Three Photos in My Wallet
I open to the smell of leather -- a young girl,
not yet ten, sunbathes on a dock in Lake Champlain,
unaware, it seems of the camera's presence.
It's the early '20s. My eyes are drawn to her,
not because she's my mother. The composition
points to her. She's been gifted with
timeless beauty to balance her not so lovely sisters
striking poses behind her.
Another girl, my daughter. Her newborn face
resembles the one on the dock; she'll be a real looker,
alert and present on that summer day in '74
when I cried with joy because of the long-dead
girl in the bathing suit.
It's '97. My daughter is grown. A small girl,
a toddler, her mirror image, sits on her lap
smiling up at me -- I see the sunbather on the dock;
she travels through time with me.
The sunbather on the dock. My mother, Elizabeth Reeves,
Lake Champlain, NY, circa 1920.
Angel
I'm hooked on your wind-curled hair
floating high above me in your troposphere,
thin, wispy, high-white and delicate,
ice-crystalled, you are my sunrise/sunset;
your silky translucent sheen brings change;
you color my mornings, evenings
crimson, rainbow-salmon, pure gold.
Emerald Isle
We drove on the wrong side of the road
on the right side of the sea
where green is greener than green
can be anywhere else in the world
and the sun and rain collide
in the stretch of an hour.
Kings, saints and martyrs
rest beneath the stones
that grow like grains of sand
or stars across the sky
lining the fields of night
with runes set in bygone days
but not so far they can't be heard
in a Dublin pub behind a pint or two
when music sings down every lane
and spills out on the streets of Temple Bar.
We heard it on the wind at Dingle Bay
from beehive huts of stone stacked upon stone
mocking time, marking time with the sun
and with the moon for all eternity,
songs sung from each thatched cottage
with gorse as yellow as sows' ears,
from roads that course with no intent
up and down, around and through
tiny villages where craggy folk
solid as rocks within themselves
lilt their way across the land
among the ruins of their past.
And we fit right in as each day waned
we paused for bed and breakfast,
settled in for a still night's sleep
and woke to a big Irish feast of cereals,
juice, bread and jams, coffee and conversation,
earthy talk with hosts and fellow pilgrims.
We inhaled burning peat as if
my grandfather had cut it from the land
and handed it to me.
We lunched on strong fish chowder
and the briny smell of the sea
was everywhere and wild
as the hair on an Irishman's head.
I know from where my rock hard stubborn streak
derives as sure as does my love of music and words.
I met myself each day strolling down the streets
heard my voice issue from the mouths of men
in pubs, churches, shops.
I live there now in them
and dwell there always in my mind.
Old Man to Young Friend
Please take me in hand,
show me how to read
your new world:
where to dine,
what to eat,
when to sleep.
You say you'll sleep
when you're dead.
I once thought that way.
I now say, why rush things?
I walk in circles
like Thelonious Monk
seeking lost chords,
bemused.
There is so little time;
decisions appear so fast,
make toast,
play with dog,
read paper,
cross to the mailbox,
swim upstream,
cautiously.
And the worth that I see in you
is unworthy of my expression.
While you fly on vaunted wings,
I sit here in my indolence
an old fart enjoying the scent
of years lived so fast
with only wisdom to impart.
Bird/Tree
The bird is just five black
lines, but it is a bird on a
limb, plain as day.
The limb is one long line,
thick here, thin there.
And the needles,
thin lines in a spoke.
A blue wash is the sky;
the bird, limb and needles
just three colors --
brown, blue, green.
Simplicity, space
defining form, and
my hand inspired,
guided somehow by
the breath that
animates me, and the
bird and the tree.
© Joe Larkin
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