The Middlewesterner

“Failed something.
Cannot touch

pale ambition.

Creak of an old sign
moved by silence.

Cannot speak

of it again,
the dream that will

not have me. As

if the wind that's
here is gone.”

“Silence
just beyond
sound. Light

in this
darkness like
a lamp.

Wind and
the memory
of wind.

All the words
redeemed.”

“No,” said the poet,
“it's not a show.

We actually
live
here. This is

life. These are
my people.”

“You don't understand?”
the poet asked.

“Then hold your breath
til the frog jumps.”

“It's a gift,”
the poet said.
“Take what you're

given and be
grateful. It's
never about

the poet, it's
about the poem.”

“Swing
of line like
the way

a woman
moves
her hips.

Little more than
premonition,
a bird

heard
but not yet
seen.

The promise
of silence.”

“Sometimes the sound,
simple and sharp,

a scrape of chair
on wooden floor.

Sometimes more.”

“Cannot
walk into.

Cannot
crawl out of.

Only am.”

“Yup,”
said the poet,

“I can write
in the dark.

That's where
I do my

best work.”

“I would give you this
if I could catch it.

Take instead the promise,
for that's what it is -

always and only
a promise of promise.”

“Do not wish
too much for
silence - it

will come soon
enough and
last long

after we
imagine.”

“So I am here
as witness.

They come to me.
I can't ignore

their sorrow.”

“Who
would be

saying
these things

I say,
and why?

If I
cry out,

who's to
hear? Or

is it
that I'm

here to
listen, to

witness?”

“About all we do,”
the poet said, “is

add a little music
to the language, a

little light during
the storm, a little si-

lence when it's needed.”

“Ah, yes,” he said,
“poets work hard

with never much
to show for it.”

“The poem,” he said,
“might be a fastball

right down the middle,
or a curve out over

the edge of the plate.
You swing hard and hope

it falls in for a single.”

“That's the way it is
with poetry,” the poet said.

“The more I explain,
the less you understand.”

“Some,” he said,
“cannot be caught,

and some are
not worth
catching.”

"You want to write?"
the poet asked.

"Empty the empty
bucket. Kiss

a hard wind."