Poetry

This train is bound for glory, this train . . . comes in the voices of fellowship from the Holiness Refuge Tabernacle on the Hill. Rooted in a road-side gully, a salt-loving wild morning glory has set out bearing crimson … Continue reading →

 -Catalpa speciosa -March 26, 1951 How long have they idled, motor throttled down, off the two-track, at rest on snow-crust in his ’47 Dodge, its chrome bumper, its yellow fog lamps, facing the catalpa tree, the heater madly whirring against … Continue reading →

We are driving through our laments for what this town has become, almost lost though we turn routes so familiar I hardly need to steer. The clubs gutted to build shops and chain restaurants, the all-night diner where I once … Continue reading →

But there is no crash or shatter. Only a hush, a slow rousing, the eider ducks’ merest mutterings. Light seeps into the sky as though leaking from unfurled fingers, and here, delivered on an open palm, the bay against the … Continue reading →

. . . if I find your grief exceeds due measure I shall be more greatly distressed than by the misfortune itself.    — Plutarch Upon learning of Timoxena’s death, unable to write her name until late in his letter, … Continue reading →

Yesterday afternoon, my wife taught me blueberry plants come with all the parts they need to bear fruit, both male and female. To get one full of berries, though, you need to plant it right next to some blueberries from … Continue reading →

As if the heart had turned coat and fisted herself into a knot, tightwadding breath, blocking off thought and the light in the kitchen, the road to the daughter’s house just down the way and the whole of the soft, … Continue reading →

I live beneath the hawk untouched and bare, but sometimes it descends determined, wings spread. Today I cut through a parking lot to follow it, walked along the pines beyond my neighborhood. I took my camera there. It was as … Continue reading →

Standish sacked Merrymount and drove the heathens out. Not to be outdone, Endicott the iconoclast came for the crumbs, leveling what was left of a maypole on its hill. I remember in darksome Devonshire many a maid in May wound … Continue reading →

Mr. Warham’s first sea storm I sat with him in his chambers. We read together the Psalm about them that go down to the sea in ships. He was far he said, looking green, from having list to sleep with … Continue reading →