D's Bones » 2007 poems

House Guest

David Stallings — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 23:09:34 +0000

It looks like a forget-me-not
my daughter, Ariel, ponders,
but how could that be—
here, at over 5000 feet
in the eastern Cascades?
On our descent I pluck one,
examine its five blue petals and hairy stem,
stash it in my shirt pocket.
Hours later I resuscitate and key it—
an Okanogan stickseed.
I email Air the news,
make the stickseed comfortable
in the rich, sea level chamber
of my kitchen window.
We share a week of quiet reflection
before the hardy visitor
gently wilts
farewell.

What pleasure there is in taking the time to discover a new little piece of the world, in this case a stickseed. The entire experience becomes something akin to a pressed flower in a book of memories.

Ariel and her husband, Dre, and I were backpacking in Teannaway River country last summer, just east of the Cascade crest. It was pouring on the Washington coast, and this was our dependably drier fallback location. We were climbing an old favorite of mine, the ridge above Bean Creek Basin, when the lovely stickseed, not yet identified, waved hello.

Reality Check

David Stallings — Sun, 21 Oct 2007 23:15:11 +0000

I nod at a pair of slouched graybeards
by the entrance to a Denver Starbucks.
Coupla’ owlhoots, I growl.
Ariel, my daughter, raises her eyebrows—Say what?
You know—sort of like Yosemite Sam’s ‘varmint.’
Waiting for her chai, faster than a gunslinger,
she draws her Sidekick,
checks Dictionary.com
Nada.
Uh-oh, have I made this up?
More clicks, before Google opines
this may be a western regional term
rooted in outlaws’ use
of nighttime warning hoots.
Well, there you are! I pronounce.
Once again Air’s vocabulary expands
and my all-knowing fatherly ass
is saved.

I found one of the guilty pleasures of fatherhood to be, for a time, considered by my daughter as omniscient, a virtual living Wikipedia. This can (and should) be true only for a while. All too soon, and with any luck at all, the scale tips. My daughter the culture maven, has come to know a great deal about a great deal. She is also genetically disposed to be a truly accomplished bullshitter, which makes her even more formidable. So now our word play is sometimes like a good game of chess with a respected opponent, but more often is simply an appreciative tasting of words like sips of good wines.

In Passing

David Stallings — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 18:14:03 +0000

My young self drives an old Volvo
up Fourth Avenue for the first time,
just below Yesler overpass
near where I work.
He has left his Colorado home forever,
bound for graduate school in Seattle.
I will hail him as I often do,
reach for words
of confidence
and fathering he has long
missed.

But not today.
Fuck it.
I am old and lonely.

This time, it is he who smiles first—
then drives on,
not looking back.

In August, 1964, I crossed mountains and deserts, finally descended into the dream-green of western Washington for the first time. For some reason, I clearly remember driving that segment of Fourth Avenue–perhaps in order to set yet another hook in time to facilitate a visit from my older self. This encounter now often happens.

What conversation would you have with your younger self? I’ve had many, but on this day I was startled by the conversation he had with me, all in just a smile.

Totem

David Stallings — Thu, 31 May 2007 19:32:43 +0000

My partner buried eight human placentas
in a circle at our meadow’s edge.
A midwife, she invoked the feminine
from all directions. In turn,
I carved a twelve-foot cedar pole,
erected it at the center.
When she and I divorced,
the pole traveled with me.
I planted the shaft,
somewhat shorter by this time,
on property shared with my new partner.
Things with her have soured,
and now the carving lies
covered by more moss
and dead branches each year.

This spring
families of bark beetles,
potato bugs, small spiders
are hard at work in their new
home.

Life giving phallus? Marauding cock? Both? Figuring this out has proven to be a lifetime’s work for me. And for many men.

By the end of this poem, it’s fair to ask, “what’s next?” a question for which I have no immediate answer. However, in the short run it looks like a pretty good deal for the bugs.

Moving the totem was interesting. It made for a protruding pickup load. I briefly considered entering it as a float in the local “Grand Old 4th (of July)” parade, but decided against it.

Seasons

David Stallings — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 03:29:14 +0000

i
We tried to plant a garden
some years ago.
Even hanging deer netting
turned into argument.
The soil was sour—
only blackberries, Scotch broom,
and sticky weed thrived.
Later, removing the old netting
required too much
effort.

ii
Spring breathes urgency
into an eruption of peonies
near my porch. Here,
Heavenly Bamboo
shimmers in the sun,
chard and kale just surface
the soil.

iii
The distance
between us
sighs.

This is an older poem, recently revised and re-felt.
In the past I found it surprising that poems of a relationship’s ending are nonetheless regarded as “love poems”. However, I have come to see there is great wisdom in this view.

Return

David Stallings — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 19:58:46 +0000

A smile rides home
with me
after five days
of coastal backpacking
with old friends
and family.
I approach my single
man’s cottage,
know loneliness
is near,
nearer.

Is now.

What vast sweep
this feeling has,
how rich with fear!
I let the waves tumble
and tumble
me into the sand.
Finally,
cast ashore,
I rise
naked
in the sun.

Anyone having the opportunity to body surf quickly discovers that the way to deal with a botched ride is to relax into the wave. I initially found this counterintuitive, tending to keep my neck and back stiff, head above water–resulting in my being repeatedly smacked against the bottom, breath knocked out or worse. This experience rapidly improves one’s technique, and yields a metaphor of value in surfing other waves.

Always something of a slow learner, it took me a long while to realize that the direct, sensory experience of suffering is a safe, sure portal to the soul.

The Arrow

David Stallings — Sun, 04 Mar 2007 18:07:34 +0000

Wind gusts
my kitchen window,
plucks
a long-covered note
from beneath a magnet,
thrusts it at my feet.
I feel you don’t listen to me,
or hear what I say,
complains my old lover
from across the years.
Pierced,
I sink
to the floor.
How
can this still
be happening?

For comment, let me offer a recent poem from Mary Oliver (who says, “In my sleep I dreamed this poem.”):

The Uses of Sorrow

Someone I loved once gave me
a box full of darkness.

It took me years to understand
that this, too, was a gift.

For the Godfather

David Stallings — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 20:50:04 +0000

You needed to be 18
to get into the Rainbow Ballroom,
but they let Norm and me in anyway.
Things were different
in this tough Colorado steel town.
We sat near the stage, ordered three-two beer—
the only two white faces
among many tables of black ones.
Contraband liquor flowed,
empty bottles rolled on the floor.
When the band eased into Please, Please, Please,
we were lost in heaven. But then the singer
started choking, collapsed to the stage.
What the hell?
People screamed.
The Famous Flames played on,
while someone
figured out what to do.
Four tall men in black suits
and skinny black ties entered,
lifted James Brown to their shoulders,
marched from the room.

The Famous Flames were solid.

Eventually, the funereal four
returned with a lifeless James Brown,
gently propped him onto the stage,
curled a microphone into his hand.
Feebly, he rose, rasped into the mic,
Oh, baby, please…
don’t go.
We went insane.
We cried and shouted
in a roar that I still
feel in my
chest.

Oh, baby, please please please please please…
don’t go.

It was 1959, and the town was Pueblo. My friend and I were into black music as much as two white kids going to high school in Colorado Springs, 40 miles north, could be. We listened to rhythm and blues on the powerful Mexican border stations (the “X’s”) and haunted Rhythm Records, the only black record store in C. Springs. In a way, early James Brown was like early Elvis Presley–they both pointed us straight into the wilderness.

That night in Pueblo, James Brown taught passion. I think he changed my life.

Always a showman, he closed out his final act on Christmas Day, 2006.