Grief Work
Crows circle in a murder, caw to mourn their
dead,
rifling this ordinary corner, gunning for the
culprit.
I lie back on a new webbed lounger.
These are the waning days of summer,
season of solace. Black birds smaller and
higher
than I remember. Neither placated nor
gracious,
not the type to gather quietly ‘round
a survivors’ table, their keening unnerves me,
like outrage I can’t muster. Cruelty’s
bred and braided, knows no surfeit--
crows darken their line of flight, scribble
in black crayon, mark the perimeter
of this crime scene. It’s instinct. We know
the pitch and tempo of such harrowing.
Why?, they cry. Why not? Even so,
sorrow’s raw, bearing down,
this racket won’t be mistaken. Behind me,
a bowl, rugged, unsettled. No one would dare
build there. I still learn to scout the limits
of my own safe standing. Closer now,
fear seeps. Audacious cries that dare
not drive away the comfort we crave.
What’s savage defies plans, hard-earned,
or magical. Compromises I once wished
would protect me... until I bargained
away
hope. Sorrow spreads wildly,
any beasts’.
The Crossing
As the days shorten, I consider my own pardon
Ready myself to drape in the full weave
Of sorrow passed down, now refashioned.
Blood’s
Warmth, the full account. Only now I see
How grace shows up. At first, a suggestion-
Antlers dart from the side brush to the right
In my periphery. Then the full view
Just beyond my windshield. A buck midway,
A fawn follows. He turns his eyes, fixes
My gaze, finds a fitting stride. Not
Rushed. (More like a crossing guard
Who ushers school kids) across
A stretch of two-lane
He’s cleared space for us. Ellipsis
That orders the sequence of passing. Time
Refolds. Pulses sync in the pause.
Lines of Flight
1.
The sweet of lush fall ferments in underbrush
and pale blue seeps
through gaps in a backlit topography of cloud.
Fair day in flux.
This tender exposition. Silken sorrow hovers
beneath my sternum,
though the wind has died down. I hush my
approach
once off the street, head toward the edge of
the pond, no expert
at hiding. To my left, marsh grass, the
kerfuffle of wings unfurling
as he takes flight. Great blue heron- churlish
rush- protecting
his privacy. Never catch him off-guard.
Yet,his take-off is show
enough: wide outstretch of wings, neck tucked
to chest, dangling
stick feet taking long seconds to retract as a
plane’s wheels
off the runway. He’s airborne, despite an
ungainly start,
gliding just above the gleaming pond skin,
headed
for some solitary perch on the small island at
the far side
shore, trained, as he is, to fly low to nab
fish. Lone majesty
here on my account. I’ve been buried before in
the screams
of my inflamed tissue. Not today. Here, to
tell
of holy time. Slowed passage. Not numb, not
raging,
no race from this wracked body. The deep ache,
the unbridled grief of a young boy with no words
for terror. On the verge, like the great
bird, I’ve new quiet to find. Sighted, free
of my own desolation, I’ve never dared...
What if I can’t cash-in on the approval
I’ve spent my life accruing? To rely
on my own estimation. Cast off accusation,
the smacking hand of a child’s warden
in whose line I’ve stood for check-out.
As if she knew my price per pound. She told me
I’m self-deluded. Weighed me, armed and aimed
each time to take me down, debit my account
Why would I participate, child raised on
discount?
2.
Back home, I prepare my perch: a new easy
chair,
in my den upstairs, where light dapples walls
painted
robin-egg blue. These days, I write in
dormers,
under eaves that enfold me in their soft
angles.
Here to unpack what I saw, the horror and the
surfeit
none of us deserve. I’d gone to catch a
glimpse
of a great bird. Even so, unsated. I
missed
the disarming white- the egrets who grace
my daily return, atop stones I’ve come to
know.
I couldn’t piece it: how they were the ones
who
circled high above my head, as I came to
water’s
edge. Their convocation headed westward:
resolved,
without remorse. I won’t ever mistake them
again
for gulls: the way their long necks lead, the
slim tube
of their bodies stretched, the unhurried
sweep of their wings. Like me, they’re
called,
who knows where. Universe expanding, too
vast, too fast. Eons will shine again
tonight
as I gaze up to find Orion’s Belt. Light sent
to me
millions of years ago. Ready now to draw my
own
star map, early fall’s constellations in a
northern sky
Note them. Date them. Before the heavens
change.
AG Compaine is a
psychotherapist, a psychiatrist by training, who works with adults who have
histories of childhood abuse. e has read and written poetry for 25 years but
last sent out his work in the late ‘90’s when e had a few poems published in
journals such as Slipstream. Meanwhile, AG and eis husband are in the
first generation of queer men to raise a daughter together. She has just
started her undergraduate studies at Yale. During the pandemic, AG moved to a
coastal town in southern Rhode Island, and e has been sharing work and
workshopping with a college friend who is a poet and writing professor.