Güd wrtr

Right in front of the birdbath
in the front yard of my mother’s house,
the old concrete bowl still firmly

attached to its pedestal with a
now-detached little bird that rests
on its side. I refill the birdbath,

as my father did, as my mother did,
as my sister and brother-in-law have,
when I hand water the geraniums

under the kitchen window, when I turn
to squirt the towering azaleas that my
mother planted nearly sixty years ago.

Peter—the next door neighbor who
transitioned not long ago into what
we hope is his next incarnation—

told my mother that deer bedded
down at night in the thicket at the
bottom of their adjoining back yards.

And more than once, hose in hand,
I’ve stopped watering as a pair of does
has crossed the wide expanse

of lawn, in transit to the next place,
wherever that might be.
My sister and brother-in-law saw

the buck yesterday, stately and
watchful, in the front yard. They
stopped the car before pulling

into the driveway, took photos
as he stared at them. Is he
a neighbor? A spirit guide?

The gift of a wild life to remind
us of our own wild lives? Here’s
to the temporary ones that we

cherish all the more for their
here-and-gone-ness, which offer
us such opportunities for wonder,

moments of unexpected beauty,
before disappearing into
the who knows where.

(for Terri Wolf in Port Ludlow, Washington)

In the midst of our online chat,
Terri abruptly said, “A bird just
slammed into the glass”—the large
picture window over her desk
out of which she beholds stately
pines marching downhill to
the deep blue of the Hood Canal.

We sat at our respective machines
almost 800 miles apart editing
together a piece of her memoir
about working in the chemo suite
early in her nursing career, both
of us left a bit teary by stories
of patients out of options,
near death, when… bam!

Had a life ended in that moment,
literally before her eyes? Terri
got up to look. “It’s lying there,
face up,” she said, both of us
thinking, oh, dear. “Maybe I
should go turn it over.”

And, grabbing a tissue, the nurse
opened the sliding glass door
door to see what she might do
for a small brown patient. “A finch?”
I guessed, having sat on that deck
in the hot tub watching a small
flotilla flock to the feeders.

Terri gently flipped the finch and
returned, both of us turning back
to the task at hand, pausing a couple
more times as she checked on the birdie.
After several minutes she reported,
“It’s sitting up!” and I cheered.

Hours later, when she texted,
“No bird on the deck this evening.
Hopefully, it flew away… ,” I thought,
not for the first time, that hope,
that thing with feathers, was what
she tried to bring to every patient,
scared and sick in her care, even on
her busiest days.

So often all we can do is offer
a gentle hand to those knocked down
by what they couldn’t see coming,
perhaps help them turn over,
then be delighted when they sit up
on their own, stunned, but still
somehow amazingly, blessedly
alive.

In the nail salon, she’s
manicuring for the big day
tomorrow, getting married
in a friend’s lovely yard,
the young woman whose
hands are currently being held
by a blue-gloved woman
filing newly applied
French tips.

I overhear the story—
about 30 guests, plenty
of parking in the neighborhood,
neighbors making space
for the celebrants, catered
by a pizza guy in a food truck.

Honeymoon? asks the manicurist.
Maybe next year, says the bride.
It’s been a big year, buying a house,
getting married.

And that’s when you drop in,
your big hand landing on
my shoulder (like us!),
your smile caressing my lips.

Four decades melt away
like the knots in my calves
after Eric has massaged them
into jelly, the pedicurist now
dabbing rosy polka dots
at the ends of my toes.

You had good hands, too,
my dear, when you had hands
and a body to carry them.
You’d have liked a pizza truck,
too, as I imagine her groom will.

And the bride, silent now,
looking into the distance,
must be reviewing all the
still-must-be-dones on her
to-do list before she rises
to wash her hands and
head into—

“oh, please let it be,”
you and I whisper together—

the rest of her joy-filled,
married life.

Every leaf fall is a letting go,
the death of the once-verdant,
wishing that it might hang on
forever to the branch from
which it sprang.

As the autumnal equinox creeps
up on us, the dying has begun.
Dog days have consumed spring’s
green gift and summer’s ripening.

The tiny blossoms on the fuchsia
by the driveway have shriveled;
their delicate green stems morphing
into brittle webs, even as the heat
nudges the last roses into explosive
blooms, and the bees, clearly not done
with their work, keep coming.

Here’s the thing:

There is no end, though we resist
the falling away. As if we have
anything to say about it. As if
we can stay forever. As if we can
keep anyone or anything with us
as long as we want them to be.

But just wait, the dog days whisper.
The inventions of a new season
will emerge, just as the just-right
people will appear—possibly with
friendly dogs ready to offer
love in the form of a doglick—

without our ever having to ask.

Like plucking fat blackberries off
a still-loaded bush in September,
putting most into a dented colander
to take inside to someone you love,
who could use some sweetness
on the tongue,

mindful to pop one into your own
eager mouth, too, here and there,
greedily licking your stained fingers,
knowing this short season is
passing quickly,

that it won’t come again like this,
that you’ll never pick blackberries
on another summer afternoon
without thinking of this—

wondering if she’ll awaken when
you bring her a berry, if she’ll
be able to let it melt in her swollen
mouth, swallow a flavor she once
loved, remembering cobblers she
cobbled together with her capable
hands,

baked to bubbling perfection
and served to people like you,
beloveds all, tending her
in the now of this sweet
moment.

How different it looks,
day to night, night to day,
as I see it for myself

for the first time, the tall
spire arrowing into the sky,
a iron-and-steel tribute

to what was that awful
year when you disappeared
in a whoosh six months

before the planes took
their tragic dives here
and in two other places

burned forever into our
collective memory—
as you are in mine,

standing tall, gleaming
in sun, glowing with
an unearthly light

at night, reminders of
how it used to be
when we used to be

us.

Is not octopi.
It’s octopuses.

Because you can’t stick a Latin ending
on a Greek word,
and octopus is as Greek as Achilles,

oktṓpous, the singular creature, and
oktṓpodes amounting to more than one
of the cephalopods,

whose very name translates to “eight legs,”
though the creature possesses a beak like a parrot,
injects venom like a snake and spouts ink

like an old-fashioned pen. A single octopus
can weigh as much as a man, stretch as long as a car
and somehow squeeze its baggy, boneless body

through an orange-sized opening. And while
elusive in the wild, master hiders that they are,
I stand transfixed before the glass where

I watch a young female octopus in temporary
residence in a small aquarium. She tucks
herself away here, too, and I cannot blame her.

She did not apply for this position. But she,
who can taste with her skin, whose mouths
ride in her armpits, who is as smart as any

dolphin or whale, captivates me with two
long, floating arms, the translucent suckers
like so much body art adorning her. I squeak

when one of her eyes opens, imagine that
she sees me fangirling her, the saltwater star,
wondering if she’s as curious about me

as I am about her—pearly smooth in her
creamy outfit, soft bodied and relaxed
before she is returned to her native

waters just outside these walls, for
which I am glad. No one should have to
live away from home for too long.

I wish her well, hope that she’s as happy
as a clam (bet she’s heard that one before),
watching her bubbles waft upward toward

the light, imagine her at home in the sea,
a sly hunter waiting—the picture of patience—
to make her long-armed move.

•••

With thanks to the astonishing writer Sy Montgomery for her classic book,
“The Soul of an Octopus,” which has taught millions like me about
these remarkable animals.

(for Curtis… and my mother)

It goes back to the college boyfriend
with the vision impairment who taught
me to always cap the toothpaste,
never to leave a clear glass in the sink,
and always tuck sharp knives into
the mini butcher block on the countertop
where they were less likely to do either
of us injury.

We used to joke that the mostly blind guy
could chop vegetables better and faster
than the nearsighted girl, whose fingers
bore telltale evidence of accidental
self-stabbings. No wonder the Girl
Scout leader gently removed that girl’s
whittling knife from her blood-spotted
hands—and didn’t give it back for years.

But the blind boyfriend had a sixth sense
for where things lay in space—the guy who
whipped down the bike trail on two fast
wheels—possessing a kind of radar that I
don’t and I so wish my mother did as
her sight dims.

He and I in those heady, early days of love
walked the fridge and cupboards after
trips to the store, making sure that he could
find things—which he did, often more easily
than I.

Now, almost a half century later, Mom
stands before her open fridge, blinded
by the light as she tries to discern honey
mustard from shapely bottles of electrolytes.
I walk the fridge with her, the two of us standing
there letting the cold out (which could get
you yelled at as a kid), as I point out three
containers of egg salad and one of tuna along
with the new salami and cheese packages
atop the cheese sticks of Colby jack.

Mom runs her hands over the just-brought-home
lunch leftovers in their traveling container,
as well as the circumference of the receptable
that shelters her special fruit—blueberries,
strawberries, bananas—that her favorite
restaurant assembles for her. She traces
outlines of small water bottles that sidle
up to Moscato chilling in thick glass.

And, when she’s committed to memory
the locations of the to-be-consumed,
she edges away from the chill and says,
That’s good. I’ve got it.

And I marvel again at the ability of these
beloveds who channel shapes into
visual memory, those who can’t see
the details of my face but who swear
they’d know me anywhere.

And I believe them.

Before you go,
let me do so again:

I love youI love youI love youI love you
I love youI love youI love youIloveyou.

(Je t’aime. Te quiero. Ti amo.
Aloha nui loa—all my love)

Thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou
Thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou.

(Muchas gracias. Arigato. Danke.
Mahalo nui loa—thank you very much)

You did good. You did great. You made me me.
You, dear teacherfriendsmentorparenthuman,
I can’t imagine this life without you.

I apologize for all that stuff I did/said/forgot to do/
promised to do/thought I had done/thoughtlessly did
or said. So sorry. Really.

I’m beyond grateful for all that you did in kindness,
and anything other than that has dissipated like
the kettle’s steam as it readies itself for tea.

Of course, I’ll miss you, whether for an hour or a lifetime.
Of course, I want to hear from you. Send me a postcard,
drop me a text, show up as a whisper in my head on
my next walk or in a dream, one in which I’ll
likely not remember what you said, just that
we were together, and we were happy to be
in each other’s company, which we are
all the time anyway, carrying you
in my heart as I do, sewn
into the very fabric
of me.

(for Catherine O’Brien)

On a hot Sacramento evening
you invited us to your backyard
for martinis and conversation—

something that even those of us
who don’t drink did not want to miss—
and thank goodness we didn’t,

for what a delight to sit with women
who gather weekly as Shelley works
us out, chatting and sampling goodies

under the big umbrella, mister misting,
when the accordion was mentioned.
And though you hadn’t played in

four or more years—in the before
times when some of our loved ones
were still themselves, before

illness and infirmity crept upon
them—you fetched your glossy
black and white instrument

and slid the old straps over your
shoulders. Your fingers found their
way to buttons and keys that hadn’t

known your touch in ages, sending
tunes bouncing through the air
like magic from one of the most

challenging of instruments.
My late aunt, an accordionist from
childhood, said it was like playing

a tiny piano with bagpipes
inside—with too many places to
put your fingers. And though

you stumbled and stopped and
swore, you kept playing at our
urging, we, your friends,

delighted by the sounds,
singing along—You are my
sunshine, my only sunshine.

We who have grown close
thanks to ones who can no
longer join us, we who’ve

spent so many mornings
exercising together—You make
me happy when skies are gray.

It’s true—you’ll never know,
dear ones, how much we’ve
come to love each other.

Please don’t take
my sunshine
away.