"FROM MY OWN MARGINS"

 

"FROM MY OWN MARGINS"

                --for Geoffrey Hill

Ingenuity

Of unreconciled oppressed

Never dreaded truth

Jim Bodeen

28 February 2022

EPHIPHANY'S END

 

EPIPHANY’S END

Fall line beacon-fate

Takes us mountain dancing down

Sunlight shadow shunt

Jim Bodeen

27 February 2022

DOUBLED-UP HIGH CAMP TANKA

 

DOUBLED-UP HIGH CAMP TANKA

        --for Katie

Layers of face mask

frozen flexibility

Katie down fall line

Skis find fall line on their own

Turn over sun apple cloud

*

Snow-dusted alpines

Almond-shaped black fingernails

Orange fresh nobility

Russian sastrugi sandwich

Honey Camp and high sugar

24 February 2022

TWICE PREPARED BEAUTY WORKOUT TALK

 

TWICE PREPARED BEAUTY WORKOUT TALK

            --for Vonnie Johnson

He will call you back

He might know what he’s doing

Time to tumble turn

Turn time around little book

His sister walks across hot coals

*

Snow melt leaves snow mold

She brings back some Chekhov tales

Flat thatch muscle rake

Get your hands lower on rake

Forsaking mountain breath prayers

Jim Bodeen

19 February 2022

anamnesis

 

anamnesis

          You’re having a breakdown,

          but never mind. We’ll go

           to the doctor right now.

             --the medic, Chekhov

While coffee brews,

I read headlines in the paper,

pour half a cup

interrupting the inner-action

of water and bean

turn towards my studio

carrying the paper

setting it on the floor

by the butterscotch

chair, opening stories

of Chekhov, where

for three days

I've been reading

The Breakdown, each

time, interrupted

by whom, if not

God? Resuming

still early

the only way

I'll ever know,

remembering,

remembering

and looking up words

Jim Bodeen

12 February 2022

FEBRUARY LISTENING WALK

 

AFTER WALKING WITH KAREN IN FEBRUARY

                     for Rex DeLoney

Not everyone

who sings Coltrane’s love supreme

hears Coltrane’s love march

Jim Bodeen

7 February 2022

SILVER BLUE SKY ON SKIS

 

SILVER BLUE SKY ON SKIS

Three times I returned

ducking under frozen ropes

Those three trees are gone

Jim Bodeen

3 February 2021

THESE ARE THE GOAT ROCKS

 *

These are the Goat Rocks

Light changes as you break lines

present to the poem

Jim Bodeen

3 February 2022