August 2016
From 2011 until November 2015 I was Poet Laureate of Vermont, during which time I visited 116 Vermont community libraries, not so much to read but to talk about what poetry can do that other modes of discourse can't. I loved the Q&A the most, because those within the academy often ask things that show how much they think they know, whereas library patrons are inclined to ask the important things: Who's talking here? To whom? Why? Where? I hope my poems can answer those questions, that no one needs some special knowledge or language to penetrate them. My twelfth collection of poems, NO DOUBT THE NAMELESS, is just out, as is my fourth collection of personal essays, WHAT'S THE STORY? REFLECTIONS ON A LIFE GROWN LONG. www.sydneylea.net
Final Evening at Oxbrook Camp
Our loons still scull on the pewter
calm of the lake, the chick having dodged
the eagle one more day.
The valorous drake and hen both held it
between their bodies while the raptor circled.
Reprieve. And here I am, old.
I stooped an hour ago
to dump the pail of dace I’d trapped,
then watched them scatter, the ones
we hadn’t hooked through their dorsals for bait.
Twenty or so now swim at large–
still prey, but not to us,
Who are headed home in the morning.
I’m poised to throw away this clutch
of wilting black-eyed Susans
picked wild by my wife of all these years
to grace our painted metal table,
where we lifted ladders of spine
from fat white perch, last supper.
So here I am, this aging man
who wants somehow to write
only one love song after another.
pause at dusk, I blink, I toss
Our dim bouquet into late summer’s woods.
Our loons still scull on the pewter
calm of the lake, the chick having dodged
the eagle one more day.
The valorous drake and hen both held it
between their bodies while the raptor circled.
Reprieve. And here I am, old.
I stooped an hour ago
to dump the pail of dace I’d trapped,
then watched them scatter, the ones
we hadn’t hooked through their dorsals for bait.
Twenty or so now swim at large–
still prey, but not to us,
Who are headed home in the morning.
I’m poised to throw away this clutch
of wilting black-eyed Susans
picked wild by my wife of all these years
to grace our painted metal table,
where we lifted ladders of spine
from fat white perch, last supper.
So here I am, this aging man
who wants somehow to write
only one love song after another.
pause at dusk, I blink, I toss
Our dim bouquet into late summer’s woods.
Editor's Note: I asked Syd to tell me something about the inspiration for this next poem. He wrote: "Well, it's about a rather Rabelaisian fellow (me exaggerated) and one of my oldest and dearest friends, who is an increasingly ascetic Jew, and our deep relationship in spite of our characterological differences. We met in grad school some fifty years ago and have remained bosom pals, although to my dismay he lives on the west coast."
Failing to See Through Summer: A Letter to Sol
Sizzled insects drift down from my ceiling lamp
To dot these scribbles, these clotted phrases. Ink
Smears and paper wilts in the August damp.
I write in air to gulp more than to breathe.
Who’ll recognize my failings if not you?
I always seem to seek your validation
And thus I send this on to your dour attention,
Never mind it’s bound to make you frown.
You’ve thrown out possessions, even most of your books.
You read just the grimmest Hebrew prophets now.
My claim to want to see through haze and bugs,
Abandoned hayfields dense with summer brush,
Is false, and you know it. I won’t be able. Words
Come at me thick as leaves, as raindrops, weeds,
As white-tailed hornets crowding their hive in that tree,
Despite your last note’s cautionary sentence:
“Seek out the mind’s pure cold.” You’d find yourself pleased
Were I to take as totem a single letter–
Z, for obvious instance– with which I might
Construe a simple hieroglyph for winter,
Freed from all these quiddities, this clutter.
I’d give Z all my study. No, I wouldn’t.
Such resolve dissolves in my very being,
In my constant and quenchless yen for the friendly human
Flesh of life. I can’t help gorging on summer’s
Alphabet. You may be wise. I’m not.
Consider my store of ready similes:
When I found a ruffed grouse wallow under a beech,
For example, and in its bowl a ball of dung,
Bleached white by days of sun, I likened the color
To whitewater, sperm, or cream. Then I dashed down
To my wife at our kitchen table with three grandchildren,
All eating chocolate, sloppy. My wife looked gorgeous.
Sol, it’s true: the disciplined life confounds me.
The bird’s shit would have seemed a pearl, icy,
To you. Or less. Your refinement tends to the edgy,
My appetites not. If that’s a failing, I’ll own it.
Even this late, old Eros lives within me;
My hungry gut grumbles; I whiff the laden air;
I crave the feel of the round red cheeks of children.
I greet you, my admirable Jew, although the greetings
Are clothed in unsuccess– not all unwitting.
Sizzled insects drift down from my ceiling lamp
To dot these scribbles, these clotted phrases. Ink
Smears and paper wilts in the August damp.
I write in air to gulp more than to breathe.
Who’ll recognize my failings if not you?
I always seem to seek your validation
And thus I send this on to your dour attention,
Never mind it’s bound to make you frown.
You’ve thrown out possessions, even most of your books.
You read just the grimmest Hebrew prophets now.
My claim to want to see through haze and bugs,
Abandoned hayfields dense with summer brush,
Is false, and you know it. I won’t be able. Words
Come at me thick as leaves, as raindrops, weeds,
As white-tailed hornets crowding their hive in that tree,
Despite your last note’s cautionary sentence:
“Seek out the mind’s pure cold.” You’d find yourself pleased
Were I to take as totem a single letter–
Z, for obvious instance– with which I might
Construe a simple hieroglyph for winter,
Freed from all these quiddities, this clutter.
I’d give Z all my study. No, I wouldn’t.
Such resolve dissolves in my very being,
In my constant and quenchless yen for the friendly human
Flesh of life. I can’t help gorging on summer’s
Alphabet. You may be wise. I’m not.
Consider my store of ready similes:
When I found a ruffed grouse wallow under a beech,
For example, and in its bowl a ball of dung,
Bleached white by days of sun, I likened the color
To whitewater, sperm, or cream. Then I dashed down
To my wife at our kitchen table with three grandchildren,
All eating chocolate, sloppy. My wife looked gorgeous.
Sol, it’s true: the disciplined life confounds me.
The bird’s shit would have seemed a pearl, icy,
To you. Or less. Your refinement tends to the edgy,
My appetites not. If that’s a failing, I’ll own it.
Even this late, old Eros lives within me;
My hungry gut grumbles; I whiff the laden air;
I crave the feel of the round red cheeks of children.
I greet you, my admirable Jew, although the greetings
Are clothed in unsuccess– not all unwitting.
©2016 Sydney Lea
Editor's Note: If this poem(s) moves you please consider writing to the author (email address above) to tell him or her. You might say what it is about the poem that moves you. Writing to the author is the beginning of community at Verse Virtual. It is very important. -FF