This Is Not a Dark Poem

Death has its anniversaries,
Even its fetes. One hundred
Years since so-and-so died.

This was the time of year,
We say, when she passed
When he passed, when they

Passed away. We shake
Our heads and shrug
Or sigh. We remember,

We drink a bumper
To their names, for such
Is fame. Then on we go

While we are anything to be
Ongoing, knowing the small rain
Down can rain, any day.

But one might imagine
Along the way, for a bit
Of mildly macabre fun,

That death really does
Have its own anniversaries,
Its own birthday to mark,

Although the planet spun
So quickly then, no time
Of year now could correspond.

Yes. Once there was a new
Kind of thing that, living, died,
And death was born that day.

We Belong to What We've Never Known

The dark squirrel silhouettes
In the long dark firs scurry
All through the hot afternoon.

It's been a weak, wet summer,
The floods only just receded,
And the heat now doesn't mean

The days aren't already dimming.
The squirrels, the living ones
Active in the living trees,

Haven't known much else,
Maybe one or two summers,
Not much to go on, but look

How they answer to themselves
Not to their experience, not
To the world they've known.

It's the long-dead squirrels
Who ghost living woods successfully
In those descending silhouettes.

We've been carved to prepare
For events we've never experienced
And never suspect happen.

Another Kaslo Festival

Maybe a thousand human lives,
Under belated northern sun,
Half of them in shorts or swim suits,
The better to sun or sink with.

Who cares about the band playing
Next on the boasted floating stage?
Summer has found the Kootenays
With scarcely a month left to spare.

Me, I'm more interested in them,
Those however hundred many.
I don't give a good goddam 
About their nations or ethnies.

I honestly don't think those count
Except to everyone and them.
I'm caught up in the real numbers
Of personal existences,

Every one as rich and detailed
As every other, full of plans
And particular convictions
Trying to make life of a world

That is their own and alien
As the sunlight sunk in the lake,
As each of them remains to me,
As each of me remains to them.

Xenophanes Clarifies

If current estimates are correct,
Several hundred million years ago
A few multicellular life forms
Tried fore and aft configurations,

Arranging a horizontal line
With an opening and an exit,
And thereby inventing heads and tails,
Futures to squirm to, pasts to squirt from,

Something to get to, something to leave,
The sacralization of hunger,
The frantic escape from filthy waste,
The distancing of brains and bottoms,

The distinctions of body and soul.
We live out the perspectives of worms,
Turning our heads, nodding at the light,
Dragging our carcasses behind us,

Whether we're bugs, birds, apes, or horses,
We all have entrances, then exits,
Opening acts, middles, conclusions.
If we all had gods, they'd look the same.

Mushrooms, amoebas, jellyfish, trees,
If such creatures imagined futures
As they radiate from their centers,
They might imagine spherical gods,

But what thing lacking architecture
To distance pure thoughts from grotesque ends,
Lacking hindquarters minds could disdain,
Could sever the sacred from profane?

The Evening Is August

Thick virga trails draperies
Across the horns of the Twa Corbies.

Coincidence shapes the perfect
C of old snow below their obscura

And equally, opposite, in Valhalla,
The remnants of ice fields for retreat into mist.

The world has aged
Because it is human

And because it is so inhuman
That the gaps within the lace

Of imaginary memories
Only grow, blown cobwebs

Sailing in sweet summer storms,
Billowing out uselessly

For hardworking spiders, exquisitely
For fools in the god light

That arranges the clouds
And iron bars of sunset.

Ephebe

She puts up with us pretty well
Despite our manifest belief
That we're accommodating her
And not the other way around.

It's on her to learn our language.
We make a minimal effort
To understand her take on it
And mostly call her hard work cute.

Oh well. She'll be one of us soon.
She's mastering nouns and phrases
And picking up speech rhythms.
She overhears our arguments,

Nuances fine as melodies,
Robust as polyrhythmic blues.
She's listening; she gets it straight.
She'll be a participant soon.

As for us, we can't remember
When we first played the game like this.
We only rehearse strategies
We learned at the knees of giants.

Your Server Today

"If you tell people up front that something might be distasteful, the odds are good that they will end up agreeing with you."

To begin with, I must apologize 
For the sour acidity of this poem.
I've laced it with droplets of pure envy
And a little balsamic vinegar.

I had intended to write something good,
But you know what a busy world this is,
And I like to get chores out of the way.
So here you go. I'll be back with your bill.

By the way, there are other poems, you know,
Good ones, well-seasoned ones, perfectly aged,
Rich with imagery, pathos, and insight,
Made from original ingredients.

Not here, of course, but around the corner
In a charming independent bookshop
With high ceilings, ladders, and oaken shelves,
A wonderful selection of volumes,

Formal, political, personal, sweet,
And savory on the tongue, all printed
On acid-free pages, bound in leather
Or in elegant paperback covers

With encomia and thoughtful portraits
Of black-and-white poets, slightly pensive
On the back, if still living, in small squares,
Or taking up the front cover, if dead.

Well, no, of course you don't have to read this,
But you've already finished most of it,
So I'm afraid I'll still have to charge you
Even if you send what little's left back