National Poetry Month - Day 30: Teacher Appreciation Day pt. 2: Carl Dennis

THE PROMISED LAND

The land of Israel my mother loves
Gets by without the luxury of existence
And still wins followers
Though it can't be found on the map
West of Jordan or south of Lebanon,
Though what can be found bears the same name,
Making for confusion.

Not the land I fought her about for years,
But the one unvarnished by the smoke of history,
Where no one informs the people of Hebron or Jericho
They're squatting on property that isn't theirs,
Where every settler can remember wandering.

The dinners I spoiled with shouting
Could have been saved,
Both of us lingering quietly in our chairs,
If I'd guessed the truth that now is obvious,
That she wasn't lavishing all her love
On the country that doesn't deserve so rich a gift
But on the one that does, the one not there,
That she hoped supplies could reach its borders
And hopes they're crossing even now

Into the land of the righteous and merciful
That the Prophets spoke of in their hopeful moods,
That was loved by the red-eyed rabbis of Galicia
Who studied every word of the book and prayed
To get one thread of the meaning right;
The Promised Land where the great and small
Hurry to school and the wise are waiting.
--
from The Outskirts of Troy (Quill/Morrow, 1988)



GIFTS

Though her feelings for the man across town
Who writes her weekly are a tiny fraction
Of his feelings for her, and will always be,
She doesn't return his letters unopened.
It may do him good to believe she scans them
All year long, even, as now, at tax time,
A bookkeeper's busiest season, her weeknights
Commandeered by the office and many weekends.

Half an hour with his thoughts on Sunday
Hasn't hurt her so far, or stowing them in a shoe box.
And if April's hard for her, it's harder for him
In his landscape business. His customers want new lawns.
Lights are flashing on his phone when he gets home,
His back aching, his clothes crusted. But the calls
Must wait till he's done with a paragraph
For her eyes only on his luck with organic mixes.

Now his news may bore her, granted, but on gray days
When those who matter most don't seem to value
Her high regard as she'd like them to,
It does her good to think of her photograph
Commandeering the messy desk of a practical man
With taste and talent who feels compelled
To practice the lonely art of non-reciprocity,
An art that civilization requires for the virtues
Of graciousness and gratitude to reach full flower.

Yes, her busy schedule keeps her from visiting
The shelf in her heart set aside for him
As much as she'd like, but for all he knows
She may be thinking of him this very minute.
That's reason enough for the sudden rush of joy
She imagines descending on him out of nowhere
As he makes a note to himself about grub control
Or a lawn to be roto-tilled tomorrow and seeded.

Most days shes may see herself as dodging her way
Through a maze of traffic, a thin woman in a red raincoat
Rushing so as not to be late for her appointment.
Now and then he helps her think of herself
As one of those old churches that welcomed the work
Of every sculptor who made an effort, who took pains.

Some statues were given a niche in the entry arch
Obvious to all visitors, and some a perch high up
Visible to any monk in the choir
Willing to crane his neck or to any angel
Pausing among the the rafters to rest
Before darting away on another mission.
--

from Ranking the Wishes (Penguin, 1997)

National Poetry Month - Last Call

After today, poetry will no longer have to do its yearly "aw shucks" blushing, while it secretly wishes people would look beyond the trivializing nature of National Poetry Month. Until next April, when it becomes "important" again. I side with Charles Bernstein's take on NPM, and yet, it did seem like the perfect span of time to get in the habit of typing in a poem per day, which is to say, for me, anyway, do a close reading. (More on that later - I plan to continue this series not by posting more poems, but by reflecting on those that I've posted for the past 30 days.)

To do something special for the last day, I decided to pay homage to four of my professors at SUNY Buffalo circa 1990-92 when I was an undergrad: Charles Bernstein, Carl Dennis, Irving Feldman, and Susan Howe. I took creative writing classes from the latter two (I also took several other classes from Howe; she was too good to pass up - as a pedagogue, she was on fire), a modern poetry survey with Bernstein, and an "epic poetry" survey with Dennis. I felt lucky to be in their company. And through Bernstein and his "Wednesdays @ 4" series, in the company of so many great poets on a weekly basis.

So, the last entry in the NPM series will be four entries, each containing several poems by one of the four poets mentioned above. Thank you Charles, Carl, Irving, and Susan; I owe you half a lifetime's worth of wonder and inspiration.