Not actually the bottom,
but where the blacktop swerves, almost at right angle
on its leafy way to Mahkeenac Road,
that pleasant artery named for the people replaced 
     by those who built the road
 
The trashcan belonging to the house at the driveway’s bend
     is empty now,
and perhaps our black bear has failed to make its acquaintance 
in its more fetchingly odorous state,
as no debris is visible,
but the creature, larger now than when last 
     I made his acquaintance
at this very swerve in life’s path,
many moons before,
is snorffling contentedly in a wallow of wild roughage
not far from the hard, man-thing container
 
And wholly visible from the back-end of my car 
which I am about to load with inedibles, clothing, laundry,
     his and her laptop computers and – how could I forget? –
some garbage of our own,    
in preparation for imminent departure
 
Well, old man – or, ‘young fellow’ – we meet again!
We exchange a look,
then each goes back to his business,
mine the popping of the trunk 
and the loading of luggage happily not too fragrant
The visitor moves his feeding station a few steps, 
     to the other side of some thinly-leafed brush,
agreeing to disagree with my disaffection for his presence,
but not doing anything truly about it
 
Two minutes later, as I bear a second load for the trunk,
a car rolls up the drive and parks in front of the trashcan house, 
a mere few feet from the bear, still unambiguously present,
the car blocking my view of the scavenger
When the driver emerges, I call what I believe 
     to be a salient observation:
“There’s a bear on the other side of your car.”
He responds, “I know.”
                                                              
Not knowing what else he might know or not know
(is he the house’s owner or a short-term renter?)
I attempt a pitched-voice dialogue at uneasy distance –
the man too far for talking, the bear too close for comfort –
unwilling to take a single step toward to our visitor,
while not entirely clear on the nature of our relations.
To my neighbor I draw attention to the trash can,
implying a preference for its removal.
The other’s replies are brief and unapologetic, 
as if waiting for me to advance a quarrel,
a thing I do not easily do, whether an interested bear 
     is listening or not…
 
Minutes later, the car loaded for the long trip home,
we roll down the drive to the swerve
and glance up as the man, a woman, and a little girl
lean on the railing of the house’s abbreviated deck,
gazing down in wonder at the bear,
in what appears to be the rapture of the innocents,
as if they have utterly no inkling
     that they’re the creatures in our zoo.
                        

I too have been lost,
sometimes in the woods,
wondering both which way to go
and where I hoped to end up
Who next I would be
Who next I would love
Where to live 
(now that I was lost 
and could emerge anywhere)
Perhaps even uncertain
where to find the evening’s meal
 
It is easy to give (or recall) advice to the lost:
To keep the sun on your left shoulder,
and perhaps on the right coming back,
depending of course on where you think
     you might wish to arrive
And often, I know, it is hard to tell the trails apart,
especially when you do not know
where your destination lies 
 
So there you are, swatting at gnats,
dreading the whine of the blood-suckers,
hoping the signpost announcing “Rattlesnake Road” 
is intended only for historical interest
 
But keep in mind that from another way 
     of looking at things –
however unappealing the prospect of 
     a hungry night in the woods
waiting for the moon or perhaps the morning sun
to restore your sense of direction – 
you are always just where you are supposed to be 
 
Inshallah, say the believers
And the Vikings: “Destiny is all.”
                        

The music of the best damn soap you ever watched
     or even imagined 
How it courses its sweet corrosive dram through your gut,
the churn as intestinal as eating,
digesting, working its way through 
     the lower tract
I don't know who the hero is,
     the heroine
I'm not sure I ever will,
but I am all the seekers of 
     my father's house
I am all the stars in this particular sky
It will rain on me, if rain there will be 
I will face the storm
and dream beneath the starry sky
I will walk beneath the ruddied, thumpy,
keyed-up clouds
Venture alone to seek the trees of winter 
and hunger for their talk,
the wet-smoke tale of their thick-veined bark
 
I will gather their roots in my hands,
my nails chipped by the gathering, 
dig the grubs,
feed on the spores of fungi,
love the dark and lowering skies 
I will change with the heavens,
wait for the storm to rain arrows 
     golden with grief down upon me,
and cherish the single squawk of a crow 
as the love song 
     of the ages  
 
*The latest of my repeated attempts to invent words for an instrumental song 
by Kathryn Toyama; heard on www.youtube.com/watch?v=sf4n5VruwvU