-the story of the finding and proving of the true house at 1017 Bedford-

1.

before there was a gang hanging-out on the corner

of Columbus Park at the right field line,— there was another gang

made-up of our older cousins and their girlfriends who were the older

sisters of those who will become our girlfriends.

but another gang before them,

those kids,— they were our fathers, and their girlfriends,
they would become our mothers.

those boys and their girls hung-around on the same street corner as we,

as did our older cousins before us.

the houses were much the same then as they were when I was young.

the look of the shingles was the same and the interiors were populated

by the same kinds of occupants roaming the rooms, shouting,

eating in the kitchens, watching televisions in the same parlors or 
listing to radios.

the great cabinet radio in our house

was located in the kitchen

against the wall between the bedroom

shared by my brother, three years my younger, and me

which smelled like the hamper in the bathroom,

and the bedroom shared by our grandparents

which was dark all the time.

through the narrow hallway

we find the parlor where

we watched television by night,

sprawled-out on the rug where we also

clung to one another during the hurricanes.

on those occasions, my father

laid tape across the windows, warding-off

the heavy winds and rising floodwaters

same as applied lambs-blood saved the inhabitants

from Pharaoh's nasty edict.    

off the parlor at the same wall

were the bedrooms of my teenaged sister,
three years my elder,

which looked like a small palace, filled with jewels,

exotic scents, linens and erotic nylon,

and of our parents, which was neat and orderly

with its consistently made bed where

at its foot, my father tossed his weary

trench-coat at the end of his day.

every animal we ever had lived and died

at 1017 Bedford.

a few of these deaths

were attributed to aging

but most were caused by violence.

the violence stemmed from impossible

attempts at escape.

the screeching of wheels,

the sickening thud.

a kid or a cat?

we had a lot of cats.

we had white mice, parakeets

and gold fish.

we had hamsters and guinea pigs.

no dogs.

not one dog.

we had but the one lizard.

we had rabbits, and at Easter-time,

a few living yellow peeping chicks

which were delivered to us

in shallow boxes by the same uncle.
In short time, these were buried near the craggy
vegetable garden across from the grapevine in the backyard.

once, one of our more adventurous parakeets

escaped into the wild when perched on the visiting
egg-man’s sweaty fedora

and it flew across the backyard cemetery,
then over the fence into Rachlin’s Junkyard

never to be heard from again.

our pets were requiems in the making; 

walk one in through the kitchen,

then carry it out to the graveyard in back

in the endless cycle of animal life and death.

I’m telling you this merely to set the scene.

but also to say that this is the place

where the poems were born.

for example,—

I thought about the one lizard we kept

in the small desert-like aquarium

under the window streaming lots of sunlight

as I wrote the recent poem somewhat dedicated to

Federico Garcia Lorca.

2.

the gas stove was old, huge

and hissed with burning blue flames.

the refrigerator was big, too

as was the winter-clanging space-heater.

the kitchen's single sink

was deep enough for two kids

and the toilet had its own little room

next to the tub

which had its own little room.

the telephone weighed-in at 36 pounds.

the screen door to the kitchen had cancer.

the linoleum, tuberculosis.

the wallpaper patterns were washed-out

but as ever-present as wandering polio.

my sister's room was a goldmine.

the television, miraculous.

every candy dish on every surface

was filled to capacity.

houseflies vacationed there in summer months

doped-up on island meadows of peppermint.

In this house, when my sister's girlfriends

came waltzing through for an overnight sleep-in,

some of them bathed in the tub before bed.

they took baths in my tub.

yes, you, Beverly Greenwood.

you, Beverly Greenwood.

3.

I'm speaking of you, Beverly Greenwood.

the ballpark was across the street

and so was the ESSO gas station.

the great Italian bakeries were across the street

and the Marconi Club as well, belching-out

its nighttime drunks in the early morning hours.

the cemetery was close by,

and by that I mean the cemetery for human remains.

the church was within sight

and the grade school, too.

the great and terrible Hugo A. Dubuque School.

Sandra, the girl at the desk

one row to the right

and three desks forward,

lived on Highland Avenue.

I wrote about her

in a couple of poems,—

one of them on seeing her house

from my bike for the first time.

I was lost on the day

when she knew she was rich.

that's right, lost when

she discovered her wealth,

her beauty and when enlightenment 

came over her.

the saddle of my bike

caught fire and singed my youth.

sure, we can still be friends.

Sandra died of leukemia

while in the 5th grade at the Hugo A.—

but this time, for once, it was something

that had nothing to do with me. 

4.

requiem aeternam dona eis domine.

and amen. and amen.

-Stop. Look. Listen.-

Requiem for the liquor salesman on the road

Hit by the train

The Doppler shift won’t matter.

But a slow death is like the funeral knell

With the Doppler in effect.

It opens with its soft alarm, then

Crescendo— and it’s too late to recover.

––The tree

Falls and you aren't in the woods to hear it.

––The star

You’re looking at isn’t really there.

––You don't

Hear the one that’s got your name on it.

––It's the first

Chesterfield that killed you.

                                                      

  

-what sweet song- / requiem for Neda Agha-Soltan

had rainfall swept

the city streets before 

the fleeting moment froze

within your breast –– 

when last the burning

bullet struck to pierce your heart

or soft breeze lingered

through an open space

to softly cool your olive skin. but —

what sweet song, Neda,

left your mouth to yield 

such blood? 

and so they tell you: "don't be afraid.

Neda, don't be afraid".

06/20/09

Ray / a self portrait of sorts (with compliments to Bill Saluga)

Call him

Procrastinator to the next step

Part-time rationalizer

Apprentice to the one who makes the thing.

Call him

Student of the daily recollected 

Jury-rigger

Know-it-all

The one who passed the test for certification.

Call him

Novice

Small Potatoes

Intruder into the lives of those
Who've chosen to remain anonymous. 

Call him

Star-gazer

Ringsider

Striker of the set

Amateur poet of the after-living.

Chisel into his headstone:

"Here lies

The lone assembler of the fragments to his singular life."

Now,—  you can call him Ray

Or you can call him Jay

But-cha doesn’t hasta call him

Know-it-all.

                            

-watching the airplanes come and go-

I went to the airport

to take off my shoes

to take off my socks.
they passed a beeping wand
upward then downward
across the opening between
the legs of my pants then squeezed

the material at the buttocks

like a bathtub ducky.

no squeaks.

no findings.

they opened my mouth

and poked-around

with the implement

of their fingers
draped in surgical gloves.

they mussed-up my hair

then spread my whatchamacallit

looking deeply into the dark situation.

now,—  some of you

may have moved-on from

Osama bin Laden.

but he still pisses me off.

                          

  

-across the street from the ESSO station-

my old house is dressed in vinyl.

It was dressed in aluminum before that

after it was dressed in wood.

It’s during the age of wood where I showed up.

now when I drive by on my way over the river,

across the big bridge which

wasn’t there during the time of wood,

when gasoline wasn’t sissified by the extraction
of its lead and doctors

smoked cigarettes during the examinations,

I see lots of vinyl.— pea green. sky blue.

even sunlight can’t help it.

here, the entries have entrances,—

little structures of their own leading to them.

God’s been vaporized

and I mean that in the good sense.

I didn’t think of God as vapor, in the time of wood.

backstops have been moved further from the plate,—

in my case, further toward Wall Street

beyond the third base line where a friend
lived with his family.

he was a good shortstop, a mariner later in life
and later still, dead of a fat-constricted heart.

four or five mills have burned to the ground

and four churches, too.

as I've told you, during the age of wood,
at the bubbler beyond the backstop, the water was a clear fall.

and I've said: one could see through the water to the other side

where the game would play-out— 

and I've imagined

it might have been the way baseball would be seen when played on another planet.

and that imagery could never be experienced in the age of vinyl.

  

-Waiting on the Troubadour-

I've chosen the audaciousness

Of personal preference

Over those whose performances

Are more skilled than my own;

Urlicht over Des Knaben Wunderhorn;

The tenacity of Rockland over fractured Airplane Dreams.

But two weeks in––

And still, nothing.

Then on the first day of the third week,

The day God seemed to like above the others

Late afternoon

Under the mailbox

In the dirt

Nearing mud

Behind the dense

Neck-high honeysuckle

On the south-

Side of the house where

The driveway winds to the road,

A small package sealed

But carelessly delivered,

Dropped down

Through a night of light

But steady rain

Is retrieved—

Is addressed to me

Under shrink-wrap cover

Shielded from the elements,
Is carried inside, is opened,
Is engaged and begins

As drenched as the water

With "Duquesne Whistle."

                             

-Steppin' out-

-Let’s meet at the Grand Opera Diner;

We'll order from the menu's elegant penmanship,

Dressed appropriately at our seats.

-At the diner down by the river,

The waitress calls me “Honey”

And I'll order the meatloaf plate, double-up on the mashed.

The guy at the steamer's hard-working

And meatloaf is laid-out one thick slice

Upon the heavy utilitarian plate.

At the diner down by the river,

One thick slice is the distance the stomach can run.

-Let’s meet at the Grand Opera Diner;

Order from the elegant cursive gracing its page.

-At the diner down by the river, the menu

Is slipped inside a sleeve of stiff, yellowing acetate.

It's been this way since the diner rose-up in stainless

Steel at the banks of the Taunton.

-Let’s meet at the Grand Opera Diner.

The light is softly articulated.

Everything seems to be anticipated.

Listen to cello sonatas piped-in electrically.

-The diner down by the river is cranky.

The light slaps with a harsh fluorescence. 

Nickel-plated jukes at the walls of its naugahyde
Booths offer Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Fats Domino,

And the Everly Brothers harmonizing a tough-strung "Bird Dog."

-Let’s meet at the Grand Opera Diner;

order from the menu's elegant penmanship:

–––"I'll  have the Mezzo, Coloratura on the side, and...

Easy on the Vibrato."

                                                  

utilizing the new wheel

1.

when the poem stops

in the depth of its tracks

but the track of Venus is full-

bodied and the clear

northeastern sky exhales its contents,

the poem’s resuscitated.

(mouth of Earth moves

to the mouth of Venus — lips
like a drop of star!)

2.

the deep exhibition sweeps

above the city farther than the neck bends

backward in its bones.

(tonight it's the measurement of light

which sets the distance the eye can see.)

if it all ends now I'd be

the first in the world to know.

                                  

                       

                                

aftermath

the winding two-lane country road
ends in violence at the trunk of a tree.
nothing’s remembered and everything’s moved

to another space where occupancy is transformed

redefining its bones.

––this is due to a fatal car crash at the junction of Routes 177 and 6.

tonight, they "Beat the Clock" at Imbriglio's Bar in Westport.

doors open at six. ––the first hard drink is full-price,
the second is half of that, the third's on the house.
the bar is busy stamping the backs of its frantic hands.
last-call bell rings out at morning's earliest hour and

driving hard on 177 at the junction of 6, the dashboard radio's

romancing fever-pitched: "Be-Bop-A-Lula".

-maybe baby-

maybe she'd say:

—I’d understand clearly

if the thought of you

had crossed my mind

as the thought of me has crossed yours.

maybe she'd say:
––when was it we danced?

was it the Spindrift where you say

we learned the language of saltwater

and from the dance-floor the language of song?

this fabric you speak of,
that which unraveled at our feet,––

I don't know it as you do

and yet you tell me of how

we stormed the diners, the balconies

and the bench-seats

falling in the trenches for young

love’s sake,

laughing.

indestructible.

invincible!

irresistible.

maybe baby

had I the time reserved

would remember something

of your journey toward me ——

something of when you said the windows cranked-down

when the dashboard's radio tuned-in

and the chain-linked fences brushed

in silver passed the Portuguese

widows dotting the sidewalks in solemn black

forever in mourning.

was it then the rush of the swift
afternoon was at my face?

when did we feel the heat from the pistons

of your father’s flaming Roadmaster?

she might say.

-the poem-writer's last days-

when he's old — not so much

older than now

the age of his old grandfather

his old uncle

the older brother of his old father

when he's old enough

to fear another solid

penetrating the bowel

and water

softly splashed to his face

becomes a nightmare

when he's old and pisses
uncontrollably with the blank

expression of the animals

is spoon-fed unspeakable concoctions

by younger women applying

a tepid attendance

when he's old and barely

conscious of the brittle

bone ready to snap––

squinting at the written instructions 

lost at the face of the mechanism 

lost in the dust of the kids

running by in their lightning attitudes

when he's old 

not so much older than now.

                            

-with the girl from Mount Saint Mary Academy-

Let's go to the mayfly.

It sits on the screen-door to the kitchen

If the door to the entry is left open.

Goo-goo eyed, the mayfly stares blankly

Into the face of the one day it has.

Mayflies covered

The outside walls and windows

Of the Carnival Drive-In on route 6

Sticking to the rims of its saturated

Paper-boat trays in deep-fried seafood.

There, at the farthest edge

Of the redwood picnic table

Where the great Watuppa Ponds

Of the Narrows split,—

Maureen Herron’s blue eyes veer

Outward toward the water

Across the southern pond,— the distance

Leaving a comet's tail of fatal ice.

Pinch the mayfly gently by its wings.

Look within to the frail and failing

Heart of the mayfly.

This is the barely beating

Transparent heart of man.

She said I should go without her.

She said she had found another.

The mayfly disappears long before winter.

                               Westport, Massachusetts