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The wave breaks And I'm carried into it. This is hell, I know, Yet my father laughs, Chest-deep, proving I'm wrong. We're safely rooted, Rocked on his toes. Nothing irked him more Than asking, "What is there Beyond death?" His theory once was That love greets you, And the loveless Don't know what to say.
From The Rote Walker, published by Carnegie-Mellon University Press, 1981. Copyright © 1981 by Mark Jarman. All rights reserved. Used with permission.
Roland was a Paladin of Charlemagne, And he was my mother’s cousin. The Paladin Served Charlemagne and died, blowing his horn. The cousin spent a day with her at the fair Over sixty years ago. The great Paladin Enjoys an epic named after him. The cousin is remembered as a big kid Who never grew up. His first wife left him, Taking only the pillows from the pool furniture. Roland the epic hero was betrayed By a fellow Paladin.
Sick as it approaches, sick as it departs.
In fall the hulks of burned out houses stand unrazed.
In winter bearded with fire truck ice they stand unrazed.
The ice cream maker, the piano tuner, the ceramist and tile engraver,—
The belovèd craftsmen turn up killed at their work places.
And the river, stingy, greedy, shrinks and enlarges.
And bumper stickers protest how people like it here. The hated city.
And the loved city? Only at a distance can it be loved.
How do you turn into a flower of the field, the lily clothed to make Solomon rue his glory? What leap takes off from here towards evolution, pointing the way to the pearly everlasting? Eons made the flower and flowers have their agendas, whatever the population of the field— more than a lifetime to construct that airport.