Door in the Mountain: New and Collected Poems, 1965-2003

In Fear (1)

“When I get up in the morning, after consciousness of this big form . . .” Maybe so-and-so would like a child, but I am too old to give birth. Too old, too much wanting to live my life, not take care of anyone as so-and-so takes of so-and-so. When I get up in the morning I am water and wine with this big form, this pouring out spiral of stars . . . Everyone Was Drunk South Dakota, August 1989. The buffaloes’ deep red-brown hinged shoulders and beards, their old hinged humps . . . These are the old males, separated from the herd. You can get a state license to shoot them. “So who saved me? And for what purpose?” The rich WASP suburb, 1946. The fight about the Jews on Wall Street. My uncle said, I thought that’s what we fought the war about. My uncle was right; everyone was drunk; my mother was peeling shivers of Scotch tape off the counter, peeling off her good hope. Or was it I who was losing my hope? in the violent lightning white on the white lawn. So why was I handed out of the burning window? For joy. Journalism. Stories. In Fear (1) By the St. Vrain River thirty cars, thirty young men the river at wolf 201 looking down into the water. What are they looking at? Now the police cars. What is going to happen? Now the ambulances. Someone was here and is gone. In Fear (2) M. comes and hits me, along the spine, top to bottom, karate-handed. I say, It hurts me! And she, her face the face of a person in Hell, compelled to unhappy action: “It hurts everyone.” In This Egg My mother as a child under her father’s sexual hand ticking over her like an electric train. The household scissors to her hair. Scissors cut paper Paper covers rock Rock crushes scissors Sticks and fluttering paper notes gravestones river stones scissors holocaust. 202 door in the mountain ...