Aphiemi

TAKING UP WHERE THE DREAM LEFT OFF

Morning sun coming through green leaves

of the Walking Stick Tree, backlit

and sunlight stunning. News from the poems

take me out of myself, while I wait

for Karen to join me on the porch.

She’s gone for the next two days,

quilting landscape with an artist

who teaches blind children.

Last night Karen showed me

images of quilts

she took with the camera on her IPhone.

Barn and mailbox. The quilted sky

I mistake for a mountain range.

This is Karen mapping her way

from the garden, out of West Valley

through the eye of the needle.

She’s going through Ukiah

carrying her own material,

along with tulle, a soft cloth,

finer than netting, toning and disappearing,

foot peddling images of painted hills.

Jim Bodeen

19 May 2016

TURN THAT SUN AROUND

            for Dean Stewart

Front porch morning sun

after tacos with lime-garlic

marinade on grill.

                             Last night

late night meal.

Dean and Gretchen.

Gretchen brings a salad

with more stuff than one

can fold into a burrito.

Gretchen likes the stones

in the garden more than the trees

and it warms my Hank Williams heart.

So do I love those river stones

shaped by time, older than any tree.

Those same trees doing what they can

to save us all.

                        Saying good night

in the driveway Dean giving me

that Greek word for forgiveness

which I leave a space for in this poem,

writing him for it.

                                         By noon

this morning’s so far gone

I remember nothing

that has anything to do with sunrise,

the hole for forgiveness

in this poem the one thing

I have left to cling to.

Under a weeping birch tree

Lou Reed sings clear

in the year of his passing.

It’s a temporary thing, he sings,

Keep singing, Lou, I say,

Keep singing, waiting for the word,

and it arrives in the mail,

in time, Dean’s letter: 

transliterated,

aphiemi

(or af-ff-A-me).

And it is the typical word

used for forgiveness

in the New Testament.

                                          

            It has several uses/

translations: Send away,

            let go    dismiss   forgive

The question: let go of what?

            What does forgiveness do?

For the effect:    take what was separation—

            remove it.        Let it go.

Start again without separation

            the forgiver

                        lets go of the advantage

Lucky man      temporary as the song     as eternal

A pastor’s etymology—

Word  in time

Finds the whole in heart

Jim Bodeen

20 April—19 May 2016

WAIT

Other things.

Other things.

Too much water

on a Shimpaku Juniper

and it goes anaerobic.

A new leaf uncoiling

like silk from Karen’s studio,

on the Half Moon Maple—

as if, as if it’s beauty

stopping me.

Jim Bodeen

18 May 2016