in between, so much you’d think that it’s chased away
the sad, the blues, that no one can possibly die when
rock star flowers show off on their spring stage.

But no, we look up into the wild blue yonder, inhale
clear skies as pollen rains on the cars and some of it
sneaks up our noses. We plant the herb garden and
hope, despite knowing that we all have expiration

dates. Some of them arrive for those we know
on these breezy days, as we tuck seedlings into warm
earth beds, the cycle we’d rather forget of endings
arriving amid new life. It is our way to hope,

the happenstance of four-leaf clovers a one-in-
5,000 chance for luck, for love, for good fortune.
Here’s the thing: Should you find that four-leafletted
clover, keep looking. It’s likely to produce

more quartered offspring nearby. Look beyond
the green to polished stones gleaming, morning glories
climbing, to mountain-peak spring in a whirlpool
of wild. Claim the color, gather it, hold it close

to your sturdy heart. Then scatter every hue like
poppy seeds, with no idea if any will morph into
slender stems with petals the color of fresh lava.
Doesn’t matter. Share all the color you can,

even the humdrum—
porcelain, sagebrush, raven, old barn,
chanterelle, bone.
Glorious, all.

we live in the midst of astonishing mystery,
and in the everydayness, we must remember

to celebrate the miracle of where we find ourselves,
in the most ordinary places—at the car wash,

perhaps—on a hot spring afternoon watching
people vacuum up and wipe down, clean inside

and out what we imagine is ours before we drive
into the not knowing, forgetting, all too quickly,

the marvel of workers’ hands, their sweat and
energy expended momentarily for our benefit,

though ultimately for those they love, ones
they provide for, with their great, compassionate

hearts.

the red bush roses that Inez, the saint
of Santa Ynez Way, planted years ago
in the space between the apartment
building next door and my front yard—

luxuriant roses that unthinking
yard guys working next door hacked
to bits, far from the proper pruning
Inez taught me before she moved
away.

They’re yours now, she said sternly,
as was her way. Take care of them.

And so, when I come out to find
their main stems all but gone (leave
three main stems, Inez advised),
I felt that I’d let her down, knowing
that new ones will grow long and
skinny from the remaining stubs,
unable to support the weight
of the blossoms.

And sure enough, the leggy stems
now sag into each yard, a glorious
profusion of crimson that should be
growing in their proper bushy shape.

I know what to do: Cut the stragglers,
de-thorn and trim stems, remove
leaflets, take the roses inside and
set them in every vase I can find.

Then give them away—to a couple
walking their dog who happen to be
passing by—Would you like some
roses? I’m drowning in them—
gesturing to the lawn strewn with
velvety petals. Delight in the woman’s
surprise as I help her choose some—
careful of the thorns!—for their walk
home.

I deliver a vase to Jeff across the
street who talked to the yard guys
—don’t touch the roses!—
and another vase to the young
physicians and their toddler son
who live in what used to be Sonya’s
house, where I imagine her majestic
Mr. Lincolns blooming their fool
heads off.

She was the one who delivered,
more than once, a plastic bucket
full of roses to my front porch,
sending me searching for vases
and people with whom I could share
the bounty. How I wish I could
bundle up some of this rosy
magnificence and send it to her,
far away in Portland.

I wonder if Sonya remembers
the abundance that will last
through summer, if Inez is still
living, if they can feel my gratitude
from far away, if they can close
their eyes and summon
the fragrance of their roses
on a warm spring day.

for the Poeppel cats… and their people

I rise and dress, shunning the shower
for now, aware that today is the first day
of cat feeding a friend’s felines down
the block, maybe a quarter mile walk,
including the stairs up to her old house,
so I put on the walking shoes, set off into
a day hovering between spring and summer.

It’s projected to be 90 with a breeze, the
perfect summer day, though we are a month
away from its official start, but it’s still 20
degrees below that now under bright blue
skies not yet grayed from heat and fires.

We are in the just-right moment here,
and the kitties I let myself in to feed greet
me eagerly, though I arrive much later than
they’d like. They are forgiving souls, like
so many who surround me, those here and
gone, who remind me that there is grace
in scooping the litter box, in making sure
that Katy gets her tiny pill mooshed into
her food, that Maple likes her pink dish
in a specific corner to feel safe.

Don’t we all need that sense of safety,
that we’re fed and warm or cool enough?
Aren’t we all in between feedings?

I’ll be back, girls, I tell them as they finish
their breakfast and wander off to find a
favorite spot for a nap, as I head home
into a day of betweens, the spots where
the sparkling morning gleams through
new leaves, as I make my way to set
this all down before I forget it—
this tiny, precious moment.

for Mary Mackey

I follow her down the path by the river,
her river, the one she and her late husband
canoed, where they swam and soaked up
all manner of nature, when they weren’t

teaching or traveling to the Amazon
for research—him the environmental
scientist, her the poet/novelist who based
books deep in the jungle, among other

places. Now recovering from the tsunami
of his passing and exercising her new hip,
this long-ago teacher of mine still has
much to offer this perennial student.

Did I tell you the story about…? she’ll
begin, and even if she has, I want it again
because it’s been almost a half century
since I first sat in her classroom,

and Mary’s got so many more stories,
some doled out in books and poems,
some spun out to my listening ears
as we walk by the green-grassed,

poppied banks of the levee, each
day yellowing into summer weeds.
We follow the path under heavy oaks
that must be so grateful for all that

winter rain torrentially delivered,
the river running high and fast
beside our slow, steady steps. She
wants us to try the canoe once

the water settles down, after the big
melt that has filled every reservoir
and river in the state has passed
through. Can you steer? she asks,

and I think, Can I? Canoe?—
chuckling at the old joke. Can two
retired professor poets make their
way downstream, learning to

paddle in sync with a new/old friend?
I say, We can try, and Mary says,
with ageless enthusiasm,
Let’s.

for Henry, great nephew-to-be

You will not remember this by
the time you are old enough to remember,
but you should know that while you

were still cooking inside your mama,
you were already adored by people
you would grow to call by name:

Mom, Dad, grandmas and grandpas,
aunts and great aunts, cousins first,
second, third—so many cousins—

though we had seen you only in
fuzzy black and white scans, your
little face mooshed up inside your

mama, whose voice you already knew,
and your papa, who couldn’t wait
to hold you and snuggle you,

the two who named you before you
landed on this strange shore to breathe
air and eat food, to discover your hands

and feet! Such amazing feet! To one
day walk on those feet, and run,
to become your own person,

Henry, whom we cannot wait to
meet and hug and talk to and laugh
with. Know always that you are

a treasure to the people you will
come to know as family, that you
have enlarged ours by one—but

by so much more than one because
love cannot be measured in simple
digits. It is infinite; it goes forever,

as do you, heybabyheybabyheybaby,
tucked tight into our hearts for all
time, beyond time, lucky you,

lucky us.

for Lisa

Now that she’s gone, you tell me,
you sense that there’s more you should
have said, more you should have asked,

but she has died after a long life,
and you can’t begin to think of all you
wish you’d said, much less what you

wish you’d asked. Walking around
her vacant house with its baby blue
kitchen counter tile, putting out food,

as she did, for the raccoons and
the cat who may or may not be feral—
doesn’t matter—the woulda shouldas

ping-pong through your grief. You
shoulda told her, repeatedly, that she
gave more than you acknowledged,

and though you thought you thanked
her, again repeatedly, assured her that
you were listening, you do remember—

likely not everything she told you but
so much. You realize that, near her end,
she did not feel important, that what

she wanted, more than anything, was
to know that she’d made a difference—
not in the lives of those she taught

or helped or loved in hundreds of ways,
big and small—but to you, that what
she craved, more than anything, was

your admiration, though you did so
much for her, day after exhausting day,
the hole of a lifetime’s underappreciation

still needed filling. You showed her
again and again how smart and funny
and worthy and important she was,

that she did good, that she did well,
that you miss her in ways you
didn’t expect—that you owe her

nothing, you owe her everything
now that every day is mother’s day,
now that she’s not here, though you hope,

in ways you discover daily,
that she is.
She so is.

There’s an obesity of roses weighing
down the stems in my back yard,
drenched by winter’s oh-my-god-
not-more-rain deluges so rare in these
parts that the lawn morphed into a
months-long lagoon.

The roses live just off the lagoon, which
has at long last receded, giving way to
the healthiest crop of dandelions and
tiny English daisies in years. I wouldn’t
let the yard guys cut any of it till
the grass swished up to my calves.

It’s astonishing what an outrageous
amount of water can do.

Of course, it was an indecent supply,
causing flooding the likes of which
parched California rarely sees, snowpacks
of unfathomable heights in the mountains—
Donner Party snow—trapping some folks
in their cabins, snow packed on roofs and
up to the eaves.

I know a woman who, barely able to open
a window, dug a tunnel bit by bit into the wall
of white outside—with a garden trowel
she happened to have in her house.

Meanwhile, my fat roses in the flatland have
reveled in the feast of water, a lavish banquet
producing the most glorious bouquets. I hate
to cut them, taking only the ones bowed down
to the grass that will go quickly if left there.
But when I do, I load them into vases all over
the house, admiring them out loud every
chance I get.

The others left outside in their natural state
look like drooping, swollen breasts, unable
to lift themselves without help, fragrantly
crimson and cream, an embarrassing
extravagance. Every bush in the neighborhood—
the show-offy azaleas taking their final bows
for now—

every living thing brims in profusion,
delighting passers-by like me, who cannot
walk half a block without stopping multiple
times to, yes, smell the roses, then look up
into the still-sparkling blue sky and thank
the rain gods for such dazzling bounty.

for Julia Ellen Cook,
July 15, 1916–May 9, 1998

Honey, she’d say,
in a voice that still comes to me
waking and dreaming,

Honey, you have to choose to stay.
You just can’t leave.

I was 22 and 100 pounds and passing out for no
apparent reason—waking up on the floor of the studio
apartment tucked next to the garage on Serenity Hills Drive.

No reason other than perhaps the stress of a job I loved
and devoted nearly every breath to. That and surviving
mostly on Dr Pepper and M&Ms with the occasional
cheeseburger.

She was my landlady in the big house up the hill—
the woo-woo, new age, holistic nurse with fiery hair
who shaved a decade off her age, who said things like,
You can leave your body, honey, but only when
you’re asleep, dreaming, or awake meditating.

Huh, I thought. OK.

She taught me to meditate, though I’d watched my mother
do so for years, sitting with me in the big pink recliner
built for two, teaching me to calm my breathing, to let
thoughts run through my brain without chasing them
like a flitting hummingbird, waiting until behind my closed
eyes deep violets and indigos pulsed like expanding
waves rolling into shore.

She fed me stews and broccoli, soups and homemade
sourdough bread, made sure I had access at all hours
to both full kitchen and washing machine in the big house.
Honey, you’re a gift, she’d tell me. You’re meant to be here.

And, she said, as I meditated, every day, I was to think,
very hard, I’m staying. I’m staying.

You never decided to stay in your body, she said.
You have to decide to stay and mean it.

I knew the story of my mother finding me blue
in my crib, picking me up and whacking the breath
back into me.

I’m staying, I’d think as I interviewed people
for the newspaper, as I typed up stories, as I
laid out long galleys of waxed words on big
pages at the slanted wood tables.

I’m staying, I’d think, as I explored the town
with its onion smell that embraced me, as I found
myself enveloped in the arms of a new lover.

And years later, as she was dying, as I sat by her bedside—
Honey, I need you to be a witness to the process—
I reminded her of the mantra she’d given me.

Now you’re going, I told her.

There are no accidents, honey, she said. You’re staying.

I did. And I am. Staying, carrying forward
what she gave me, decade into decade,
in every meditation, every breath,
with my grateful heart.

***

You can listen to Jan read this poem here.