May 12, 2006

Graduation

Rain, fog and mist.
Not so unusual
For the Pine Tree State
In the month of May.
Yet, remembering:
Warm, dry days of Summer,
October, crisp and clear,
Reds and yellows everywhere,
And the cold, white of Winter,
With distant mountains
Nearer than they really were.

We’re here, his mother and I,
For Scott’s gradation.
Master of Fine Arts, they say.
The artist, husband and father,
Lover of beauty,
The woods and mountains,
The trail by glen and stream,
The float of the fly,
The rise of the trout.
And People.
A friend to Mankind.

It came hard.
Backward letters and words,
And shoes misfooted.
The discovery of clay and paint,
A view of the muse,
Teachers and mentors;
Those who helped.
And college,
As if that were possible;
And now the first
Advanced degree
In his big family.

I sit surrounded
By paper and glass and clay,
While he, on his last day,
Defends his thesis.
Ninety-nine pages
Of thought and sweat.

A last day for him,
And a beginning.
One world leads to another.
Joy and challenge,
Fear and hope; the future
Unknown and unknowable,
Lifting his eyes
To the sky.

--Poland Maine, 12 May 2006
For Scott Fuller's
Graduation as
Master of Fine Arts

April 7, 2006

Remorse

Memories of opportunities lost,
A chance not taken,
Venture denied.
Somewhere that path plays
In the mind
Where unknown
And known
Conflict.

I cannot keep my buzzing mind
From quoting
The immortal words of Frost:

Two roads diverged..
And sorry I could not travel both,
And be one traveler..

There’s a Dinosaur in my backyard

I awoke and looked over my domain
Surprised, would you know,
A beast of pre-antiquity.
Long neck and green tail,
Moving silently from left to right.
What would the neighbors think?
I don’t care;
Its mine, and they can assume
What they want.

Its gone now.
Lumbering lightly
To places unknown,
Where others may see it
And some will believe.

March 22, 2006

Alone

The solitary tree yearns to drop its seeds.
This magnet draws inward,
A pull from gravity of distant stars.
The sea kisses the sand and then retreats.

Like a ragged army, the tombs
Remembering life, the beginnings and endings,
Smiles and frowns.
The old clock, wound on Sunday,
Strikes its strange message of time.

Tevye: Sunrise, Sunset…
A constant dirge.
Or: Tell me not in mournful numbers…
Days race to weeks, months and years,
An ever accelerating race to
The unknown.

Now.
The quiet sounds roar out.
Filling the room.
The actions of the day,
Done, morphing into
The contemplations of sunset.
Time to rest. Time to think.

The dichotomy of being;
Two persons.
Solitude, love.
Soon demasiado.
Loneliness
Yearning for nearness.
Knowing that I am there.
Caring that I am there.

Snow

Early this Sunday Morning
We woke to snow
Still falling at thirty after seven.
Hayden, two year grand-daughter
Enthralled. We are too.

A few weeks ago
It was breaking records for heat;
Now cold.
As the north,
Moved by a wayward jet stream
Meets us here.

It must be Global Warming.