Poems by Richard St. Clair
HAIKU
no conversation . . .
just the winter ocean surf
heard beyond the dunes
soldier's funeral
a steady gust of March wind
tears at the colors
katydid rhythm
joining the evening chanting
of the Buddhist monk
the dog thinks she helps
by foraging with her nose’Äî
mushroom gathering
just introduced and
not knowing whether to kiss’Äî
New Year's Eve party
reflecting sunset,
the placid winter ocean
looks as though it's warm
lightly falling snow . . .
all quiet on New Year's Eve
in the hobos' camp
old romance novel
reading for a chilly night . . .
dying embers
straightening the nets . . .
the bat makes a nighttime pest
for the fishermen
stopping forbidden
by the side of the turnpike:
herons' nesting pond
pigeons standing still . . .
their heads bobbing right and left
in early spring sun
cloudy winter sky’Äî
circling seagulls snapped away
by a sudden gust
railroad station pit
suspended in an updraft
a dead leaf twitches
scent of hyacinths’Äî
gentle talk in therapy
by the flower pot
autumn graveyard mist . . .
sparrow atop the gravestone
eyes me then flies off
gusting winter wind . . .
small buddha in the front yard
scarf around his neck
midnight chill’Äî
someone rifling through the trash
for bottles and cans
summer butterfly
flitting across my path and
into the dark woods
lightly falling snow
in the road a crow pecking
at a mashed pumpkin
Indian summer:
the roses on the branches
smelling like roses
a chill wind’Äî
the Jack-o'-lantern's teeth
melting to mush
a morning walk;
rose blossoms half-buried
in early snow
New Year's Eve:
heavy clouds have settled
over the quiet city
a cold winter night;
the Hunter's belt pointing
to a million stars
low hanging clouds’Äî
a crow making lazy eights
in the wintry calm
moonlight on the pond;
in the cold of winter
nothing moves
a wisp of cloud
floating across the moon’Äî
cold returns
in the still of night
the moon is gone from the sky’Äî
only my heart beating
the evening cool wafts
in through the open window’Äî
the alley cat's mewling
in the small forest
the smell of rotting wood’Äî
autumn sunshine
almost colliding,
a white autumn butterfly
and a falling leaf
sunrise;
across the muddy path
a beetle struggles
wanting to hug it,
the big retriever
with fleas
gift of a worm:
the robin's full-size offspring
can,t swallow it all
twilight adagio . . .
moving through the ocean fog
cranberry workers
therapist's office . . .
noticing the withering
poinsettia leaves
opening the door’Äî
the scented breeze quickly gone
in the old outhouse
sudden autumn storm:
dog and master's frisbee game
goes on anyway
their master's cigar’Äî
little puppies on a leash
taking turns sniffing
behind the garage
March wind making dust devils
out of old cobwebs
distant rocky shore
softened by the ocean fog . . .
sand-dollar hunting
fighting the March wind
pedestrians barely miss
the limping pigeon
snow become sleet...
a piece of ice
blown into my eye
on the stucco wall
mona lisa painted
in dark glasses
the bright sun...
yesterday's snow
melting into icicles
alone
in the clinic waiting room . . .
giant fern by the window
sheets of ice
on the Charles River
ducks floating on the melt-water
ROUND
While I wait I wonder.
While I wonder I dream.
While I dream I grow.
While I grow I waken.
While I waken I wonder.
Da capo e senza fine.
INSIDE AN ETCHING
Fog does the most interesting things
to the most pedestrian scenes
It is a rarity here
perhaps that is why when it comes
it gilds reality with an awesome tone
and turns the view outdoors
into a photographic essay
The screen window of this room
is a permanent fixture, a mesh
which filters everything outside through itself--
the few cars in the parking lot
the pair of trees in silhouette
and the evergreen outside the window
The lingering patches of snow
that should be prospering
merely linger here in this
not-quite-sempiternal but sodden
mid-January spring,
tinged with an odd effect
that blocks everything beyond it:
I can only guess what the fog hides,
an even remoter ground of nothingness
could be a road or a river,
a yard in which nothing moves
and only a distant crow calls
A car starts up
and breaks the moire
of mood and motionless matte
the host says good morning
and my vision is grounded
It was a perfect vision,
living inside an etching
for a while
THE POND
There is a pond
outside this house
and other worlds
I cannot grasp
or touch or see
people too kind or cruel
to make any sense to me:
I'll stay put for now.
I could trespass
and walk around the pond
and see it from the other side,
see the house I'm now inside,
but as for those other worlds
I can wait to find bridges to them
if the need should arise.
The pond soothes me
dumbly reassuring me
that I don't need to go beyond it
for today
NAVIGATING
Feeling my way
across the lake without a map
is like
singing words without music
is like
chanting aloud how this world is
one vast nest of sorrowing
with only little oases of joy
sprinkled here and there.
Riding the current
and looking down
I see pebbles at the bottom,
the dripping tears
locked inside me for years
that dried to rock
and sunk to the lake bed.
"Run, do not cry,
sweet little one,
it never was your home:
do you not know it?
you have been cast off
from their fears,
and now
you have to find
your own."
Every atom has a place in the cosmos,
Every rock
comes out
at night
to sing.
NIGHT FLOWER
What is it I have learned
from the sky
I have not learned already
from the earth?
What is it I have learned
from the bird
I have not learned already
from the flower?
What is it I have learned
from the day
I have not learned already
from the night?
REVOLUTION, RESOLUTION, REVELATION
A Sestina
Knowledge sweeps our mysteries away,
disproves attractive theories left and right;
it undermines the grounds for firm belief,
impoverishes the visions and the dreams,
deflates pretense, cut arrogance to size,
and tempts us deeper into all these vices.
I cannot think of any better vices
than those which carry ignorance away,
confounding fraudulence of any size
and bigotry of any shape. How right
it is that we should reach for sweeter dreams
and not be addled by inane belief!
And what is more inane than that belief
which sanctions, succors and defends the vices
of the ignorant, perverts the dreams
of minds which live in fear and run away
from what they need and ought to have by right
and only lack through small ambition's size?
The restless wishing to ascend should size
their chances up, examine their belief,
respect the bounds of reasoned wrong and right,
rebuke their foibles, minimize their vices,
sweep their self-defeating pride away
and build fresh schools for climbing to their dreams.
What choices, when informed, our vaunting dreams
present us with, promethean, with a size
of vast dimension in their sights. Away,
I say, with rancid obsolete belief!
Risk more, lest we ourselves succumb to vices
by our sloth: To err's our well-worn right.
