Distressed fabric, I
did it the hard way.
These creases are real—I
only wish I had smiled more
when these uncloaked
skies came into view.
Author: Arambler
Minnehaha Falls
Abandoned and crowded, you
are my calm in a steady roar
on a warm Sunday afternoon.
Hidden but no secret, you
remind me to cease
my underestimation
of the middle. Oceans
are my soul edges—today
here lies my heart. Just for today.
Feigner
My own private alley
is not for parking
ideas unless they’re going
in reverse. New words
to my ears tumble
from your mouth
to tempt me to pretend
to fall from an open window.
You who won’t trespass
against me—will you
catch me on the way
down?
Will the ivy on brick
tie us together
for a moment? I close
all blinds on the east side.
Brown Foams
“What is the Mississippi River?—a washed clod in the rainy night, a soft plopping from drooping Missouri banks, a dissolving, a riding of the tide down the eternal waterbed . . . down along . . . and out.”
—Jack Kerouac, On the Road
Heavy legs won’t lift
the feet so easily over
cobblestoned walkways
on the West Bank. I make believe it’s winding
north, but I’m the one
doing the twisting slowly upward. The water flows
south over falls that used to be
natural spilling below. Louisiana
steam has backwashed against the current
to fill up this Minnesota atmosphere.
It could happen. Anything is possible. Weather is everywhere—
weather is god. I am everywhere
weathering god.
The Sighting
Cold trapped beneath
redwoods outside
the Henry Miller Memorial
Library doesn’t deter me
from standing against evening grain
to see you straight
ahead performing. I know that sound
of aching beauty won’t last. I only wish
those graceful branches could
suspend
the deep wails
from your blues harp the way
these trees, those mountains, the rocks, that ocean hold
steady. You pack up
your guitars and you’re gone
down Highway One. I don’t see you
drive away, but I know
I can feel the air stir
from notes dropping
around substantial roots.
Big Sur
How to memorize a place
like Big Sur
without becoming a thief
is a mystery no cabin
key with a plastic Holiday Inn
shaped tab can slide into, let alone
unlock. It hurts
to witness this dangerous
beauty’s power to break into
the securely fastened chamber
of emotion inside
me. It’s not the dilemma
of choosing to die by a roadside
snake bite or by becoming roadkill
under the wheels
of a musician who never was your lover’s van.
It’s not a choice. The white line will crop the shoulder
how it will at the most substantial curves
in the two lane highway. And I won’t remember
when they come—so busy trying to commit
the impossible reality
of rock and wave and height and crash
to a memory that cannot be
committed. And I could be
in my wobbly attempt.
Ripplewood in the Redwoods
Across Highway One
from where I slept, from where a hummingbird swept
into the brush to alert me to another
day, I wait.
Fog never fully rolls back to reveal
those mountaintops but allows the sun to be exposed
and exposing
as hours progress. Seams between
sky, ocean, cliff
recede. I’m not waiting—I’m opening receptacles
to turn-outs and drop-offs and rock-ons.
Pacific Saudade
This Noguchi sculpture encased
in glass on the departures level inside the San Francisco Airport soothes
my incurable longing
for what those Big Sur rocks would not release. That he could have been
my soul mate doesn’t matter—he’s been gone
since I was a young woman. That this other creator
of darkest beauty could be is
a lie I tell myself
to keep my feet from straying
off the cliff side path. I believe in
an art that mates soul to soul for a moment. And that is enough
to fly home on.
In a Serious Room
“Waiting like a longbodied emaciated Modigliani surrealist woman in a serious room.”
—Jack Kerouac, On the Road
She who passes
the art test will be cursed
with elongated worry—the weight
of aluminum confused
with its atomic
number 13. She never believed
a number could sink her
dream. Has not encountered quick
sand, is not willing to take
the risk. She takes high
bridges over vehicles to knock
the wind from her diaphragm
of fear, pauses abnormally long
before crossing
any street. Then she runs a quick
rodent race across, laughing
all the way
at herself. She knows how
to do that—has been
doing it for years.
Even as she prepares her face
for that stranger she believes
would catch her before
she spilled over a cliff,
she giggles at the distortion
in the mirror.
Day 2,822
Take off
the wheels,
hang the amputated
boards on a café wall.
If you don’t want
opinions, don’t go
on display. Rent the piano
in the public library
for an hour so you can play
inside a sealed chamber. Or,
collect yourself
into a scream
that will skate outside.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 