Güd wrtr

Not even the susurrus of a breeze
rustling through leaves—
all is still by the river.

I am late, the early birds,
the day’s first walkers
having moved on.

I usually take this path
with another, but on this
cloudy morning,

a spit of rain finally
falling from dry skies,
I go solo.

Alone, I relish the quiet,
the great river silently
making its way

gradually to the sea.
And then
the snicker of geese

brings me near the edge
to see them hovering
near the opposite shore.

And, as I get closer,
on a sandbar’s rise,
a heron stands sentinel

accompanied by
a trio of cormorants,
attendant mallards

swimming nearby.
A squawk, the flip
of a fish close to me,

a single trilling bird
and finally, the merest
breeze, lifting.

As if we are ever
truly alone.
As if there aren’t

other beating
hearts
always nearby.

They paint the sky with swoop
and fall, with pirouette and jeté,

bird ribbons synchronized
in a dusky cloud shortly

before sunset, perhaps to
keep warm, to whisper

where to find food, all in
preparation for sleep.

They have no leader;
they follow no plan,

but if you stop to watch
a mumuration of starlings,

look up and listen well—
your limited ears might

detect the whispers of
of thousands of wingbeats

and soft flight calls, fluid
poetry written on the sky

in a whoosh of wings.

Drops from oak tree just ahead of me
on my walk, bounces twice,
rolls over to display
its belly.

I step over it, peer closely as it joins
its nutty brethren on the ground
in this, the falling time,
dropping like rain,
wondering how many more
will fall.

What if it is simply a releasing,
this natural cycle of restoration,
of trying to plant new life?
Not an ending at all,
though it may look that way
to those of us plagued by
the limited vision
of humanity.

What if, by pocketing a few
of the fallen and taking them
home as treasures, I honor
their implied promise—
the possibility of new life?
The assurance that
somehow, in some way
we cannot foresee,
we will go on.

I tuck them in my pocket,
where, with every step,
they click like castanets,
and I go on.

When you start to crack open,
well, that’s it. Your old stuff
starts leaking out like lava
from a fresh fissure,

hot and messy, and yes,
you want to get away from
that. As if you could.
As if you could gather

it all back up with a
big ol’ spoon and pour
it back into you. Never
gonna work. Not

supposed to. Instead,
that new self is yummy
egg yolk, the color of
the golden daisies

still well-petaled in
the front yard. What’s
spilling from your interior
is sunlight, my dear,

straight from you into
the world, fiery magma
newly expelled from
the interior of a planet.

Like tears, it’s not meant
to be gathered. It’s meant
to be spread around
indiscriminately,

everywhere, for everyone,
into everything, which is
what sunlight does.
You’re sunshine now,

lovely one, and you
can’t—you shouldn’t—
do anything but let
yourself shine.

no matter how many autumns
I am given on the planet,

that at this late date
roses still bloom in my fair city,

sturdy stems laddering their
way to the sky,

a lavender bud high on top
starting to unfurl, and,

behind it, leaves preparing to turn
before their fall,

and a profusion of white roses
thick on the bush

and still some myrtle on the crape,
all set against a vastness so blue,

reminding me to hold those in despair,
deep in the mess of their lives,

often not of their own making,
so very tenderly.

(for Dick Schmidt)

After he makes a day trip
with a friend to the coast
so she can walk on the beach

to clear her head and heart,
he returns with your favorite
crab sandwich from the place

next door to the place that
makes his favorite crab sammie,
and texts you on his way home,

“I have a crab sandwich for you.”
So you drive to his house
with jazz tunes bopping

around your brain after
an early evening show, and
there it is, your favorite

sammie, just for you, lovingly
encased in foil (just the
sandwich—he’s 86’d

the side of pickled carrots
you don’t love). And you are
once again so grateful for

this man, who gets you in
so many ways, who
demonstrates his deep

adoration (among other
ways) via sourdough
and crustacean,

which, on the first bite,
tingles your tastebuds
with yummy syncopation—

fascinating rhythm,
indeed.

In those long-ago days,
whenever possible, we lay
braided like eager wisteria
in spring, your leg around mine,
mine around yours, requiring
no little untangling should

one of us want to turn over
or rise. And then the other
would reach out with
come-back hands, and,
often without words, we’d
weave ourselves together
again.

Affairs of the heart
can ignite like that, and
while not my first, only
with you did I awaken
disoriented, tangled
in a fiery dream that
neither of us wanted
to extinguish.

I feared we’d burn so
ferociously that we would
crumble to ash, and in
that disintegration
I would not remember
you.

All meeting ends in parting,
said the Buddha.

Lying in your bed or mine,
face to face, you’d run your
hand down the curve of
my torso and hip,
promising the impossible:

I will remind you.

What if you don’t know
where I am? I’d ask, with a
foresight that seared me.

And you would assure me,
I will find you in this life or the next.
I will always find you.

I didn’t say, Even if we end up
with others? Even if we die?

Because romantic me wanted
to believe that somehow,
eons afterward, we could
return to that state of
green love, raw and crisp,
even if it exists only in other
existences yet to come.

And all these decades later,
in dreams, I find myself
half-hoping that parting
might end in meeting,
that each of us still carries
an ancient, tiny spark,

which, on a breath,
in a future lifetime,
a fresh lifespace,
might one day rise
and warm us again.

(for The Burns Sisters)

Shelley and three of her four sisters—
Susan, Sally and Sherri—sang together
and began performing as little girls,

and The Burns Sisters were born.
(The musical act, that is.) As teens,
the “vocal darlings” toured in their

cute minidresses, and, ever after,
Shelley’s been singing jazz and
teaching jazz and living jazz.

I know her as the delightful human/
exercise goddess who makes moving
fun on Tuesday mornings, but now

I can die happy because I got to see
all five Burns Sisters take the stage
for a rare performance,

singing one of my favorite songs
as a kid that spun on a 45 on my little
red and white record player:

Lollipop, lollipop
Oh, lolli, lolli, lolli
Lollipop, lollipop
Oh, lolli, lolli, lolli
Lollipop, lollipop
Oh, lolli, lolli, lolli
Lollipop (pop)
Bobom, bom, bom

Shelley providing the cheek pop alongside
sisters Susan, Sally, Sherri and Shauna,
all of them singing together in the ’50s,

now singing ’50s tunes in the ’20s—
the 2020s, that is. And as I listened to
their voices swirl on “You Belong to Me,”

I thought, not for the first time,
that sisters are the best—
there were never such devoted sisters—

harmonizing throughout their lives.
Look at them up there, singing
their sweet hearts out:

All I want is loving you
and music! music! music!

•••

Listen to Jo Stafford, who popularized “You Belong To Me” in 1952. sing here.

Listen to Teresa Brewer, who popularized “Music! Music! Music!” in 1950, sing here.

I love when, on my daily walks—
at least I try to make them daily—
the universe lobs a challenge

at me. Today so many younger
women, striding by—slim, fit,
full of so many years to come.

Without a sound, little Envy
climbs greenly onto my shoulder,
whispering, That was once you.

This is what my grandmother
meant when she said, You have
so much life ahead of you.

I hope, of course, for a good long
stay on the planet, but I know this well
given the size of my years:

We are not assured of another day.
Every time I see that woman—in my
mind, she is always the same woman—

I nudge Envy off my shoulder, pull up
Admiration, a kinder being, and,
with my older-but-not-super-old,

still-puttering-along heart, wish
that marvelous woman so much good
stretching ahead on her path,

the one she’s walking into
the right now.

For Roger E. Haag (Aug. 2, 1930–Oct. 8, 2004)

Every time I’m in his garage,
I’m searching for my father,
20 years gone today,

though I know his essence
remains tucked into every old
Skippy peanut butter jar shelved

in the sagging wooden cabinet.
He’s in there with the screws
and nuts, with bolts ranging

from tiny to so big that they
once ringed my small fingers,
a treasure trove guarded

by loyal soldiers still standing
at attention in precise rows.
Tough-to-open metal lids,

rusty and dusty, crown each
jar. I apply all my oomph,
as he would say, to open one,

and, before my fingers dive in
to explore the treasures inside,
retrieve just what I need,

I inhale him, long encased,
a little genie of a handy man,
a father waiting to be released.