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My sanity is borne on rivers,
meandering;
yet rivers know their course,
an end predestined,
not assured,
or not predestined but assured;
and yet in cities they are still, the same.
Four rivers, then; four that define
the cities where I loved them; for I know
I may be smoothed and worn, but I am coarse
like the stubble that scratches where I kiss,
and wakes the baby.

I

The first is Graytown, call it Dixon, home: the Rock; my namesake,
where I grew, a tribute to the old frontier, a ferry town, downtown
a treasure trove where library, and toys, and park were found—
the ground divided by the trains, the viaducts,
cut stone, old money, and the work gone elsewhere:
the trains cut past the river, and the trestle
(standing still, between downriver and the dam,
and parallel two bridges that connect
the bustle and the hassle of downtown)
inspired dreams and horror, like the quarry
every year some swam through, dived and drowned.
The dam, too, drew some fools to glory and disaster,
in canoes; I fished with dad, or restlessly
skipped stones to drive the fish away, impatient
for their biting, though mosquitoes
found dinner soon enough; and later, fireworks,
photography on riverbanks, a steady hand
required and found at last, though better film
had left a better picture; and poems, sitting, walking,
thinking with the churn
whose soundless noise, the sheer pent foaming force,
seemed symbol of itself enough for me; seen steaming from the pool
where last I battled asthma, living low
like catfish on the bottom.

II

The next the Seine, though also Tiber, Thames,
The Rhone and Rhine, and even Danube’s waltz,
The Riviera, Venice—yet the Seine,
Through Paris, near the cathedral, the lady
blushing at the tourist’s eyes
beneath far-off Montmartre et Sacre Coeur;
and wandering through museums on Le Tour, a little joke,
like gypsy wristbands for the special few,
the price of taxis, or the thought of you: Near here
(where sketches can be bought from bins
unfolded from their crates on market day,
by starving artists’ friends, who make it pay)
I pause to write a poem, but I find
You’ve slipped away: the river has concealed
What I had meant to find, and come back healed,
The remedy for sonnets in my mind. I find
no less enchanting what you’ve sent, whoever you
may be, from where you’ve come from, for the Seine
like fishing skeins thrown wide draws well, and broadly, and here we
may rest, anonymous, still silent through the dusk, awake
at dawn to see the streets washed clean,
the city yet
just baking.

III

The next is not a river, but the straits
the great Pacific enters violently,
and passage hewn by force cuts land and sea—
the bridge above, the tunnel down beneath, the ships
that pass, the ferry that conveyed
our joys to home, our hopes
to trains or stores, from shores
where banked up in the pilings they had longed
for something stretchier, something from home:
something of salt or cheese, no fish, no need
explaining how we loved the fugu, or could eat
sashimi, nori, or a thousand things
that spawned expensive pizza
and the whaleburger.
Some side street glance of violet on the way,
perhaps in time sakura in the air,
though likely wind and rain,
humidity,
or heat that made the longing nearly melt,
or take the bus, instead of bike, today,
and pass Akama Jingu—
painted red
by ghosts of long ago
still live today,
though sighed at in sobriety; yet living here
expect to see them pray,
your friends to pay
with all the others homage to the princess, sword,
and gem, and infant life,
here lost to keep the line intact, the battle ending
in despair for all, and dives
where drunken businessmen recount the tales
they’ve left to them, and call
their chat-friends—these still try
pretending they have hope that what we teach
can help them find a future, but they know
what we can only guess at,
seeking each.

IV

lux aeterna! luceat eis!—Then the angel showed me the river
of the water of life,
as clear as crystal, and flowing
from the throne of God,
and of the Lamb laid down
for our sins and for our lives—I borrow
borrowed words, remembering, in hope,
the premiere of a requiem:
before Japan, before the Brazos,
long before the Tiber and the Rhone,
we sang: my friend had called us, for the time,
his time, recital, and his friend
had finished just two movements, and we sang:
We were not brilliant, and we were
illumined, and inspiring all we sang the river
glorious, and the light, and peace, and nothing
more than this: to see the face
escaping us, though present, here in this,
the river, singing, waves, the sound of trains,
alive, the death of sister, apple trees, the rains
of tears and monsoon, sleeping and the race
to take a present hidden Christmas Eve,
or turn on our cartoons;
awaking to Bugs Bunny,
Valkyries,
and something more that calls to us at last.

PGE 12-13-2008

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 16th, 2008 at 12:50 pm and is filed under poetry.