PORT WASHINGTON TOWN BOY
He digs worms
this morning
gets his fishing gear
from the shed and straps
it on the bicycle.
He makes two peanut butter
and jelly sandwiches
and wraps them
in wax paper.
He fills a thermos with milk
and tightens
the red cap.
He sees his father's
typewriter and the
"Indians of North America"
poster. The poster
and the typewriter have
been there
for as long as he
can remember.
He packs the lunch,
a Swiss army knife,
and The Odyssey
in a rucksack.
He rides his Robin Hood
3 speed
to the pier.
Flounders bite.
He hauls them in
and throws them
back.
He eats a sandwich
and stares at the
water and sky,
at his bicycle
at the boats out there,
the cars in town with
people thinking, thinking…
He cuts some worms,
baits the hooks,
flips out the line,
feels the tug.
School is over.
School will start again.
He thinks of his mother's
open face,
his father's strong arms.
his grandmother's fierce
loyalty.
He packs his gear
and rides to a hill
with woods from where
he can see beaches
and the sound.
He eats the other
sandwich and drinks
the milk.
He reads slowly,
sitting beside a tree
and he looks up
and sees the top
of the mast of
Odysseus' ship
FORTY-FIVE
What is it about
being in my forties?
If forties was a color
it would be brown.
Forty-five is like new
driftwood.
It is a red tree.
It is a shovel jammed
into a pile of earth.
It is dirt.
It is the ground.
It is walking with
my hands deep
in my pockets.
Forty-five is a sliver
of forest behind
old houses.
Forty-five is a cloudy
day when the
sun comes
out sometimes.
It is the shadow
of a red car.
It is a last romance
in my mind.
It is wanting to walk
to a train station
alone and to kiss
the shoulders of
a tall woman.
ONE GREAT POEM
I want to write one great poem
that will win one of the contests
in Poets & Writers Magazine.
They will put in a little photograph
of me, half smiling or not smiling.
(A photographer once told me that I
looked better when I did not smile.)
The magazine will write little things
about me being a promising writer
even though I am forty-five
and the promises
have already been kept.
I want to write just one great poem
that college students will either get
or not get or hate or puzzle over
and write papers about with thesis
sentences and all that and misread
and read right to help them be wise.
I want high school valedictorians
to recite it at commencements.
Everyone will nod and say,
“Yes, yes, it is so true, so true.”
But they will not really be sure
they know exactly
what is true about it.
But it will sound true and they
will sense that it is true and wise.
That will be enough.
I will be asked to speak at small
colleges in Indiana
and upstate New York.
I will look for profound
things to say and read my
one great poem
and it will be enough.
CANOES
The Iroquois traveled in canoes
Paddles dipped into green water
Birch-bark reflected white and black.
I have been thinking about canoes
Since I drifted alone on Emerald Pond
Since I glided along the shore of Long Pond
White dots glittered across to still rocks,
To the line of deep green, thick on the edge
Where tree meets tree until death.
What is it about canoes that draw me?
As a kid I canoed down the Delaware River
We tipped it over on purpose on the rapids
We camped on the riverbank under stars
I forget the longing in the sleeping bag.
Why are canoes on my mind?
Why do I think about canoes?
When I am late for a train to Boston
When a bill is past due
When the baby doesn’t sleep nights
When I have a hundred compositions to mark.
THE IMPORTANCE OF SWEAT
It is important to sweat when you write
in a dark room in a quiet house and to
sleep on the floor with your feet up on
the bed and to be in a union and stand
up for the workers and the people and
to spend time wandering the streets and
beaches and woods alone and to let
yourself go to hell and get in fights
and lose a job and lie on the floor all day
and listen to old Thelonious Monk records
and smoke cigars and stare blankly and
regret everything you ever did even the
good things and quit your childhood
because it is over and there are plenty
of new childhood's around as good or
as lousy or as lousy and as good as yours
ever was with bicycles, canoes, and drums.
It is important to be a laborer in a field
and to sweat when you write and when
you get a hundred bucks you give it away.
It is important to start two short stories
and a play and never finish them and to
write poems about your children and the
opera and the muses and the crummy rotten
way kids are treated in school and college
those dirty human factories where anything
independent is filed away like Nazis who
kept plenty of files on everyone and original
ideas are against the rules so some of the most
creative kids quit and sweat alone in rented
rooms in towns like Korea, Maine or they
go to the Canadian woods to build birch bark
canoes with the Algonquin and find someone
to love or go to Mexico to sweat and sleep
on beaches and sweat honestly on poor wages
in fields and sleep on the earth with earth
dreams and drink cold water from artesian
wells and walk with stars and stars and moon
and wind and sweat and love and earth dreams.
