sw00345fdl-entry7of9

Fond du Lac



Eleven
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                       Slicing between the Citgo
islands, I slip to Merrill.  The waves shrink;
the present rolls behind.  Happier, I walk
from its bright noise, and lazing through an elm
about one hundred feet away, daydream
of orioles, sparrows.  The weathered fence
of the car lot to my right seems moth dust
on my fingertips.
                         On the bridge at First,
things as they are?  By force, by fear, the sea;
by chance, the air.
                            Here, spirit--that man coming!
Who is?--I--I know him!  Yes!  Oil-rich
McNaughton.  Probably going to the bank.
But he's walking!  "Hi, O. L., where you going?"
"Church."  Judge not.  "What about you?  Coming in?"
"I guess."  Chrysanthemum sea, windy flower,
we cannot tell our closest fellow men:
we cannot tell the stars.  What can we tell?
One-fourth of us wills evil, half of us
thinks evil's holied when used to obtain
what it supposes good, one-fourth of us
seeks good through good; yet even these last rip
each other's hulls.  What is this air we breathe?!
this slender shade?!  Is logic locked in stones,
and faith alone, beyond all seeming reason?
We take this stale, volcanic century,
embrace it; love.  For what?!  Christ!?  Cross!?  We are
impossible.
                 Standing, where Merrill/ stems
Marquette: projecting beyond my eyes--the tumbling
of Main, the curve of Macy: standing, fused,
uncertain, I see my mother (softer than
a distant kite) preparing dinner, knowing
I won't be home, but worrying the same.
Or what's a mother for?
                                  That noon the ball/
went skimming over/ the fence, and spattered glass
at a butter plate, giving a couple wonder,
I was shook to envy, laughter, fear/ no sharper
than now: with O. L. in my thoughts again,
and Fond du Lac.
                          Sounds, like someone mowing!
There!  In his fifties, I'd say.  But that poppy
paisley!  He must be liberal; even so,
he slices weeds to equal heights, and we
suspect they're civilized and/ call them grass.
I suppose/ I should be at home myself,
pruning our double lot; but then, I wouldn't
be here if I cared that much about outer things.
If I cared at all, some would rub.  So what.
Does everything have to be seen, to seem
at a glance it's getting this world somewhere,
to be practical like my uncle Ben
to be worthwhile?  So we can't tell a man
by his cards, his clothes; a daisy from a cosmos;
a peach from a sun: but if similarities
conceal differences . . . all cards are jokers!
And if everything's relative . . . the grounds
for it?!  Playgrounds, neighborly fresh-mown grounds,
undergrounds?  I cannot begin to play
or cut unless I assume some absolute.
There must be grounds from which to start, or what's
this living all about?  Grandmother used
to bake gingerbread men.  If a man's junk--
atoms without meaning--why does he care,
argue: to soften the absurd?  Absurd
it is to have absurd grounds.  But what then?
Roses?  And yet, how do we get together
when one man's right is another man's wrong?
Perhaps the confines of this rock do cause
us to become schizoid (imperfect as
we are) though water flowed from a rock, a church
was built on a rock; "Choruses from 'The Rock'".
It's enough to drive a man out of his bird:
all this crazy walking around.  Of course,
I meant to challenge myself, shake the haze
from my will; face this/ century for once.  Still,
if we could be one . . . if doubts were dispelled. . . .   







 Fond du Lac: page 8
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Brian A. J. Salchert