Nuclear Family Planning
Hear an audio version of this piece
Denial
One of the youngest of those on earth,
One of spring’s children
Plays in the litter of summer leaves,
Soft as yellow rose petals,
Fallen fans of the gingko,
Among the oldest of this family’s trees.
As a conifer, it will be the first to go
If holocaust happens.
But if I hold this boy, sheltered
down among the roots and grubs,
He may be the last.
And when we emerge
There will be no more leaves to play in,
But there may be grass
And a few cannibals from the insect world.
We’ll pretend it’s winter
Where the trees are bare, just for a minute.
And the lead above is a snow sky.
We will be the new pilgrims progressing
Without the trees and seeds and helping hands
For our first Thanksgiving.
We’ll make new myths: Phoenixes from charcoal.
Tales told by a second chancer,
Tunnel traveler, greeting glowheads
At the end, before melding with the light,
Sent back to earth, to mend the ‘lovers’ quarrel.’
There will be no second coming for the birds and bees.
Diversion
(to the Soprano of the Deller Consort)
If I were a man of romance,
I would be at your feet, lady.
Light lives in your face, glides in your hair.
You seem as far from me as your English sea,
though I was water born and am a woman like you.
But you…
You make me see why a war was waged for a fair maid.
When you sing snow waters flow cold over stones
to the place in me where the red bird seeks for seeds
And I forget that in this new war
we would have no more springs.
I know you.
You have my conwoman cousin’s eyes
And Cézanne’s sun peaches in your cheeks.
You are the ‘no, there could never be
a time on earth when we would never be.’
And I want to believe you.
Parade
Two prisoners are herded across the 5:00 News
(cinco de la tarde, the hour of the bull)
--soldiers whose shirts are pulled down
to pin their arms.
Clothes that once sheltered, now fettered them.
And they are bared to their small world
while a wider world watches.
--Boys, with smooth shoulders, as rounded as mine,
targets more for a kiss
(As Spender would say)
than a bullet.
Next in the news:
The head of state
did not show up for the annual military parade,
for the blades of, glades of guns pointed to the sky.
“An undisclosed sickness” rumors through the crowds,
twines around metal and stone.
He may be feeling after all his years, how hard life
sticks to the bones, that skin grows dry and paper thin,
offers little covering for within.
Sons and daughters can creep behind closed lids
even in sleep.
Emersion
Playing again with morning’s son
(I’m a child of late afternoon):
“Army.” He chooses and I agree
(I’ve never had the ROTC make a man out of me).
But after knocking over little green men,
I have to make them stand again.
Even pebble bombing talking ‘droids
Is too much for me.
I cry at fender benders, my bike or my car.
And I’ve seen skin parted to the muscle within
--externus vastus, internus vastus—
On an Uptown street, I’ve glimpsed faces dead already
Before they raised the gun or drew the knife.
I’ve lifted the kitten, back broken by our new custodian,
Said to be not all there.
I even feel the cold more now, at night.
“I can’t play army, “ I apologize. “It’s too real to me.”
“That’s ok.” He forgives me. “But we only kill bad guys.”
Not really. Not for real.
One of the youngest of those on earth,
One of spring’s children
Plays in the litter of summer leaves,
Soft as yellow rose petals,
Fallen fans of the gingko,
Among the oldest of this family’s trees.
As a conifer, it will be the first to go
If holocaust happens.
But if I hold this boy, sheltered
down among the roots and grubs,
He may be the last.
And when we emerge
There will be no more leaves to play in,
But there may be grass
And a few cannibals from the insect world.
We’ll pretend it’s winter
Where the trees are bare, just for a minute.
And the lead above is a snow sky.
We will be the new pilgrims progressing
Without the trees and seeds and helping hands
For our first Thanksgiving.
We’ll make new myths: Phoenixes from charcoal.
Tales told by a second chancer,
Tunnel traveler, greeting glowheads
At the end, before melding with the light,
Sent back to earth, to mend the ‘lovers’ quarrel.’
There will be no second coming for the birds and bees.
Diversion
(to the Soprano of the Deller Consort)
If I were a man of romance,
I would be at your feet, lady.
Light lives in your face, glides in your hair.
You seem as far from me as your English sea,
though I was water born and am a woman like you.
But you…
You make me see why a war was waged for a fair maid.
When you sing snow waters flow cold over stones
to the place in me where the red bird seeks for seeds
And I forget that in this new war
we would have no more springs.
I know you.
You have my conwoman cousin’s eyes
And Cézanne’s sun peaches in your cheeks.
You are the ‘no, there could never be
a time on earth when we would never be.’
And I want to believe you.
Parade
Two prisoners are herded across the 5:00 News
(cinco de la tarde, the hour of the bull)
--soldiers whose shirts are pulled down
to pin their arms.
Clothes that once sheltered, now fettered them.
And they are bared to their small world
while a wider world watches.
--Boys, with smooth shoulders, as rounded as mine,
targets more for a kiss
(As Spender would say)
than a bullet.
Next in the news:
The head of state
did not show up for the annual military parade,
for the blades of, glades of guns pointed to the sky.
“An undisclosed sickness” rumors through the crowds,
twines around metal and stone.
He may be feeling after all his years, how hard life
sticks to the bones, that skin grows dry and paper thin,
offers little covering for within.
Sons and daughters can creep behind closed lids
even in sleep.
Emersion
Playing again with morning’s son
(I’m a child of late afternoon):
“Army.” He chooses and I agree
(I’ve never had the ROTC make a man out of me).
But after knocking over little green men,
I have to make them stand again.
Even pebble bombing talking ‘droids
Is too much for me.
I cry at fender benders, my bike or my car.
And I’ve seen skin parted to the muscle within
--externus vastus, internus vastus—
On an Uptown street, I’ve glimpsed faces dead already
Before they raised the gun or drew the knife.
I’ve lifted the kitten, back broken by our new custodian,
Said to be not all there.
I even feel the cold more now, at night.
“I can’t play army, “ I apologize. “It’s too real to me.”
“That’s ok.” He forgives me. “But we only kill bad guys.”
Not really. Not for real.