ACCOUNT OF MY DAYS

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6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15
16 17 18 19 20

  keyword(s) in poems:

Sequence: 17

THE PROMISE
We live without distinction, keeping up...


RESTATEMENT
the stream breaking on the rocks...


GO TO LEONARD SPRINGS
walk past the gush and then...


WINGED HOUR
swallows' multiple flights...


PARALLEL WORLDS
one world...


I MEAN
the clocks do not tire of themselves...


DRAWN ON
now that the shadow deepens...


TO ERIC
You appeal often to Reason as if...


untitled
the stone says...


8/25/09
it was hot like this...


SUMMER IS ENDING
the evenings draw off together...


DOUBLES
there are two rocks in my woods...


9/8/09
towers and arms of the wind farm...


GHOST
what is a ghost?...


A STORY OF COMING TO AND LEAVING THIS PLACE
the crossing is marked by the feet...


untitled
when we leave...


TIMES OF SUN AND CLOUDS
morning half full of sun...


KEEPING A PIECE OF BLUE
in this wind the trees throw...


THEFT OF LINES FROM SPICER AND BOBROWSKI
the river flowing in curves...


10/12/09
moon...


AUTOBIOGRAPHY VOL. IV
we had been told many things...


OH IT'S YOU
pardon me...


BLOWING IN
trees shaking their heads in the wind...


untitled
one's thin shadow...


GRIEVERS AND GLEANERS
the grievers and the gleaners...


11/1/09
last night's moon so full...


VARIATION ON A THEME
well after midnight...


LOOKING AT A FLY
how far back to our common ancestor?...


BUILT WELL
the temples...


WHERE WE MAKE OUR HOMES
the light turns its edge towards us...


LISTEN LEARN
the flames flying...


THE GODS
when the gods remember...


ROUTINE
Every morning, coming out of sleep into ...


SHAKING THE MIRROR
I hold the mirror with both hands...


I WROTE A POEM
that's enough for one week...


BLACKWING CROW
feet tight around the branch...


ECHO
blackwing crow...


WINTER CROWS HOUSE SILENCE
winter gnawing on bones...


IDEA FOR A POEM
as it has overtaken us...


THEFT OF A LINE FROM WHITMAN: THIS WINTER
five thousand games of solitaire...


COMMENTARY
the spider is history...


WHERE IT GOES
west of the west...


ONE BY ONE
inamorata...


untitled
through all the storms as light fell to halflight...


HE TOLD ME
it won't hurt you...


THE ORDER OF THINGS
last night's flood gone...


ALL SOLITUDES ARE THE SAME
All the solitudes. Each keeps to ...


STONECRUSHER
I went back to the roads I grew up on and walked daily...


RELATIONSHIP
oh words...


TAKE STEPS
steps...


MEANS
what means love...


THE SPILL
we can talk about the spill...


THIS IS THE EIGHTH ATTEMPT
no help coming from my former self...


MUCH
the weight I had at five...


SLEEPING IN THE RAIN
drawing a circle...


INSIDE
a craving in our hands...


TIME
back and forth back and forth...


SO FAR AS I CAN AGAIN
the trees at night stretch out...


NAPPER'S MOTTO
every action requires strength...


AUTOBIOGRAPHY VOL. V
I disappeared...


8/10/10
a dry touch strokes the land...


IT WILL WAKE
the drunken species...

1937


the Ohio in flood
my parents have not yet met

my father is a young man 
trying to work out a way
to avoid being a farmer
and just beginning to
fail at one alternative after another
he has not yet reached the last one
and failed at it too
which will force him to show
his true excellence

my mother is still in school
and probably already as angrily unsatisfied
as she will be later
probably as funny and beguiling
as greedy of attention
as sharp-tongued and sad
as eager to tell a story
probably already dreaming of mountains and cities

far to the south of them
another Ohio lays on top of the first
together they escape the banks
that have always defined "Ohio River"
and run over the surrounding lands
ruining homes and scraping away crops
killing and exiling many

for ages people have preferred to live by rivers
it offers many advantages
especially as settlements grow larger
they crowd their houses near the water
they send and receive by it
they get their news off it
and from time to time this happens
and they get their sorrow too

what did my mother and father hear about it?
a disaster so far away it couldn't touch them
but close enough there must have been much talk
probably their knowledge of it was slight
and quickly drifted to the back of the mind
life can be hard enough to account for
without worrying about others' heartaches