John Eivaz
train
for Nick
this morning
i stand relaxed on my patio
smoking
and this leonard cohen song
There Is A War
sneaks up on me
through something my buddy nick said
tripping around europe on a rail pass
a few decades ago with
deirdre while i pumped gas
in yonkers and this was a few years before
i lived with her for a few years
and did things people might do until
it changed a traffic light new grooves
she married soon after
what do i know of her now
her daughter ran away she maybe freelances some
i think
at times nothing lives better than cliche
until the erosion begins myself
i got married and divorced and have two sons
who live with me
desperate i write fearful to imagine
my day without it will come
i can always steady myself
see each sunrise the same
sleep in it
no
nick with bad accent looking for a train
ou est le guerre?
ou est le guerre?
confused laughs
leonard invites me
to come on back to the war
nick's words the refrain
everything is silent
i have a smoke outside
ever thought suspiciously of comfort
but for my worn bones still
a call and response unheard outside
points like math finalities
a trickle and shimmer of forecast
erases all the names easily
but my own the song
uneasily sung
more words another language
easy to misunderstand
to mean
embrace the forest
for PJ
the trees the trees
we write about
seas
if it doesn't seem stupid
it's self-obsessed
when it's self-obsessed
it still seems stupid
what to do with the maple tree in the yard:
attach clotheslines from kitchen windows
carefully carve out some bark give the tree an ass
run and jump into leaf piles
tie up your brother snug against it
catch fireflies under its darker dark
pass out drunk watch it curve above you
someone carries you in
you don't know where you are
but you want some thing
mellifluous as in
one shape becoming another
the progress of a sweet verseless song
this was my life
inside your life
collecting like the taste
of melting sugar
the sound of the sea
collecting the sound of the sea
becoming the sea
maple tree
and what are your minutes like?
do you name them?
i can't afford more
than generic minutes
so far seems enough
like a sap bucket somewhere upstate
i fill
and for what?
trees trees
we write about
seas
©2004 by John Eivaz
John Eivaz was born in New York and lives in California. He loves to
write, because it is the cheapest thing one can do for fun when one is broke. He writes a lot, and has been published online and in print in various places, including past issues of Slow Trains and its first print anthology. In past incarnations he was the editor of MiPo~Print and the poetry and flash fiction editor of the Erotica Readers and Writers Web site. His writing has been recognized online by the IBPC,
and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. He works at a winery. Read more of his work at the Web site he shares with P.J. Nights.
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