Awakening in Early Autumn

 by Brett Rutherford

(Adapted from Emperor Li Yü, Poem 5, to the tune of "Hsi Ch'ian Ying")

As my eyes open,
     the morning moon,
     pale crescent, sets.
Ashes remain;
     the incense smoke is gone.
Cold, too, the coals
     beneath the brazier --
I must wait for my tea.

Calling no one, I rest
     on this pillow and that,
remembering --

Who was I with? what
     was her name?
No matter! Right now
I have a craving
     for the scent of hay.

 Listen!
Off in the sky somewhere,
     swans weakly call.

Above me,
     on the lattice-work
     of cherry, the orioles
          hungry, unsatisfied,
dart off to fuller branches.

Chrysanthemums, those
     drooping dowagers,
          fade and fall.
No one is up. Later,
these garden embarrassments
will vanish, be sure!

Red maple leaves
     and desiccated petals
litter the enameled floor
     and clog the courtyard.

Sweet autumn carpet,
     crispèd and melancholy:
I shall have it left unswept.

I want to watch what
     the feet of dancers
          do to them.

 

At the Door

 by Brett Rutherford

The Mennonite minister,
persistent, soul-saver,
sniffing the unsaved
in our unruly house,
knocks at the door again.
It is his third attempt.

I peer out, as screen
door is the only thing
between me and his
elder-beard eminence.

"Are your parents home?"
he asks dismissively;
no child alone
is worth his trouble.

I am brimful of movies,
Sinbad and flying saucers.
"You see those marks
on the hillside up there?" —

"Yes, boy, what of them?"—

"Those are the tracks
of the Cyclops. It came down
this morning and ate
my mother." — 

"Is your father home, then?" — 

"See that scorch mark
in front of the garage?
That's all that's left
of my father
when the death-ray took him." —

"Now see, here, boy --
to lie is a sin. Besides,
I can hear their voices."

From out the living room
the shouting rises.
"Son of a bitch! Bastard!"
my mother shouts.
"What kind of man — "
"You are my wife!"
he bellows back.
"Son of a bitch! Bastard!"
she yells again.

"Oh, well!" mutters
the bearded Anabaptist.
"I’d best come back
another day."

 

September Sarabande

by Brett Rutherford

It is the night most singular,
alone of all the nights of the year,
when those who were loved
and those who truly loved them,
drift as ghosts in the grim dark.

Night-blooming jasmine smothers them,
as a blue moon makes blind their eyes.
Cruel fate torments them. No fingers
touch as, back to back, they dance
a silent sarabande, eyes to the ground.

The names they whisper, yearning,
are drowned by the night-sky’s wail,
as constellations from their dread
seducers flee, or from the wrath
of jealousy — even stars are denied
the company that most pleases them.

At dawn, they resume their places,
placid and cold beneath the ground,
side-by-side with detested partners,
head-to-foot with dreaded sires.

As burning sun warms up the stones
and the names and vows engraved
upon them, the dance is forgotten.
By name, by date, for all of time,
love’s crucifixion grinds on.

  

La sarabande de septembre

C'est la nuit la plus singulière,
seul de toutes les nuits de l'année,
quand ceux qui étaient aimés
et ceux qui les aimaient vraiment,
dérivent, fantômes dans l'obscurité sinistre.

Le jasmin nocturne les étouffe;
une lune bleue aveugle leurs yeux.
Le destin cruel les tourmente.
Pas de doigts toucher comme,
dos à dos, ils dansent une sarabande
silencieuse, les yeux baissés.

Les noms qu'ils chuchotent, désireux,
sont noyés par les gémissements
du ciel nocturne, tout comme
les constellations lointaines fuient
les ruses d'un séducteur,
ou la colère de jalousie
— même les étoiles sont refusées
les compagnons qui leur plaisent le plus.

A l'aube, ils reprennent leurs places,
placide et froid sous terre,
côte à côte avec des partenaires détestés,
cap à pied avec des parents redoutés.

Alors que le soleil brûlant
réchauffe les pierres
et les noms et vœux qui y sont gravés,
la danse est oubliée.

Par nom, par date, pour toujours,
la crucifixion de l'amour continue.

 

 

Open Stacks

by Brett Rutherford

Does your library

have one too?

A special kind of reader,

I mean. I thought

to ask you, as you maintain,

as we, the open-stack

philosophy that lets our patrons

roam freely from A to Z,

zero to infinity, from LOC

to the dusty old Dewey.

Free-range readers, I call them.

We treasure those visitors

who shun the computer,

turn up their nose at car catalogs.

They want to scan, to touch,

to run their fingers along

the embossed leather spines.

They crave the accident

by which a mis-shelved book

is the very one they need.

But now we have another kind —

do you have one like this?

He, or she, or they, or it,

no taller than a ten-year-old,

began at the farthest shelf

and is day-by-day reading

the whole library. Each book

comes down into a barely

visible hand; the pages flip,

so fast you can hardly see it,

then comes a sigh, and back

the inspected volume goes.

No title goes uninspected;

down on all fours below,

or stretching itself in ladder,

it is studying everything.

One day, consumed

with the thought of a prank

in the works, I walked up

in the shadowy aisle

and touched its shoulder.

"Just what are you about?"

I asked. A light flashed.

I found myself standing

three blocks away,

behind a dumpster.

And so I write to you,

and to a few others

I feel safe to inquire of:

are you invaded, too?

How far has it read?

What happens to us all

when they reach the end

and have yet to find

the reason for our existence?

Awaiting your reply,

I tremble.

White People

by Brett Rutherford

O whiter than white,

Boccaccio and Rabelais,

Petronius and Shakespeare

all got it right. Centaurs

we are, and not just down-

below. You think you know

your pedigree, but no,

methinks it is not so.

Among the married

Anglo-Saxon women,

Brit and American,

one out of every four

of babies born

are not the child

of the woman's husband.

Smug warrior:

does the pizza boy smile

when he passes you?

What of Fedex and UPS —

that guy-to-guy wink

from the drivers? What

do you think that is about?

And why does Jesus,

the gardener, sing that way?

And if your wife

should take a lover,

why should it be

your fraternity brother,

a golf club life member,

a Harvard club lounger?

Immigrants, you know,

are experts at seduction,

foreplay and extended

ecstasies. Their genes

are desperate to conquer.

And guard as you will

your own palace,

who guarded your mother,

your grandmother, and all

the women of your line?

Most played a jest

in the mating pool.

Most had a favorite child

they bore because

they wanted to.

Roman and Viking,

proud Scot and Norman

invader, Angle of old,

Saxon of German forests,

your line is laid waste

by Italy and Africa,

Spain and Oaxaca.

The bed was battlefield.

Your bored consort

opened the gate

for your welcome
replacement. 

Choosing No One

 by Brett Rutherford

     after the Chinese of Li Yü, “Yü Lou Ch’un”

The ladies have spent all evening preparing.

Just after the bath, the flesh

of consorts and concubines is white

as snow, with here and there

the blush of peach or cherry.

They all line up in the Spring Palace.

It is all for my benefit.

The phoenix flutes trill plaintively,

to make them long for me,

and me, for them,

water and cloud apart

yet yearning to touch.

As they retire, to await

decision and summoning,

the Rainbow-Dress song

goes the rounds, and fades

as the musicians stop

before each chamber.

Which one has overdone it

and fills the air with the scent

of her alluring powder?

Which one thinks

she has found a love-charm?

The aroma of their desire,

compounded by chemists

with thousand-year perfumes,

is enough to make me dizzy.

In my dark pavilion, I tap

the balustrade. Sometimes I just

pick a number; there are so many!

But then I choose: I tell

the servants to light no lanterns,

to let the red candles flutter out.

The wind is up. My horse

is in high spirits. Tonight

I will ride, and we

shall tread the moonbeams!

Autumn Day-Dreams

 by Brett Rutherford

     from the Chinese of Li Yü, “Wang Kian Nan” (Poem 3)

When, of an afternoon, I nap

before my tea at four o’clock,

I dream of forests further south

where Fall lights up the hills;

of yellow, brown bands a thousand miles

long, a vast brush-stroke across

the rivers and mountain gorges;

of all the red of maples touched by frost.

Night falls.

Among the reeds, a boat,

abandoned, sits idle,

with drooping sail,

and from above,

a figure barely seen

lifts up his flute

on a moon-crowned terrace,

a song for no one

in particular.

Nocturne

by Brett Rutherford

Wordless, he came.

No knock, no bell,

no warning phone call.

The door just opened,

and there he stood.

Weary he was

from long traveling.

A backpack, overstuffed,

dropped to the floor.

As I said, "Welcome!

So many years!

Sit down for tea!"

he sat.

And tea was made, 

bread torn

by two strong hands,

fruit, yogurt, nuts,

whatever in hand

that required no stove

at three in the morning.

Not much was said.

He had been somewhere

you would not want to go,

and this is where he fled.

"Go back to sleep," he said.

He lay beside me, damp

with the storm he had walked in;

he smelled of ashes, lilac,

apples, and wild cherry.

Asleep, he wept.

He was half over me,

shuddering.

I tasted tears

and the cold rain

still rilled from off

the fringe of blond hair

that covered my face.

He jolted awake.

"I dreamt," he told me,

"and in my dream

I was with you,

and weeping.

And now I wake

and find myself here!"

I traced with one hand

upon his cheek,

the salt line of tears.

His hand stopped me,

covering mine,

as each of us made sure

the other was not

some phantom.

"Oh, stay!" I cried.

"Wake not somewhere

above and beyond

this moment!"

Wordless, he came.

The door just opened.

His backpack, overstuffed,

still sat in the kitchen.

He stayed — he stays.

He is here for keeps, he says.

no matter how many

years ago he died.

Gaze Not Upon Her

by Brett Rutherford

after Callimachus, Hymn V, 56-130

Whom the gods bless

     they also blast,

heedless of hurt

     and frail mortality.

What maid would not want

to be Athena’s girl-friend,

to idle afternoons

in sheltered forests, and dine

on fine fruit and ambrosia?

Even so, one nymph of Thebes

was beloved by Pallas.

Hither and yon, to Thespiae,

Corneia and Boetia,

she rode the goddess’s chariot.

In every place the maidens dallied,

inhaling the altar offerings

or watching the ritual dances,

favored Chariclo always led them.

Although a mother she was,

neither her son nor husband dared

be jealous of an immortals’ favor.

One day Athena led her,

overlooking Thebes,

to the sweet-water fountain

of Pegasus on Mount Helicon, 

where they undid their robes

and, never blushing, bathed.

In the stillness of noon,

     not even a bird sang —

O silence ominous

     in which the splash of water

and its spray alone prevailed.

If only some young huntsman,

oblivious of the place made holy,

had not come charging through

to the very brim of fountain,

high on his horse, and looking down

on the faces, breasts, and bellies —

all taken in, in one astonished

glance, by a  nearly beardless

boy, quiver and bow and fletched

arrows behind him lie an aureole

of tiny, angry spear-heads.

The hounds came up behind;

the horse reared, the young man

choked back his cry of astonishment.

Athena’s wrath flashed out as quick

as the glance of a Gorgon.

Just as a boiled egg goes white, 

so blanched the orbs of the intruder.

He fell to the ground, and only foam

came from his still-opened mouth.

Such is the punishment

for any mortal who looks upon

a god when he is uninvited.

Chariclo, wrapped fast in her discarded

robes, now rushed to hold the fallen youth.

Athena raged: “What thirst or madness

made you come up to this flowing madness,

servant of Thebes? Did some dire spirit

compel you and your dogs to ride this way?

Still he lay speechless. “What have you done,
Athena — goddess of power supreme! — you

must undo this very moment. Not servant

of my husband lies before you — ah, no! —

but his own son, my errant son, whom you,

the goddess, have blinded! ”

                                               “Foolhardy he

came, and he has seen the breast and body

of Athena, the closest thing to Zeus

that has ever ranged the earth and heavens.

That even one doe or one gazelle should fall

to an arrow while we bathe here in peace —”

Here the companion wailed aloud in grief.

“Sad hill, sad Helicon, sad Thebes! Goddess

of inhuman pride and malice! I’d give

a hecatomb of deer if I could this avert!

With this, you have destroyed my life. No more

shall I to this fountain come, but share

in the night eternal to which you curse my son.

No more have I to do with goddesses.”

With keening voice the nightingale might

study for a lesson in mourning, she fled,

leading the stiff and stumbling victim away.

Athena, startled, drew up her raiment,

and, putting on her Pallas-wise helmet,
the opposite of her war-like demeanor,

strode after them and spoke again.

“Take back, o noble lady, these angry words.

I did not will his blindness. Think you I love

to take the sight from some mother’s son?

This law goes back to Kronos and is inbuilt

into the interplay of Titan, god and man.

Those who look upon a god unbidden,

see not; as one who overhears the counsel

of gods is stricken deaf and mute. As fixed

into the scheme of things as threads of Fate

is this cruel law. My anger triggered it,

and I cannot call it back.”

                                          “Then I,”

Chariclo said, “must never look again

on she I loved beyond all others.” 

Her eyes she then averted, nevermore

to look on those grey orbs she cherished.

“I can do this, Chariclo, so that you may

not curse me and my memory entirely:

Know that your son shall honored be,

so that his name shall echo in history.

I will make him a seer whom poets name,

and when he speaks from deep inside

the well of wisdom and foresight I grant,

priests will kneel and kings tremble.

He shall know the birds and their omens,

from their mere shadow falling on

his otherwise unseeing eyes. An oracle

shall he be, and live to many years beyond

a normal human span. Boetia shall know him,

and Cadmus, and the Kings of Thebes.

His feet shall not stumble, for a seeing staff,

taller than his own head, shall he bear,

and it shall guide him on land and sea,

and when he joins the shades, he shall not

be there among the ones made sightless

or speechless by their own evil doings.

He shall dine at the table of great Hades.”

The goddess spoke, and bowed her head, by which

great sign her Father Zeus was likewise bound,

for this was the power he gave her, since

no mother gave her birth, but from the brow

of the mighty Olympian she was delivered.

Fitting that Wisdom had no mother, nor did

she stumble childish on the way to power.

With thunder above, Zeus gave assent.

Thus ever were Wisdom and Power

in true accord. Hail goddess, and hail

to Chariclo and her god-empowered son.

Where shall fame take him, and who

shall tremble when his low voice speaks

the truth that those with eyes deny?

Who shall know and hear Tiresias?

His Final Play

by Brett Rutherford

Nothing was right. The promised theater
was nothing but a drafty church, whose pews
a squirming, grumpy audience assured.

 The sets, by a master painter, were lost
when rising waters tipped a truck over
and pillars, statues, trees and all
were turned from plaster to rubbish.

 The props, the lights, the engine
made to carry the gods’ chariots
aloft, sank into a hole that suddenly
swallowed a Brooklyn warehouse.

 Costumes, at least, the actors had —
or so they thought — until the news came
of the all-day standoff between police
and terrorists, at the designer’s loft,

 nothing coming, nothing going
from Greenwich Village as sirens wailed
and helicopters circled overhead.
“No, sets, no props, no lights,”

 the prim director wailed. “How now
shall we go forward? “Street clothes!”
one actor chimed. “Naked!” said one.
“In underwear!” another insisted.

Reluctantly they all agreed to share
whatever items best suited the characters
they played, regardless of fit, like children
dressed from an attic trunk of castaways.

The audience assembled. The playwright,
afflicted with a sudden itch from knee
to ankle, kept scratching thereabouts
as he addressed the audience. Just then

the words were whispered in his ears
that two lead actors had amnesia
out of nowhere and not a word
could they speak without a script.

“A staged reading,” the playwright explained.
“You have all been invited to an intimate,
once-in-a-lifetime, behind-the-scenes
staged reading. Not to be repeated!”

They stirred, they grumbled, but they all
agreed, critics and all, to suffer out
the play’s performance. The actors
sat unmoving, except for soliloquies,

where they did dance about, and fall,
and rise again, as though possessed,
and they pulled it off – a triumph! 

Still did the playwright fuss and fidget.
The itching was unbearable, till
in the shadow of the back-of-stage
he lifted his trousers and peeked —

at stiff green stems and shiny leaves,
at sprouting yellow and purple flowers
growing this way and that from out
his living flesh. As tough as wood,

they would not break, nor would
the petals of the flower loosen.
He nearly fainted. The audience pressed
on every side, hands grasping his.

“The greatest drama ever!” a critic crowed.
“Shakespeare, Euripides, and thee!” one cried.
The beaming lead actors, their memories
now restored, fell to his arms and wept.

“Tomorrow,” a wealthy patron told him,
“we will order new sets, costumes, and all.
A theater on Broadway will be cleared for you.
This is the triumph of the era!”

The actress, Claudia, dear friend, he took aside,
and showed her the botanic horror, whose host
upon his calves and thighs had doubled.
“I need to see a doctor at once” What can this be?”

“You took a lover recently?” she asked.
He nodded. “He was special, wasn’t he?”
He nodded. “Oh, not some new disease, oh, no!”
Then Claudia took his hand and continued:

“No, not a disease, not really. Tell me of him.
Was he a lover extraordinaire?” He nodded.
“A lover surpassing all human lovers?”
Again he nodded. “Did he inspire this play?”

“Again and again yes. It was as though
his voice dictated everything. I felt as though
I had been written through, as though
I were seven feet tall and made of steel.”

“Well, then, my dear, you have been blessed
and blasted both. You have been Zeus’s lover,
and you have birthed a play with him.
All fine and good, but now Queen Hera knows.”

“He said he had a wife. I said it didn’t matter.
We were perfect together. Perfect! now this?
What have I done to merit some parasite
like mistletoe all over my beautiful legs?” —

“This is his way of saving you. You must have
read old Ovid’s stories. You’ll be dead
in twenty-four hours, transformed into
a beautiful shrub I shall plant to honor you.”

At this the playwright fainted, and the rest
remains at the Botanical Gardens to see.

 

Thelma, Then Irma

by Brett Rutherford

An old house it was,
brimful of overstuffed
sofas, side chairs
and love-seats.

When we came in,

boys of ten years and six,

Aunt Thelma leaped

into action. A drawer

flashed open, and white

embroidered doilies

flew onto every place

a child might sit.

"Wait! Wait!" she cried.

"No dirty necks allowed

against the sofa,

no dirty elbows

on the arms of chairs!"

We had to wait until

every surface was covered.

She flitted nervously

throughout our visit,

edging each vase away

from table edge,

a towel draped

over her thin arm

in case of spills.

Nervous she remained,

and nervouser still,

until they took her away

to Torrance, that place

they whispered about,

where the walls were doilies.

On our next visit,

Aunt Thelma had been replaced

by Aunt Irma,

her cousin whom one took to be

Irma's identical twin.

Uncle Ron was a cipher.

No word was said, nor questions

asked, about the prior Mrs.

The house was the same,

with every doily left

exactly as Thelma wanted them.

I swear the same

chrysanthemums

stood upright in the same

glass vase pushed back

so that no passing elbow

could dislodge it.

As we walked in, she rose,

and running to bar us,

Aunt Irma shrieked,

"No dirty necks allowed

on the white doilies!

No dirty elbows either!"

Barred from sitting,

we played on the porch,

ran off to a movie,

ate in the kitchen,

then slept on beds

whose crisp sheets crinkled

over some waterproof,

germ-free mattress.

Leaving, we trailed past

the doilies, the

never-changing

doilies, necks proudly

unwashed.

Street Scene

by Brett Rutherford

He knew these streets by heart,

and could, if blinded, find his way

through every winding lane

of the old city. Some things

were ever the same, others

as sudden as meteors,

such as the kohl-eyed woman,

just now, who offered him

a basket of figs and serpents,

lid lifted just far enough to show

forked tongues and amber eyes.

One lane, off to the east

of the Scribes' Alley, was empty

(was he that late?); another,

too near the sailors' dens,

was vacant, too. One turn,

then two, and then a third

and then he leaned to look

where two young men

squatted like beggars

in Alexandria's

most infamous alley.

One spoke, in Attic Greek

as pure as poetry,

"Hail, old man, if man you be.

You may choose between

the two of us, for no one else

is left of our brotherhood.

"Dionysius we serve, for silver."

The other, in coarser tone

coaxed him impatiently,

"What, why so choosy?

He doesn't want so much,

the pretty one, while I,

I charge a stiffer fee,

if you take my meaning.

The math is simple,

if you have a purse:

He charges by the night;

I, by the inch."

Callimachus,

out far too late,

or far too early,

judging by either moon or sun,

just shook his head and muttered,

"Neither!"

The Sleeper

 by Brett Rutherford

     after Callimachus, Epigram 64

Is your bed soft, Conopion?
Do you sleep well, and dreamless,
while I crouch chill in misery
on your cold porch? Not even
one thin blanket covers me.

Yes, I would keep you awake,
and not unpleasantly. Cruel one,
you feel not a jot of empathy,
as I shiver for your company.

A neighbor walks by and notices
my toss-and-turn on marble,
nothing but my own clothes
between me and bruising.

He shakes his head and mutters,
“Another fool! You waste your time
with this professional virgin!”
And then I think of your thin frame,
black hair that will soon enough
show veins of gray, and the day
when no one looks upon you twice.

Whose porch will you then sleep upon?