tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-68792876274248774972024-02-20T00:58:31.416-08:00Poems About Nothing in Particularby Nathan LandauNathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.comBlogger118125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-82128157735449765592012-08-31T10:26:00.000-07:002012-08-31T10:26:03.603-07:00Miller's Chapel<i>"Generally, the age of a cave can't be determined directly because the cave itself is an empty space."</i><br />-Oregon Caves tour guide<br /><br />We populate our blindness<br />with nervous laughter, shuffle<br />our feet on unseen ground.<br /><br />Somewhere a bat discerns<br />our shapes by listening.<br />You clutch my hand, moored<br /><br />to the safe harbor of palms<br />and fingers as we are asked<br />to hold a collective breath.<br /><br />Listen: dark like this presses <br />on your open eyes, your chest<br />sings out to it. Your body<br /><br />contains this absence––all<br />bodies contain some light-<br />less core. Beyond the blood<br /><br />that pulses in our ears: water<br />drops on stone like pecked<br />cheeks, wind from the lungs<br /><br />of cathedrals built by paring <br />away. The sweat on our palms <br />could fill a crevice, carve a river, <br /><br />raise a pillar someplace else <br />if given time. Bless the empty <br />spaces we could make––<br /><br />I let go, and wave goodbye <br />knowing you cannot see <br />my hand. Later, driving home,<br /><br />we hold our breath against<br />the walls of freeway tunnels<br />to keep the mountains aloft.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-73940199161525712892012-08-21T19:29:00.000-07:002012-08-21T19:30:07.326-07:00Non Finito I"Never before had works of art so clearly revealed the process that made them."<br />
Jeremy Angier<br />
<br />
I.<br />
<br />
When you die, you leave<br />
dishes on the counter<br />
you swore you'd wash<br />
<br />
tomorrow. Or is it 'you <br />
had sworn'? Tasks like that<br />
become past tense right<br />
<br />
in the middle of things.<br />
For something so definite,<br />
everything is half finished.<br />
<br />
I imagine Donatello knew<br />
this, left his works <i>non<br />finito</i>––a woman's face,<br />
<br />
pensive, praying, perhaps<br />
for hands instead of<br />
the unhewn stumps<br />
<br />
he left her; a wrestler,<br />
struggling ankle- and wrist-<br />
deep in the stone slab<br />
<br />
of his uncarved opponent––<br />
the suggestive power<br />
of the incomplete.<br />
<br />
The crumpled ghosts<br />
of your dirty laundry. <br />
Last song on the stereo, un-<br />
<br />
rewound cassette tape <br />
playing six seconds<br />
of static. Not just the dishes.<br />
<br />
The dustless circles<br />
on the counter once<br />
we washed them. Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-23513245454126349852012-04-12T18:08:00.001-07:002012-04-12T18:08:59.542-07:00NaPoWriMo Day 12: Untitled (because I am lazy in the face of the apocalypse)You tell me how long it will take<br />for the Sears Tower to crumble <br />in on itself like a star. Water will <br />be our undoing. You tell me<br /><br />the pillars of bridges will stand<br />long after their roads have fallen,<br />but dead gods are no good <br />to anyone. Corn will shrink <br /><br />to the size of a finger bone. The word<br />"bone" will mean nothing. Grass<br />will cover the streets ankle, hip,<br />waist-high––we measure the world<br /><br />by our bodies and without them<br />the world still grows. Our untouched<br />oases––nature preserves like<br />fenced-in jewels––holding<br /><br />the key to <span style="font-style:italic;">before</span> in <span style="font-style:italic;">after</span>. You say<br /><span style="font-style:italic;">the stars will again be nameless</span>.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-90873633545874283082012-04-06T17:51:00.001-07:002012-08-21T19:16:43.480-07:00NaPoWriMo Day 6: The Ongoing Search for TruthI'm told the average person tells<br />
four lies a day. One thousand<br />
four hundred and sixty lies<br />
a year. The most common:<br />
<br />
I'm fine/alright/okay. Second:<br />
I'm sorry. The third is: I know.<br />
You can understand the problem<br />
of collecting this data, like taking<br />
<br />
at face value the unseen second<br />
and third hearts of the octopus,<br />
the dreams of an infant not yet<br />
born. <span style="font-style: italic;">Invasive (of medical procedures):<br /><br />involving the introduction of instruments <br />or other objects into the body or body <br />cavities. From Latin: Invadere (see invade).</span><br />
We cannot always break things open.<br />
<br />
I will be an uncle next month,<br />
my brother's first child. They called<br />
him Little Sprout, then Big Sprout,<br />
then just Sprout. We outgrow<br />
<br />
most things given to us.<br />
When he is older, and capable<br />
of speech, I will not ask him <br />
if he remembers his dreams.<br />
<br />
I will ask how he is doing.<br />
He will say he is fine. I will<br />
say that I know Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-44588631333496476552012-04-05T21:45:00.001-07:002012-04-05T21:46:21.058-07:00NaPoWriMo Day 5: Apocalypse Pow [fragment]Entire flocks of turkeys <br />dropped dead that summer<br />out by the Air Force base.<br /><br />Heart attacks. Who knew fear <br />lived beneath the breastbone? <br />But without our association<br /><br />of explosions to progress, I suppose<br />test flight sonic booms would sound <br />a lot like the end of the world.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-21203538993852010662012-04-03T23:37:00.003-07:002012-04-03T23:42:21.000-07:00NaPoWriMo Day 3: My House is Your HouseRayne painted bricks onto the drywall<br />of her rented room in the basement,<br /><br />then vines on the bricks, a city behind<br />that. When the washer and dryer<br /><br />chattered and the water heater<br />hissed and groaned it sounded<br /><br />like somewhere far off where she ended<br />up running to. We painted a lot <br /><br />those days, footprints on the ceiling,<br />names and dates and sold the house<br /><br />that way, gallons of paint in the garage<br />the original shade of each room<br /><br />somewhere in the stacks. Look for<br />the drip-dried runs down the lip<br /><br />of each sealed mouth. Break one open<br />with a hammer and chisel and <br /><br />I'll bet it's still wet inside. <br />Whitewash everything and wonder <br /><br />what we whitewashed to get here.<br />Cleaning out the attic, we found<br /><br />a squirrel, hollow and flat and––<br />like a drum: the skin between<br /><br />his mummified ribs and limbs.<br />I was six, no, seven. Our brother<br /><br />held it aloft like a trophy, wanted<br />to make it talk, cracked its tail off<br /><br />accidentally and we all felt cursed,<br />saw our pupils as black stones<br /><br />at the bottom of every puddle.<br />In the basement the cat's foot-<br /><br />prints were indelible in fresh<br />concrete, dried sharp enough<br /><br />to snag socks or skin long<br />after the cat had died. I don't know<br /><br />why we never fixed that. Maybe<br />the same reason we sold the house<br /><br />without repaving the front walk <br />where our names and ages were.<br /><br />They're gone too, without us<br />doing a thing about it. <br /><br />There is always someone following you, <br />marring your footprints with their own.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-68010588086332171852012-04-02T19:45:00.001-07:002012-04-02T19:47:35.045-07:00NaPoWriMo Day 2: [Fragment]Crouched behind the mandolin,<br />tail twitching from under the body<br />of a guitar precariously leaned<br />against the arm of the couch,<br />our cat hunts a felt mouse over<br />and over again. <span style="font-style:italic;">It's dead</span> I say<br />over the lip of a bottle. <span style="font-style:italic;">Kill it again</span>. <br />And she does. This kind of certainty. <br />How the face resides in the marble <br />block, already smirking. How every <br />stone holds a face, a hand. How<br />we all await the chisel, the claw.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-70381809839386822882012-04-01T21:44:00.004-07:002012-04-02T12:22:32.705-07:00NaPoWriMo Day 1: DisembodiedI.<br />The telephone<br />has told me that<br />you are dead<br /><br />and apologizes <br />for bearing bad news.<br />I think it's nice<br /><br />to give the television<br />a break from being<br />death's mouthpiece,<br /><br />but do not say so.<br />I say <span style="font-style:italic;">Thank you,</span><br />and then <span style="font-style:italic;">thank you,</span><br /><br />and then <span style="font-style:italic;">goodbye.<br /></span><br />II.<br />The first telegram<br />read <span style="font-style:italic;">What hath<br />God wrought?</span><br /><br />and I think of the few<br />men gathered<br />at the rail depot,<br /><br />looking at one-<br />another, benefactors<br />to this ghostly message,<br /><br />knowing there to be<br />a man on the other end<br />and doubting still.<br /><br />III.<br />Tonight the telephone<br />will not stop apologizing<br />for my loss,<br /><br />the radio crooning<br />that <span style="font-style:italic;">every little thing<br />will be alright</span> in voices<br /><br />I am convinced exist<br />nowhere but in <br />the object itself.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-9987288354957524862011-07-30T19:17:00.000-07:002011-07-30T19:24:04.391-07:0030/30 day 30: FragmentLeashed dogs cower beneath the porch<br />before dawn. Peeling planks of wood<br />swell out nails like teeth, widen gaps<br />to yawn lazy in expectation of rain.<br /><br />You peel lemon after lemon, separating<br />each segment and salting them, a cross-<br />sectioned core of some planet, glowing<br />and never seen.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-57695245858499867612011-07-27T22:31:00.000-07:002011-07-27T22:41:04.337-07:0030/30 Day 27: You, carrying severed head on a shield. Me, the head.-W4MIt was that goddamn mirror you carried––no, hid behind––that distorted everything but your ankles, calves, the impeccable curve and crater of one shoulder from behind it. All I could see of you I wanted to keep, the hand that raised the sword a perfect sconce for a torch in winter, for cradling drying herbs in spring. To hold something with grace is a beautiful thing, you know. The sword fell and I felt your hands in my writhing hair. You will never be more perfect than this moment. I love you. I hate you. You could be preserved for all time. A work of art. Just look at me. Look at me.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-82244822090158411832011-07-26T15:50:00.000-07:002011-07-26T16:09:55.132-07:0030/30 Day 26: ApologiesYou say I would be better off<br /> apologizing to the ruptured capillaries<br /> of your neck, shoulder, collarbone.<br /><br />Some things I refuse to do. Others<br /> I refuse and do anyway. You repay<br /> the kindness by making a prison<br /><br />wall of my back, the captive days<br /> hash-marked and raw. Summer languishes,<br /> the breeze from the window, the fan<br /><br />at the foot of the bed, like lying<br /> in a shallow, lukewarm stream. Nothing <br /> will cleanse what bleeds through <br /><br />the next page, the indelible reminders. <br /> What stains and does not wash. What <br /> is not washed, in case.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-37198463607254968542011-07-25T17:39:00.000-07:002011-07-25T17:42:42.337-07:0030/30 Day 25: At Lorine Niedecker's Grave (2)<a href="http://poemsaboutnothinginparticular.blogspot.com/2011/07/3030-day-13-at-lorine-niedeckers-grave.html">I.</a><br />II.<br /><br />The groundskeeper,<br /> ill-tempered and precise,<br /> mows between each stone.<br /><br />The trailing swallows <br /> make every comment <br /> on impermanence <br /><br />we can stand. I do not<br /> believe in portents<br /> or the chattering <br /><br />of cicadas as something<br /> beautiful––moreso<br /> their husks clinging<br /><br />to the oak, the hand-<br /> rail, the front door,<br /> incapable of holding fast<br /><br />their violent contents.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-3275503389906515242011-07-22T10:41:00.001-07:002011-07-22T10:44:58.267-07:0030/30 Day 22: ReprieveThe spider starts rebuilding<br />in the middle of a storm which<br />you tell me is a beautiful woman<br /><br />in India shaking a silk Dhoti<br />after washing, the quiet claps<br />of damp cloth making thunder<br /><br />to shudder-rattle the windows.<br />Not half an inch of rain<br />since July first, I was told yesterday<br /><br />by the farmer selling asparagus<br />thick as a thumb. His crops<br />will be flooded and joyous tonight,<br /><br />with the rain which is the water<br />shed into that far-off river in sheets <br />from the garment's weft and warp.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-14336165935832672872011-07-20T21:26:00.000-07:002011-07-20T21:47:39.300-07:0030/30 Day 20: Table of ContentsIn New Jersey, medical students <br />forbidden from studying cadavers<br /><br />use bone chisels to pry the hinges<br />from the morgue doors. You show me<br /><br />a film of a dog's severed head––<br /><span style="font-style:italic;">It's Russian</span> you say, as though<br /><br />that explains the apparatus<br />siphoning blood through its host.<br /><br />Nothing tragic about these days<br />spent invading the living, the dead,<br /><br />the students opening men like<br />china cabinets, reverence, care,<br /><br />setting the table with our contents.<br />The dog licks its muzzle, calm<br /><br />as we are, watching it track<br />a flashlight, turn its bloodied ears<br /><br />toward voices. <span style="font-style:italic;">This is where<br />it started</span>, you say. <span style="font-style:italic;">Now<br /><br />that machine keeps organs alive.</span><br />Somewhere, a fist of red muscle<br /><br />beats in a clear box before transplant,<br />a lung breathes deep without ribs<br /><br />to confine it. When finished, <br />the students replace the hinges and, <br /><br />inside, the bifurcated seams that split<br />their subjects are sewn shut,<br /><br />not a stitch out of place.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-10227898419317831072011-07-19T18:55:00.000-07:002011-07-19T19:40:54.139-07:0030/30 Day 19: Pity From the Sirens (2)II.<br /><br />The tired snakes writhe above me––<br />I can never tell when it's raining<br /><br />without looking out the window. Early on,<br />I would wake with a satisfied weight,<br /><br />usually a mouse, a rat, a roach,<br />consumed while I slept. Only men<br /><br />turn stony, other creatures freeze<br />from that scaly gaze I can claim<br /><br />only distantly as my own. Nothing <br />strays close these days, but the snakes<br /><br />will never eat one-another––how<br />could I destroy a part of myself<br /><br />with so much work to be done?<br />When champions plead, their hands <br /><br />make a beautiful place for bird nests.<br />Every man is bettered by stillness.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-50808938409845817492011-07-18T15:41:00.000-07:002011-07-18T18:31:26.064-07:0030/30 Day 18: Pity From the Sirens "...'Tis the tempestuous loveliness of terror..."<br /> -Percy Bysshe Shelley<br /><br />It starts at the eyes,<br />not that anyone asks.<br /><br />Too often the limbs<br />break before everything<br />is done––I have too<br />many fallen arms<br />littering my home, shields<br />as platters, swords enough<br />to shutter the windows,<br />fence the yard. <br /><br />Pity from the sirens<br />whose art needs only<br />a sweet song and <br />sharp stones, one-time<br />shows lauded for<br />sincerity and scale.<br /><br />For me, a fine line<br />between victim and<br />sculpture. A man<br />will always guard<br />his face. I paved<br />the path last summer<br />with so many stone hands.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-56596586513826715642011-07-15T18:33:00.000-07:002011-07-15T18:35:05.702-07:0030/30 Day 15: ApocryphaMy grandfather tells<br />a story so filled<br /><br />with detail it is difficult<br />to parse, the hallways<br /><br />of the boarding house<br />wallpapered with horses<br /><br />running a constant circuit,<br />the veranda partially<br /><br />screened, mosquitoes<br />invading nightly. But it is not<br /><br />the hooves of horses which<br />make the racket he pounds<br /><br />on the dining room table<br />of our now-modest home, it is<br /><br />the footfalls of a ghost<br />which braves the insects<br /><br />and wanders the veranda<br />after thudding down<br /><br />the eighteen––<span style="font-style:italic;">eighteen</span><br />he is quick to repeat––<br /><br />stairs of the house.<br />He counted them nightly,<br /><br />counts them now, and<br />as he leads me through<br /><br />every haunted room,<br />I consider the crop circles<br /><br />outside Verona, the pressed<br />grass fallen like dead men<br /><br />in rows, which, viewed<br />from above, make<br /><br />an asterisk, an ampersand,<br />the last period in a sentence<br /><br />which nobody knows began.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-79843694534831678452011-07-14T15:49:00.001-07:002011-07-14T15:55:31.220-07:0030/30 Day 14: The Exotic OtherOn a minimalist kick.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">The Exotic Other</span><br /><br />Conical mounds, linear, effigy,<br /> the last in the shape<br /> of an animal only<br /><br />if seen from above.<br /> In a fistful of earth,<br /> shards of pottery,<br /><br />blades of glassy stone,<br /> a tooth, a tarsus.<br /><br /> .<br /><br />A skeleton shipped<br /> from Rochester,<br /> catalogue number<br /><br />drawn in pencil<br /> on the parchment<br /> floor of the pelvis.<br /><br /> .<br /><br />An African village,<br /> transplanted<br /> to the world's fair,<br /><br />six months of buzzing<br /> generators, impossible<br /> Ferris wheel, Pabst's<br /><br />first blue ribbon. Imagine<br /> going home. Imagine<br /> not going home.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-86692183586032390562011-07-13T19:25:00.000-07:002011-07-13T19:43:39.935-07:0030/30 Day 13: At Lorine Niedecker's GraveTook a field trip to Ft. Atkinson today with the residential poetry program I'm TAing.<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">At Lorine Niedecker's Grave</span><br /><br />Why do I always leave<br /> the milk on the counter,<br /> just long enough for it<br /><br />to spoil slightly before<br /> I replace it at lunch, <br /> sour little secret;<br /><br />my keys on the shelf<br /> staring me down as I<br /> walk out the door;<br /><br />my pen on the table<br /> of a dead poet consumed<br /> by remembering <br /><br />every detail, small <br /> as a seed, hidden as <br /> a pencil that has replaced<br /><br />a bone in a living bird?Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-51441042289159847642011-07-12T20:34:00.000-07:002011-07-12T20:44:15.027-07:0030/30 Day 12: Yes/No/Maybe/Never/AlwaysWhen Aron hands me back the joint<br /> and asks if this is what I thought<br /> it would all be like––it all being,<br /> I thought, the spacious interior<br /> of his father's SUV, my body<br /> cradled in a palm of plush leather,<br /> a gently closed fist of metal,<br /> skyline receding behind us, all<br /> aglow and shrinking behind<br /> the hills as teeth behind lips––Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-22281251699135465042011-07-11T20:33:00.000-07:002011-07-11T20:34:29.991-07:0030/30 Day 11: FragmentThe body is a timeshare of doubt<br />and overconfidence, each one<br />drifting in and out, leaving their<br />small, accumulating messes.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-66984289345929741012011-07-10T14:42:00.000-07:002011-07-10T15:02:08.711-07:0030/30 Day 10: Natural PhenomenaThe horse inhales deeply<br /> as it is saddled, and holds in<br /> hope that the rider will not<br /><br />notice. The coyote gnaws<br /> off her own front leg from<br /> the trap that has snared her,<br /><br />counts this as a victory. I think<br /> about points of entry without<br /> exit as my uncle flays a shad<br /><br />still flopping on the gunwale,<br /> this to use as bait for larger<br /> game. He spears a knot<br /><br />of flesh around a palm-sized hook,<br /> casts, waits. The horse will release<br /> its breath only when the rider<br /><br />is mounted, toppling him from<br /> his loose throne. The coyote<br /> will wait for the limb to die<br /><br />before murdering the family cat.<br /> The sturgeon which has taken<br /> the bait deep below is older<br /><br />than I am, and in its surfacing<br /> has irrevocably tangled our lines.<br /> The shad, half-skinned, flops<br /><br />into the water and disappears.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-15508754952513133722011-07-09T18:36:00.000-07:002011-07-10T07:37:18.153-07:0030/30 Day 9: Navy PierShe places a pile of ash ten<br />feet from the last, measuring<br />by footsteps toe-heel-toe-heel<br />as you tell me that everything<br />made by human hands looks<br />terrible under a microscope.<br />Constellations reveal themselves<br />in the poured concrete, but I don't<br />mention it, the woman's bicycle<br />(given over to the appetites of rust)<br />balanced with one hand as<br />the other, coated, ghastly, cradles<br />another half-cup measure mountained<br />like gray flour. You say that nature<br />presents itself as a beautiful series<br />of boxes within boxes, and here<br />the messy particulars of life and<br />death meet––what is contained<br />contains, what holds is also held.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-57592672682464168272011-07-07T19:24:00.000-07:002011-07-09T18:34:55.322-07:0030/30 Day 7: ThriftThose mornings we rose to the newspaper<br />splayed across the living room floor, enough<br /><br />red ink for a murder scene, our mother<br />poring over classifieds: everything<br /><br />given was received, sought was found.<br />Here, a couch made home by wasps<br /><br />last summer, a canoe portaged a county<br />too far, our city rivers thick and silted.<br /><br />Every harvest took planning, the hand-<br />drawn map pointing the way from one<br /><br />discarded oasis to the next and, on her<br />return, the living room became an orphanage<br /><br />of mis-matched furniture and crooked lamps.<br />The house was a weakened body after a vital<br /><br />transfusion––every surface new and flushed<br />with life, none of it recognizable as our own.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6879287627424877497.post-13358379447155429142011-07-06T13:56:00.000-07:002011-07-06T13:57:16.955-07:0030/30 Day 6: Distance2.<br /><br />Here changes momentarily, a rail-<br />road, a bridge across the creek that<br /><br />splits a tiny town in two, a silvered<br />vein of quiet in the rocky conversation<br /><br />between shores. But already, here<br />is fields of grass shorn for the coming<br /><br />heat which have hosted wars and their<br />children––you can almost see the bone-<br /><br />meal beneath the bonemeal. Here is<br />not the forest, but the memory of trees,<br /><br />and not the leaves, but rich earth<br />in their burned stead.Nathan Landauhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15192227257742194090noreply@blogger.com2