Charleston Rooftops

Everything that lifts into the air
has purpose: even the granite tipped war
monument rising above palmetto trees
points like an arrow toward the sun;
chimneys, stove pipes, weather vanes and steeples—
the flag at half mast, flapping in the wind.
Streets clog with memories of smoke tinged wind—
of a dark sky on fire fueling the air,
flames swirling around steeples,
and a harbor blocked by ships of war.
Cannons fired toward the ever present sun
until the avenues lined with oak trees
were abandoned, and the trees
thrust transcendent into the wind
reached like prayers toward the sun.
Odors of ruin and rot lingered in the air
above the streets emptied by war;
the bells silent in the steeples.

Beyond scaffold enshrouded steeples,
sunlight weaves through leaf-thick oak trees
now filled with blossom and song, though war
saturates the brick and memory of wind
spinning with salt through summer air
that simmers beneath the blood streaked sun.
Red runs through ribbons of sun
across the skyline and steeples
lifting off tin sloped roofs into air
filled with flowering trees.
Always the tireless ocean wind
ripples the worn-out flags of war.
The names of the enemy change, but war
is the inscrutable language spoken beneath this sun.
The flag at half-mast, stiffens in the wind.
Funeral bells sound from the steeples.
In the cemetery, beneath the oak trees,
taps linger on the broken air.
The sounds of war will rumble in the wind.
As steeple bells call through the sun filled air,
birds nest in trees twisting toward heaven.

**
Nothing Can Contain You
In memory of David Hilderbrand

Not the wreath woven from fresh flowers,
nor the photograph it rings. Not the calm
smile at the center. Not the messages
inscribed by the ones who loved you most.
Not your initials, nor the dates
marked in black lettering across the white
cross, planted behind the guard rail
at the edge of a Georgia highway—
the one perpetually filling with sunlight.
But birds….there should be birds.
Small and many. Birds that have just come
from the sea, which can’t be far. There should be
one for each year. They should descend in a rush
and surprise, and smother the small trees
growing in a line beyond the roadside
memorial. They should be white. And from
a distance, it would look like a line of crosses
trembling beneath a sky full of sadness, full of song.

**

Geography Of Home

Sudden winter rain a need like night
camellias that morning startling
a thing remembered how we fill
our days of ornaments
unwrapped and scattered across
the kitchen table chocolates
in a silver box from home wind
white and furious watching
the first hour of Fanny and Alexander
Christmas Eve snow falling candlelight
feast at the end of day a family
gathered and then, the stark unraveling
ice breaking on the river
beside the house children
shocked into submission
reality broken ever since

That night the voice on the phone
once held me steady
sometimes that is enough a man
with a full heart and stories
thick snow on a lake white breath
of horses small children digging
tunnels in the fields beside the house,
afternoons with an English novel or the film,
because he misses home, but won’t say
this is where he asked her
to marry him under the stars
a bottle of champagne wedged

in a snowbank as if songs were true
stories as if joy could be anything but
elusive promises made
before God sometimes
a sudden turn in one direction
or another eyes that meet
or do not across the bar
the risked kiss unbuckled belt
and so it goes a stranger
came out of his house
to speak to a woman this was
as calculated as a long voyage
shaving cream caught in his ear
this too was planned one thing
on his mind his stories as old as the sea—
the first stab to his heart
home on holiday leave that
night and the snow was falling
the girl’s hair was full of snow or stars
caught on their eyelashes and tears
he got down on his knees his uniform
shining buttons none of that mattered

he moved in we wore
the same size jeans we fit
like us no arguing with that
forget the world let us

be happy when we are happy
that story that stays with me
his submarine surfacing
into a swarm of monarchs
crossing the Atlantic mid-day
no clouds the wonder of it
so much sunlight with you
it was something like that
he said and then
a child conceived because
of me the memory of that
story not written anywhere.

**

Grief, the Color of Dahlias

On my mother’s first wedding anniversary alone
I walked through rows of flower stalls
in the outdoor market in Cuernavaca,
grabbing every color I can find spilling over
the tops of knee-high white plastic buckets,
until my arms were filled with blossoms
for my young widowed mother.
The chatter of the women selling flowers
hovered in the August heat like birdsong.
I didn’t understand a word, but I saw
how they hid their grief beneath layers
of cloth the color of dahlais. Each day
started in sun light and ended
with thick rain. It was the season.
That evening, my mother screamed
in the kitchen, when she saw the goat’s skull
floating in the soup pot on top of the stove.
It was louder than thunder crashing
down from the mountains outside the city;
the ones still covered in snow and the crumbling
remains of pyramids built by an Aztec King

**

Pine Pitch
For Jerry Smith

Clustered around the edges
of my father’s open grave,
the grown-ups lean into one
another like bunches of crows,
pressing their pale wet faces
against the emptiness
of the slate sky gathering
in the late winter wind.
The flapping minister’s robes
sound like sails unfurling
beside the coffin. It is
as if this man carries
the sea inside of him,
the way my father did.
Pine boughs cover the coffin.
Arranged like flowers from one
end to the other, they fill
the air with Christmas smells.
I think of my uncle, climbing
at dusk through falling snow
to do the one thing he could
still do for this man he loved
like a brother. I consider
the tenderness and courage
it must have taken to tear
the branches one by one,
from the mountainside. And how,
when his arms were full of pine,
he ran stumbling down
the trail he had made alone
through the woods. His hands covered
in dark patches of pitch
that stayed on his skin for days.