City

The Olympics
crystal
bright
in the morning light
on the western
horizon
behind tall,
red
harbor cranes

(trains)

Steam plumes
from stacks
beside harbored ships, 
swarms of gulls
above stacked
containers. The daily
ride into the city
past warehouse decks, 
tarmacs, 
skyscrapers ablaze
on the skyline.
(Sanctuary
for resistance)

Strangers

“Both strangers
and beggars
are from the gods,”
sang Homer:
the rites
of hospitality
in inhospitable
worlds.

(estrangements)

“Strangers
were found
in places
where the presence
of strangers
had previously
been unsuspected:
the process. . .
undid
the familiar.”
Foucault.
We’ve turned
everyone
into strangers
denying
the gods.

Tarmacs

Sunlight
filtered through
fir boughs
and bare
limbs. Morning
shadows
on the winter lawns.
Take
a breath.

Pause.

No longer
the hope
that we claimed
to be. Dreams
shatter
on the tarmac.
Everything
feels smaller
somehow.
The pale sunlight
fades
as clouds
return. As always,
the rain.

Closed Borders

Nothing
crosses the borders
of your closed
mind.
Drapes are shut
fearing
the view
from the window

contradict

illusions.
You are small
and afraid
behind too big
a desk.
The world outside
can die
at the foot of your wall.
You will deny
even
the bones.

Outrages

Frost
that melts
as soon
as the sun
touches
(a few
white patches
lingering
in shadow)

Outrages

These days 
in which we live,
beyond anger.
The last requirement:
to deny
what you see:
the moon
is the sun
and the sun
will never
rise.

January 25, 26

*
Rain 
has embraced
this city again.
You wonder 
what she sees 
in these streets.
Wet 
sidewalks
glistening.

(Sanctuary)

Rain
murmuring 
down drains, 
caressing windshields
of stopped cars, 
red light
smeared like blood 
on black 
pavement.
Undocumented,
but fresh, 
she gives
the city
life.

*
When we walked
just beyond
the breakers fall, 
the blue
and clouds
painted
on slate sands 
(sandpipers)

(gulls)

(((so much more
than I
ever hoped,
you) a world
that is,
perhaps,
less) still,
this day
with its memories
of salt spray
and moving
skies)

January 23, 24

*
Gulls float,
mirrored
and remirrored
between
bank towers,
(captains
of capitalism)
banking
away—
beneath
high 
thin cirrus

(habitual)

The commute,
a mobius loop,
home to work
to (the question
is 
one of action,
or escape
from perpetual
inaction)
The question
is


*
Steam flows
down
from a chimney
drifts across
a rooftop.
Construction cranes
tower above 
the city.
Crows.

Colder

than it will be
(warming world)
(let it bake:
their policy--
let the tides 
wash
through Miami’s
streets.)
Sludge from pipelines
plopping
into streams.

January 21, 22

*
2 eagles overhead
raise cheers
from the gathered
crowd, now
that the day
of reassessment
is come

(auspicious)

If millions flood
the streets,
surely
some debris 
will be washed
away;
if millions shout
surely
someone hears
(and cannot
deny)


*
The air is still,
but heavy.
The gray firs
are hushed
their limbs
un-
moving.
Burden
of sky.

(weighted)

That there are
no
“alternative facts.”
The tactic is
delegitimize 
and lie;
that with each
morning
they’d erase
the previous
night

January 19, 20

*
The day before
the day
in which all our beginnings
end (cryptic
disclosures (encrypted
answers))
(tea leaves.)

Prognostications.

So many words
spill like blood on the ground.
You have talked
until you are empty,
a wordless
ghost.


*
“that
every poem
has a 20th of January”
What do the augurs 
see
in the gathering
crows?

Inauspicious:

bare trees
and drooping hemlocks
weep 
against the sky,
gray, 
expecting rain.
This date will be etched
in grave stones.

January 17, 18

*
Building space stations,
you cannot 
take for granted
anything,
for instance,
air--
(the void pressing 
against us)

(avoidance)

Rain beaded on window glass
looking out at a city,
two dimensional,
against a flat gray sky.

*
On thin ice--
the trend
is disturbing
(but they will not
let it disturb
their profits)
(gulls

ghosting)

Rain whipped
through cottonwood,
cedar and fir.
Storm off the Pacific.
(Denier in chief)
Tree limbs sighing,
moaning.

January 15, 16

*
We may not yet be
beyond
history:
nothing moves
in blue skies.
The fir trees
are still.

Expectancies

A certain 
dread
of the approaching moment.
Boot treads crush
the brittle ice.
Your word.

*
The wounds of history
still ache
in the cold.
Our bodies
bear the memory
of each bruise.

Despite

or however much
we choose
to forget.  “Hatred
does not conquer 
hatred”
(before the coming
rain)

January 13, 14

*
What appeal
to re-
peal? Sun
on snow.
(Little songs bound
and on the way)
ice
crystals
glitter

(collusions)

Beyond the white
tufted fields
and trees,
the cold horizons
of willful
ignorance

*
A man without decency,
in the clear,
cold
light of day.
(bloodstains
on the bridge
to Selma)

Speak:

“find a way
to get in the way”
breath
condensing
in the frozen
air

January 11, 12

*
Among trees, 
standing waters
gray with ice, 
edges laced white.
Crows gathering at twilight.
Moonlight 
on 
snow. 

Winter

Face to the wind.
There are beauties
that freeze 
the heart.


*
At last, 
all we confirm
are our fears--
bundled against the blue ice
of these clear skies.

(if

(what can compromise
one who
has no shame?))
I dream of summer.

Poems January 9, 10

*
Moonlight 
smeared on a thin layer of cloud.
The unvetted ghosts
that haunt the night.
(hypocritical oath)

Snow

in my dreams, adrift:
whitening convolutions
in my brain


*
Not that we are likely
to fare
well:  "Against 
the insidious wiles
of foreign influence
(I conjure. . .)”

(partisan) 

“A uniform vigilance
to prevent
its bursting
into
flame”

January 6. 7th, 8th

*
Matrix of concerns:
incursion denials  hubris
nondisclosure indiscretion  hubris
or
“there is an old proverb
among men. . .”

Listen:

(porch chimes tune
the cold wind)

*
Iced gravel
along the edges of the river:
this is where the crows
gather all at dusk

Twilight.

The river swirls,
even past any hope.

*
That they have
plagiarized
their beliefs
(or that there’s this moment
of stillness between
gusts of wind)

(breathless)

Some mornings bring
only paler shades
of gray. 

Poems January 3, 4, 5

*
Hold back
(none
immune)
if you were to apply
Actual Intelligence--
tracing the florals
in the frost.

Dawn

(when stars fall.)

*
Truth of place: ethical inaction--
so many pigeons dart overhead 
and then settle, 
weighing down the power lines

Better

not to feed them

*
Sun 
without heat.
You witness an event
that never occurred.
(that season
in which viruses
are spread)

Gleam:

new ice
in car headlights.

Introduction

Perhaps we may say that every poem has its “20th of January” inscribed? Perhaps what’s new for a poem written today is just this: that here the attempt is clearest to remain mindful of such dates? But don’t we all date from such dates? And what dates do we ascribe ourselves to?

Paul Celan, “Meridian.” Translated by John Flestiner.

I have been writing a poem a day. The poems reflect the events of the time--the date itself is written into their structure. I will post several in groups to catch up with the current date, and then each day I will post the day's poem.

Here are the first two for January first and second

*
Discord
into chords:
harmony unlikely
this
civil year. You can
pass through a door
in either direction.

(snow)

(silence)


*
The first day
after the
(arbitrary)
first day.
Snow lines upper branches.
Sky cover blue.
So
cold.

Mockery

spur resistance