Beethoven Sings Like the Hills of Vermont (Love Poem for Schuyler), 2016

Little by little things fade
colors sounds motions
slow down and stillness begins
to pervade
back to where we came from
oh beauteous womb cradle
Soft and undemanding I look at
you
and you are still.

I had to call you see you
write you but not awake you so
I write you
couldn’t sleep any way
can’t run and hide from it
because it doesn’t go away and
besides I want it
you whoever you are beloved
the
one I have been looking for
everywhere you keep appearing
and
I keep believing and you keep
disappearing but
for now you are here in forms of
bird prints and
tiny Japanese mountains with
spirits in them the kind
you hold and feel them getting
bigger
of dancing dutch farmers and
long dead trees and
your mother’s 72 sweaters
and piles of silverware
and Cain and Abel.
I had a Cain and Abel too in my
life - both my sisters -
poor things poor starving things
we were all starving
and I fought them so I wouldn’t
die while my father tried to
kill us all because he was so
long dead of loneliness and
rage.
And you too you must be there
too because you had to get
away
go as far north as possible and
save somebody as you needed
to be
saved and then it all blows up
just like mine did because none
of them could save
me the way I saved them and so
I starved too hard for too long
and now I am recovering - from
the
blank walls the cement and
the screaming - I am beginning
to hear the birds - and you come
from a long line of birds and
you
weep when you hear them cry
and when you remember the
earth is full of the dying
creatures you are moved the
way I am - the interminable
grieving has begun and the
endless love continues.
 

And Beethoven sings like the
hills of Vermont now
In shifting greens and new heat
as I remember you
not knowing you but knowing
you like an ancient
mother lost long ago now found
dredged up from my dreams
would I recognize you when I
see you again or will I tremble
in your presence like fear
personified over your
impending loss which has not
happened
this to let you know how I long
to see you again.
As if you are those lamps you
made like light houses calling
me to your elegance
to the simplicity of your beauty
- taking that which has been
discarded and transforming it
into its original beauty - shining
light. A useful lamp.
How about if I take all this and
just believe that everything will
be all right just like the air we
breathe and take it easy? Good
nite dear one where ever you
are.