Under the Influence

 

Under the Influence

              

                            

…alone

All afternoon, I take my time to mourn.

I am too cold to cry against the snow

Of roots and stars, drifting above your face.

 

                                                   James Wright

                                                   “What a Man Can Bear”

 

 

Where two weeks ago the hill

And the dip in it was crusted

With ice and deepening

Snow, now the early spring

 

Rain has made her changes:

A blanket you could lay naked

On if you wanted and didn’t care

About neighbors or traffic

 

Or hornets.  The lilacs, what remains

Of them (winter, or really

The weight of winter, had

Her way with them and broke

 

The old, twisted wrists, they looked

Like wrists to me some of them

And too, whole

Lengths, to the elbow and occasional

 

Bicep) dropped from the crotch

As what was wet and heavy and cold

took hold of its age

and shook it like a stepfather 

 

might another man’s child

who won’t stop crying until finally

it lets go and drops

limp in the soft earth.  And just this last

 

storm, because before that

there had been a vibrant violence

of unleashed spring, the blossoms

still in their small pouches and closed

 

mouths and knap

sacks waiting to be awakened

naturally with a warmer breath,

a kiss surely and a dripping

 

nipple on the lips, surely, if

even a little chapped, if even a bit

weepy, still intact, still, see,

rooted and firm and, waking, alert.