Horses Make a Landscape Look More Beautiful (2 page)

off the floor

and feel my stomach muscles

rebel:

they are mutinous

there are rumblings

of dissent.

I have other things

to show,

but mostly, my body.

“Don’t you see that person

staring at you?” I ask my breasts,

which are still capable

of staring back.

“If I didn’t exercise

you couldn’t look up

that far.

Your life would be nothing

but shoes.”

“Let us at least say we’re doing it

for ourselves”;

my fingers are eloquent;

they never sweat.

Letting go

in order to hold on

I gradually understand

how poems are made.

There is a place the fear must go.

There is a place the choice must go.

There is a place the loss must go.

The leftover love.

The love that spills out

of the too full cup

and runs and hides

its too full self

in shame.

I gradually comprehend

how poems are made.

To the upbeat flight of memories.

The flagged beats of the running

heart.

I understand how poems are made.

They are the tears

that season the smile.

The stiff-neck laughter

that crowds the throat.

The leftover love.

I know how poems are made.

There is a place the loss must go.

There is a place the gain must go.

The leftover love.

If I had erased my life there

where the touchdown more than race

holds attention now

how martyred he would have been

his dedication to his work

how unquestionable!

But I am stoned and do not worry

—sitting in this motel room—

for when his footsteps at last disturb

the remnants of my self-pity

there will be nothing here

to point to his love of me

not even my appreciation.

When you remember me, my child,

be sure to recall that Mama was

a sinner. Her soul was lost

(according to her mama) the very

first time she questioned God. (It

weighed heavily on her, though she

did not like to tell.)

But she wanted to live and what is more

be happy

a concept not understood before the age

of twenty-one.

She was not happy

with fences.

I cradle my four-year-old daughter

in my arms

alarmed that already she smells

of Love-Is-True perfume.

A present from

her grandmother,

who loves her.

At twenty-nine my own gifts

of seduction

have been squandered. I rise

to Romance

as if it is an Occasional Test

in which my lessons of etiquette

will, thankfully, allow me to fail.

My father and mother both

used to warn me

that “a whistling woman and a crowing

hen would surely come to

no good end.” And perhaps I should

have listened to them.

But even at the time I knew

that though my end probably might

not

be good

I must whistle

like a woman undaunted

until I reached it.

love is not concerned

with whom you pray

or where you slept

the night you ran away

from home

love is concerned

that the beating of your heart

should kill no one.

She said: “When I was with him,

I used to dream of them together.

Making love to me, he was

making love to her.

That image made me come

every time.”

A woman lies alone

outside our door.

I know she dreams us

making love;

you inside me,

her lips on my breasts.

When I no longer have your heart

I will not request your body

your presence

or even your polite conversation.

I will go away to a far country

separated from you by the sea

—on which I cannot walk—

and refrain even from sending

letters

describing my pain.

With their money they bought ignorance

and killed the dreamer.

But you, Chenault,* have killed

the dreamer’s mother.

They tell me you smile happily

on
TV
,

mission “half-accomplished.”

I can no longer observe such pleased mad

faces.

The mending heart breaks

to break again.

* The assassin of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s mother, Mrs. Alberta King. His plan had been to murder Martin Luther King, Sr., as well.

What is the point

of being artists

if we cannot save our life?

That is the cry

that wakes us

in our sleep.

Being happy is not the only

happiness.

And how many gadgets

can one person manage

at one time?

Over in the Other World

the women count

their wealth

in empty

calabashes.

How to transport

food

from watering hole

to watering

hole

has ceased to be

a problem

since the animals

died

and seed grain shrunk

to fit the pocket.

Now

it is just a matter

of who can create

the finest

decorations

on the empty

pots.

They say in Nicaragua

the whole

government

writes,

makes music

and paints,

saving their own

and helping the people save

their own lives.

(I ask you to notice

who, songless,

rules us

here.)

They say in Nicaragua

the whole

government

writes

and makes

music

saving its own

and helping the people save

their own lives.

These are not containers

void of food.

These are not decorations

on empty pots.

Today I am at home

writing poems.

My life goes well:

only a few sirens herald disaster

in the ghetto

down the street.

In the world, people die

of hunger.

On my block we lose

jobs, housing and breasts.

But in the world

children are lost;

whole countries of children

starved to death

before the age

of five

each year;

their mothers squatted

in the filth

around the empty cooking pot

wondering:

But I cannot pretend

to know

what they wonder.

A walled horror

instead of thought

would be my mind.

And our children

gladly starve themselves.

Thinking of the food I eat

every day

I want to vomit, like

people who throw up

at will,

understanding that whether

they digest or not

they must consume.

Can you imagine?

Rather than let the hungry

inside the restaurants

Let them eat vomit, they say.

They are applauded

for this.

They are light.

But

wasn’t there a time

when food was sacred?

When a dead child

starved naked

among the oranges

in the marketplace

spoiled

the appetite?

How I miss my father.

I wish he had not been

so tired

when I was

born.

Writing deposit slips and checks

I think of him.

He taught me how.

This is the form,

he must have said:

the way it is done.

I learned to see

bits of paper

as a way

to escape

the life he knew

and even in high school

had a savings

account.

He taught me

that telling the truth

did not always mean

a beating;

though many of my truths

must have grieved him

before the end.

How I miss my father!

He cooked like a person

dancing

in a yoga meditation

and craved the voluptuous

sharing

of good food.

Now I look and cook just like him:

my brain light;

tossing this and that

into the pot;

seasoning none of my life

the same way twice; happy to feed

whoever strays my way.

He would have grown

to admire

the woman I’ve become:

cooking, writing, chopping wood,

staring into the fire.

I said to Poetry: “I’m finished

with you.”

Having to almost die

before some weird light

comes creeping through

is no fun.

“No thank you, Creation,

no muse need apply.

I’m out for good times—

at the very least,

some painless convention.”

Poetry laid back

and played dead

until this morning.

I wasn’t sad or anything,

only restless.

Poetry said: “You remember

the desert, and how glad you were

that you have an eye

to see it with? You remember

that, if ever so slightly?”

I said: “I didn’t hear that.

Besides, it’s five o’clock in the a.m.

I’m not getting up

in the dark

to talk to you.”

Poetry said: “But think about the time

you saw the moon

over that small canyon

that you liked much better

than the grand one—and how surprised you were

that the moonlight was green

and you still had

one good eye

to see it with.

Think of that!”

“I’ll join the church!” I said, huffily,

turning my face to the wall.

“I’ll learn how to pray again!”

“Let me ask you,” said Poetry.

“When you pray, what do you think

you’ll see?”

Poetry had me.

“There’s no paper

in this room,” I said.

“And that new pen I bought

makes a funny noise.”

“Bullshit,” said Poetry.

“Bullshit,” said I.

I have a friend

who is turning gray,

not just her hair,

and I do not know

why this is so.

Is it a lack of vitamin E

pantothenic acid, or B-12?

Or is it from being frantic

and alone?

“How long does it take you to love someone?”

I ask her.

“A hot second,” she replies.

“And how long do you love them?”

“Oh, anywhere up to several months.”

“And how long does it take you

to get over loving them?”

“Three weeks,” she said, “tops.”

Did I mention I am also

turning gray?

It is because I
adore
this woman

who thinks of love

in this way.

Staying overnight in a friend’s house

I miss my own bed

in San Francisco

and the man in my bed

but mostly just

my bed

It’s a mattress on the floor

but so what?

This bed I’m in is lumpy

It lists to one side

It has thin covers

and is short

All night I toss and turn

dreaming of my bed

in San Francisco

with me in it

and the man too sometimes

in it

but together

Sometimes we are eating pastrami

which he likes

Sometimes we are eating

Other things

My daughter is coming!

I have bought her a bed

and a chair

a mirror, a lamp

and a desk.

Her room is all ready

except that the curtains

are torn.

Do I have time to buy shoji panels

for the window?

I do not.

First I must write a speech

see the doctor about my tonsils

which are dying ahead of schedule

see the barber and do a wash

cross the country

cross Brooklyn and Manhattan

MAKE A SPEECH

READ A POEM

liberate my daughter

from her father and Washington, D.C.

recross the country

and present her to her room.

My daughter is coming!

Will she like her bed,

her chair, her mirror

desk and lamp

Or will she see only

the torn curtains?

When Golda Meir

was in Africa

she shook out her hair

and combed it

everywhere she went.

According to her autobiography

Africans loved this.

In Russia, Minneapolis, London, Washington, D.C.

Germany, Palestine, Tel Aviv and

Jerusalem

she never combed at all.

There was no point. In those

places people said, “She looks like

any other aging grandmother. She looks

like a troll. Let’s sell her cookery

and guns.”

“
Kreplach
your cookery,” said Golda.

Only in Africa could she finally