April 19, 2016

repeating a dream: picking weeds for dinner ................................................................................#NaPoWriMo2016

Poestenkill Falls
photo by Michael P Bartlett ©





there are many weeds to pick 
from Spring through Autumn 
in upstate NY 
more specifically for those 
who think upstate begins 
after the Tappan Zee 
in the very east 
and central part of NY ...

I know in my head where 
purslane and queen anne's lace 
with its parsnippy roots, 
can be found all August long 
along the many ways 
I can take home ... 

I sit for awhile under a big pine tree 
at the edge of the Elmwood cemetery 
'bout 100 yards or so into the woods 
up the embankment 
from the Poestenkill ...

I watch the kill meander slowly 
tonguing clay and shale 
from its birth rain 
and springs 
in the Rensselaer hills 
to where it slakes 
and snakes towards 
the gorge drop into the Hudson 
and then onto 
a waiting Atlantic ocean 
I am hoping poem 
is hungry to see 
this as something 
beautiful too as I do ... 

these weeds are edible 
and I am beginning 
to beg the land a bit 
smartly bitten 
by the foraging bug 
after re-reading 
Euell Gibbons' 
'Stalking the Wild Asparagus' 
for the umpteenth time ...

I realize there is 
a funeral going on near me 
and I laugh out loud 
not caring if the mourners see me
as I seem to them to be
talking to myself ...

but I am meaning 
for them and you 
to hear me singing ...

"we are all calculations 
parts and parcels of souls
in these entropies 
of water 
the mythologies 
of tears 
are little seas 
that understand what rises 
and falls within us 
without purpose
this gift and decay 
it weighs 
each moment 
even this one 
another one 
of my poems 
ending by listening 
to the sounds 
water makes

EJR ©

3 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I was but funny thing happened on the way to Tipperary ... as I was looking at the gorge playing with the rocks and listening to the water ...I realized I left my phone/camera in the car ... and seeing I had my notebook(black composition book) with me I just continued to write ... sometimes a poet's pen is a much better camera than the one with his/her phone ... :)

      Delete
    2. This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete

Hello there ...