And then this is another little batch of Washington poems
that were published in Poetry Magazine fairly recently.
"I have never arrived into a new life yet.
Have you?
Do you find the squeak of boots on snow excruciating?
Have you heard people say, 'It wasn't me,' when they
accomplished a great feat?
I have often, but rarely.
Possibility is one of the elements.
It keeps things going.
The ferry with its ratty engine and exactitude
at chugging into blocks and chains,
returning as ever to Mother's house under a salty rain,
slave up, slave down.
I want to leave this place unremembered.
The gas stove is leaking and the door of the refrigerator
stained with rust.
The mugs are ugly and there are only two forks.
The walls are black and soft, the bed
a balloon of night closing, the stairwell
sloped to a dragger's pace.
There are big windows with blind slaps dusty and gray.
Street life goes all night.
And at dawn, freed men shout and laugh outside the kitchen.
Where does life begin and end?
In the lamb or the cotton?
My pillow is my friend."