Storm, passing

All kinds of things are happening to me.

Skin’s becoming scaly, forehead a terrain of anthills,

and my feet are stiffening as though belonging to a corpse.

Hair’s falling out of course. And there’s my mind.

I try to read, but words swirl

in little whirlwinds on the page;

even when they’re behaving, I feel

I’m gazing at some complicated log of random numbers.

Enough of this I say aloud, take to the beach –

perhaps it’s distance my eyes are seeking.

But there I find fish tumbling from the sky,

myself face up in a clump of seaweed

foamy wavelets eddying about me.

Almost blinding,

the light is different from what I’m used to.

and I wonder if I’m dreaming,

back in the southern hemisphere,

if this sinking will have a rising too.

The next cat out the bag’s

a female, fifteen or so,

standing, mouth ajar,

saying nothing.

A mackerel on my belly, flapping.

I see her stare,

want to reach a hand, see if I can touch her

but suddenly she’s not there, and I come to,

still lying in damp sand like a heavy log.

There’s nothing for it but to roll over,

watch the water gouge

a groove where my body’s been.

Back home, I make a cup of tea.

The kettle boils. I lift  a green mug from a hook

pour, and squeeze a lemon in.

So far, so good. I wash pots and plates, utensils.

Stare out at laundry, ponder.

The light is dimming and a rush of heat comes over me.

A massive bank of thunderclouds controls the sky.

I put on my headphones, turn up the volume,

dance until my body feels fifteen.

Rain pounds against the window. I close the blinds.

Forgetfulness

The name of the author is the first to go
followed obediently by the title, the plot,
the heartbreaking conclusion, the entire novel
which suddenly becomes one you have never read, never even heard of,

as if, one by one, the memories you used to harbor
decided to retire to the southern hemisphere of the brain,
to a little fishing village where there are no phones.

Long ago you kissed the names of the nine muses goodbye
and watched the quadratic equation pack its bag,
and even now as you memorize the order of the planets,

something else is slipping away, a state flower perhaps,
the address of an uncle, the capital of Paraguay.

Whatever it is you are struggling to remember,
it is not poised on the tip of your tongue
or even lurking in some obscure corner of your spleen.

It has floated away down a dark mythological river
whose name begins with an L as far as you can recall

well on your own way to oblivion where you will join those
who have even forgotten how to swim and how to ride a bicycle.

No wonder you rise in the middle of the night
to look up the date of a famous battle in a book on war.
No wonder the moon in the window seems to have drifted
out of a love poem that you used to know by heart.


--Billy Collins

Child Development

As sure as prehistoric fish grew legs
and sauntered off the beaches into forests
working up some irregular verbs for their
first conversation, so three-year-old children
enter the phase of name-calling.

Every day a new one arrives and is added
to the repertoire. You Dumb Goopyhead,
You Big Sewerface, You Poop-on-the-Floor
(a kind of Navaho ring to that one)
they yell from knee level, their little mugs
flushed with challenge.
Nothing Samuel Johnson would bother tossing out
in a pub, but then the toddlers are not trying
to devastate some fatuous Enlightenment hack.

They are just tormenting their fellow squirts
or going after the attention of the giants
way up there with their cocktails and bad breath
talking baritone nonsense to other giants,
waiting to call them names after thanking
them for the lovely party and hearing the door close.

The mature save their hothead invective
for things: an errant hammer, tire chains,
or receding trains missed by seconds,
though they know in their adult hearts,
even as they threaten to banish Timmy to bed
for his appalling behavior,
that their bosses are Big Fatty Stupids,
their wives are Dopey Dopeheads
and that they themselves are Mr. Sillypants.

--Billy Collins [Claudia Dunne]

Cozy Apologia

I could pick anything and think of you—
This lamp, the wind-still rain, the glossy blue
My pen exudes, drying matte, upon the page.
I could choose any hero, any cause or age
And, sure as shooting arrows to the heart,
Astride a dappled mare, legs braced as far apart
As standing in silver stirrups will allow—
There you'll be, with furrowed brow
And chain mail glinting, to set me free:
One eye smiling, the other firm upon the enemy.

This post-postmodern age is all business: compact disks
And faxes, a do-it-now-and-take-no-risks
Event. Today a hurricane is nudging up the coast,
Oddly male: Big Bad Floyd, who brings a host
Of daydreams: awkward reminiscences
Of teenage crushes on worthless boys
Whose only talent was to kiss you senseless.
They all had sissy names—Marcel, Percy, Dewey;
Were thin as licorice and as chewy,
Sweet with a dark and hollow center. Floyd's

Cussing up a storm. You're bunkered in your
Aerie, I'm perched in mine
(Twin desks, computers, hardwood floors):
We're content, but fall short of the Divine.
Still, it's embarrassing, this happiness—
Who's satisfied simply with what's good for us,
When has the ordinary ever been news?
And yet, because nothing else will do
To keep me from melancholy (call it blues),
I fill this stolen time with you.

--Rita Dove