Two Poems
Joseph Enzweiler
Shaker Chair
Love is cut away, of starlight
For its own sake, and the sweet
Gold barley in a rising moon,
Falling in thin white curls
Beneath his lathe. That branch [End Page 118]
Of the ash that is woman
Is cast aside, how she kissed him
By the bright canal years ago.
Where the limbs join in swirls
Complex and dark, wife and children,
The tender joys of meat and fruit
On the tongue for the moment alone,
And murder, whiskey, the old life
Like a knot, a weakness,
All planed off and burned for warmth.
What remains is hard and clear,
Four acts of faith to sit upon.
One must look a long time,
Across grain tightened in the sun,
Run a hand on the fitted back,
The stern joined seat to find
The flaw, hidden somewhere
By the maker, the price of being human.
And then shadows come, and evening,
The barley fields drunk on the wide
Cool rain, while the chair hangs
Silent on the wall, for the Lord
To come and sweep the earth.
Christmas 1963
Because we wanted much that year
And had little, because the winter phone
For days stayed silent that would call
Our father back to work, and he
Kept silent too with our mother,
Fearfully proud before us, [End Page 119]
Because I was young that morning
In gray light untouched on the rug
And our gifts were so few, propped
Along the furniture, for a second
My heart fell, then saw how large
They'd made the spaces between them
To take the place of less. Because
The curtained sun rose brightly
On our discarded paper and the things
Themselves, these forty years,
Have grown too small to see, the emptiness
Measured out remains the gift,
Fills the whole room now, that whole year
Out across the snowy lawn. Because
A drop of shame burned quietly
In the province of love. Because
We had little that year and were given much.
Joseph A. Enzweiler's books include Home Country (Fireweed P, 1986), Stonework of the Sky (Graywolf P, 1995) and A Curb in Eden (Salmon P, 1999).
