a collection for National Poetry Month 2011
What about those poems
I never wrote?
Ideas unborn,
left to float
like pollen in the air.
Those unsung poems
coat my throat
and cloud my thoughts
with possibilities.
I wheeze
and sneeze
and blow my chance. mjh
2/9/2005
Listen to Choke (seconds)
My Virtual Chapbook (table of contents)
I never thought
how noisy it would be:
the wind through my feathers
squeaks and rustles
as I pull and release
my wings like
a rower through air.
Pull and lift and fly,
rest and soar and drop.
Now an angel,
now Icarus.
My place determined
by my own strength.
Now rowing,
now sailing through
the breath of the world.
My wings grow larger with every beat.
They become clouds.
Only now am I free
of Icarus’ fate.
There is nothing quite
like going home. mjh
2005? [Previously published on: Apr 16, 2006]
Listen to Going Home (36 seconds)
My Virtual Chapbook (table of contents)
Add this to my totem:
the porcupine —
fearsome
barbed
solitary
all defense
but subject still
to the mammalian verbs:
cuddle, snuggle, nuzzle. mjh
8/26/1997
Thanks to Wendell Lane for taking a word out of my mouth.
Listen to Sharp (18 seconds)
My Virtual Chapbook (table of contents)
Look East
to watch the setting sun
reach across the miles
to brush the mountains pink
with one last caress farewell
as they blush
rose red at nightfall
and sink into gray
waiting for the moon to say
“Hush, be still now.
I am with you til the dawn.” mjh
2/9/06
(with a tip of the hat to Jon Knudsen)
Listen to Blush (22 seconds)
My Virtual Chapbook (table of contents)
I am writing
“Mark!”
frantically writing
“MArk!”
desperate to record
these fragile thoughts
“MARK!”
done. Back in bed,
she says,
“I thought aliens had abducted you.”
How can I hope
to be so imaginative? mjh
24Feb97
Listen to Merri! (22 seconds)
This poem is yet another true story.
We’ve been together 31 years (in October) and married 21 (in May). She is my muse and my best friend (cliché though that may be).
My Virtual Chapbook (table of contents)
The coyotes
celebrated New Year’s Eve
down by
the frozen lake.
Their singing
at midnight
woke us
from a deep sleep
snug in our tent
piled high
with bags, blankets, and clothes.
I’ve never heard
so devilish a song
so demented an
Auld Lang Syne.
Just when you feared
they might devour us,
the coyotes drove off
in their red minivan
with the bumper sticker that read
“Eat More Sheep” mjh
Listen to Cold Lang Syne (28 seconds)
Of course, there’s a story to go with this…..
It was 12/31/94. We drove from Albuquerque to San Francisco to visit my brother and sister-in-law. Little did we realize that every federal property would be closed by the Gingrinch that stole Xmas during the first Shutdown.
We drove across the Sierras for the first time, convertible top down, newly patched radiator, heater full blast, snow 6 feet deep on either side of the road. That night we camped in a closed campground in sight of a ski resort across a beautiful lake. We built a nest of clothes, etc. And the coyotes did wake us. Too cold to get paper and pen, I repeated a line over and over in my head, hoping to recall it the next day. mjh
My Virtual Chapbook (table of contents)
A mile or two away
above the timberline
sheep spilled single-file
across a meadow
and pooled at a low point.
“If we can see them,” you asked,
“can’t the coyotes?”
At that moment,
we met the strangers
man and woman —
so familiar
so good looking
so foreign.
I know now
they were really coyotes
having a joke with
how easy it is
to be human.
How do I know?
Perhaps it was
the calm way they looked at us.
Perhaps it was
the way they fell on the currant bush
devouring berries.
Perhaps it was
all the wool they wore. mjh
08-25-1995
Listen to Graze (36 seconds)
There may be something fitting in the concurrence of the start of National Poetry Month and April Fool’s Day — something in this poem, as well. This poem is the first I remember writing while camping with Merri, many years ago, along South Mineral Creek, in Colorado. mjh
My Virtual Chapbook (table of contents)