A Benign Self-Portrait

A mirror will suffice, no doubt.

The high furrowed forehead,

The heavy-lidded Asian eyes,

The long-lobed Indian ears.

Brown skin beginning to spot,

Of an age to bore and be bored.

I turn away, knowing too well

My face, my expression

For all seasons, my half-smile.

Birds flit about the feeder,

The dog days wane, and I

Observe the jitters of leaves

And the pallor of the ice-blue beyond.

I read to find inspiration. I write

To restore candor to the mind.

There are raindrops on the window,

And a peregrine wind gusts on the grass.

I think of my old red flannel shirt,

The one I threw away in July.

I would like to pat the warm belly of a

Beagle or the hand of a handsome woman.

I look ahead to cheese and wine,

And a bit of Bach, perhaps,

Or Schumann on the bow of Yo-Yo Ma.

I see the mountains as I saw them

When my heart was young.

But were they not a deeper blue,

shimmering under the fluency of skies

Radiant with crystal light? Across the way

The yellow land lies out, and standing stones

Form distant islands in the field of time.

here is a stillness on this perfect world,

And I am content to settle in its hold.

I turn inward on a wall of books.

They are old friends, even those that

Have dislodged my dreams. One by one

They have shaped the thing I am.

These are the days that swarm

Into the shadows of legend. I ponder.

And when the image on the glass

Is refracted into the prisms of the past

I shall remember: my parents speaking

Quietly in a warm familiar room, and

I bend to redeem an errant, broken doll.

My little daughter, her eyes brimming

With love, beholds the ember of my soul.

There is the rattle of a teacup, and

At the window and among the vines,

The whir of a hummingbird’s wings.

In the blue evening, in another room,

There is the faint laughter of ghosts,

And in a tarnished silver frame, the

likeness of a boy who bears my name.