5 Stone Lane

Forever that bird landed in front of me

this morning, 11am, Sunday, August 2;

forever I lie in front of him, a woman

on a couch on a porch outside

her mother’s room, one year, one summer

after her death; forever I look in the room

at my desk handpainted with matching chair,

gifts from my grandmother I think will be left

behind, I think will be used for a last time.

But nothing is lost, this moment is forever,

as all of time has brought me to this bird,

this bird to me, this morning, the summer

after death, a gift in childhood, has been prepared

for by everything that came before it,

and everything from now on leads out of this moment,

carries it along, looking backward without

a backward look, from now the bird held inside

no seasons all directions on.

Every Word Leads to Every Other, and No Spaces Between

We do not speak of geography,

so shortcuts cannot affect our way.

I cannot even permit your saying “No shortcuts,”

because the blackbird must sing three notes

before it sings a fourth,

because there are (movements

to be passed through)

no shortcuts,

because the bubbles that rise to the pond’s surface

must work their way through the lily roots,

and each concentric circle touch the shore.

This is not geography,

because we cannot foretell

where we are going,

seeing as how we are carried,

and know only where we have come,

recognized if we are lucky

by where we were last.

The rose leaf has no destination

when it drops through the trellis

and could not land on the bench

without drifting by the hedge

and does not after all stay

anywhere. A breeze lifts it

beside the cat who comes round the corner

of the hedge to find the lizard,

a surprise impossible to fall upon

by crawling through the hedge

with any idea of shortcut.

I find myself

in a garden of no geography,

and could not have come another way

when I did not even know

this as a place where we would arrive.

(Untitled)

I had learned an art

of flower arrangements,

how to make clusters

inside cereal bowls,

or to venture the boldness

of one sunflower stalk

in a mound of rocks.

This art did not translate

to Tuscany.

Blue wildflowers

and yellow

die in a day,

ruin any art

that requires composition.

Better in Italy

a ceramic vase,

local, green glaze,

one handle chipped.

These flowers die overnight.

And their death is a happiness,

found each morning,

a waking that begins

with throwing the entire collection

and its squalid water from the window.

This art does not produce delicacy,

except the spray of yellow and white

powder across the kitchen floor.

Barefoot, in a t-shirt

I start the day

before the heat.

This is not a ceremony, yet still

formal: to gather

what has come in the night

when new wildness appears,

to collect quickly

as it dies

early

when I am fresh

and the day is fresh

before the sun

closes the flowers

and drives me inside.

∞

From the Spring 2003 issue of Inquiring Mind (Vol. 19, No. 2)

Poetry © Judith Stronach. Drawings © Ray Lifchez. Used by permission.