Waterways:

Poetry in the Mainstream

2000

October

Waterways: Poetry in the Mainstream October 2000

We ought to dismiss our mistake as soon as it is detected; but we are taught to cherish it.

from POLITICAL JUSTICE (1793) William Godwin

WATERWAYS: Poetry in the Mainstream

Volume 21 Number 9 Designed, Edited and Published by Richard Spiegel & Barbara Fisher Thomas Perry, Admirable Factotum October, 2000

Joy Hewitt Mann Joanne Seltzer Lyn Lifshin Don Winter Herman Slotkin Robert L. Brimm

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Pearl Mary Wilshaw Susanne Olson Terry Thomas Ida Fasel Susan Snowden Marc Widershien

c o n t e n t s
12-14 15 16 17 11

Will Inman Kit Knight Paul D. McGlynn Gerald Zipper John Grey

19-22 24-25 27-29 26 23

7-8 10 9

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Albert Huffstickler 30-32

Waterways is published 11 times a year. Subscriptions -- $25 a year. Sample issues -$2.60 (includes postage). Submissions will be returned only if accompanied by a stamped, self addressed envelope. Waterways, 393 St. Pauls Avenue, Staten Island, New York 10304-2127 2000, Ten Penny Players Inc.

William Godwin 1756-1836

Sometimes it was easier just to be you to pull your world into my mind let you take my quiescence for granted.

After the Prom - Joy Hewitt Mann

It was the pineal gland, my armpits smelling of three-year-old patchouli, this house, each piece we picked up at some goingout-of-business store, at Sally Ann, or some used-to-be-my mother's sale, a metaphor of the life we had together, stripped and redone in contemporary skin.
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Years later there is just enough love left to force the moans and trembles of denial, to hide in the shade of that first long night together: locked into the school gym a trampoline to break my fall bounce me to the hard floor.

Uncle Al went to Hebrew school with one of the ringleaders of the Purple Gang. My uncle sometimes talked about his old friend, gunned by the police.

No One is Perfect - Joanne Seltzer

The problem was, he had a fault. Everyone is entitled to one fault, right? Most of us have many faults. That guy had only one: he liked to kill people."

"He was big hearted, smart, devoted to his parents, a dependable buddy.

first appeared in Haight Ashbury Literary Journal 5

On a grey bridge in the House of Holocaust, in lifeless light, etched in grey ground glass letters, on the roster of shattered shtetlakh, is Khaschevata: where mama and papa were Malkele and Duvid'l; where the climate was blustery in winter, blistering in summer, muddy in between, and deadly dangerous all year long; where they learned love and marriage, and cholera shriveled their two little boys. From what acquifer of courage did they draw to split and shed that life to make mine?
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Courage - Herman Slotkin

Before the rain stops and I can turn the computer back on, I watch the burned grass and terra cotta shine. In another house we lay in afternoon darkness behind shutters rain pelted. Lights off, I thought something that simple could keep you hostage. By the time you were on radio air hardly a tree was dripping, as I was. For a day, this pewter,

Thunder, June - Lyn Lifshin

sunless late afternoon soothes. So much glistens under the low hood of air. Delbert McClinton's blues on the radio, I think of the blue painted juice cups my sister and I fought over, tho far from the last thing we couldn't share. Now I should use them. Forget worrying about what is fragile, won't stay, have them brimming with orange
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juice suns

Large Shipments of Baggage - Lyn Lifshin Large shipments of baggage have been sent to the ghetto since May 25. Everyone is puzzled. The bags are full of clothes of all sorts transported each day by trucks, some 5 ton vehicles. There are big ware houses for this. No one knows what the huge trucks are carrying. We see improvised sacks made from rugs, blankets, sheets,
May 30, 1942

bundles not packed by their owners but by other hands full of clothes, linen, bedding. All disinfected. Shirts and slips rolled together. Some underwear. Nearly all the jackets and coats have traces of having been ripped along the seams. Documents, letters, papers, ID cards from different cities in Europe fall out of the bundles
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On the lot, he unweaves the hose, spreads the soap. He scrubs until a parking spot lightens to a dull gray.

Eugene Walks Off the Job - Don Winter

Hosing down the foam, he thinks of the cuts in pay, in hours, of all the times he's wanted to leave, and weighs these against his brother laid off in Wyandotte, his uncle in Coker, factories everywhere slamming shut like empty cash drawers.

He puts down the hose, walks past the parking spots with names of people he's never met. The guards seen it before. He smiles and nods. Farther than the last time, Eugene walks past rows of clipped hedges, past sprinklers repeating a slow, broken sound. Yard after yard dogs bark behind fences. A well worn emptiness in his eyes, he won't admit his greatest fear: that he'll fling his life into the distant, gray highway, past the signals blinking "don't walk," the whistle turning him back.
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Masks - Robert L. Brimm What are these ornate masks we wear to keep others distanced from our true selves? Do they not serve only to mask simple, abiding truths from ourselves?

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Tower of Babel - Pearl Mary Wilshaw Overpowered with infinite detail, sections finished, unfinished, in ruins, rose atop a mountain, frustration born of confusion regarding a proper foundation. Despite machine, life, pulley, other
P. Bruegel the Elder

tools of the day, the Tower, quasi Colosseum seven levels high, leaned backward, askew, (recalling Pisa), as royalty persisted, believed ambition, species of madness renewed,

enabled goals gone astray to be met, attained if they would just try, go through motions, order supplies, construct stairs and ramps leading nowhere, hang doors opening onto nothing, install windows . . . views blocked, shutters locked tight . . . jumbled monument to uglification doomed when foolish confounded the wise for lack of communication.
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It's rare that I regret something I did for, after all, I am a decent person, properly raised to be a good human being. What I regret the most, what haunts me through my days and nights, are things I did not do.

Failure - Susanne Olson

The old peddler, displaying her sundry wares on a tray suspended from a string around her neck, her look, disappointed, hurt, and hopeless, when I closed the door in her face A pair of shoelaces, a few snaps, a package of sewing needles, how much could that have cost?
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The adolescent boy condemned to a wheelchair, excluded from young people's confident lives, longing for recognition, affection, his expectant eyes, anticipating a greeting, a smile, unanswered by the woman afraid to intrude, to acknowledge his misfortune, his existence a kind word, a friendly gesture, a pleasant phrase, how much thought would that have needed?

The old dog, beloved but left in her kennel for days at a time, deprived of her walks, the romps she looked forward to, lived for and needed a stroll in the park, how much planing could that have required? The friend, struggling with a life falling apart, overwhelmed by misfortune, balancing on the brink of disaster A visit, a phone call, a spontaneous gesture, how much involvement could that have demanded?
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Elderly parents, alone, wanting, and sad at the end of their days, no child bringing her mother flowers when she lay ill, no daughter to hold the father's hand when he went to sleep A leave from work, how difficult could that have been? Acts of kindness and consideration, omitted, drowned in the rush of everyday life, buried under self preservation An ounce more effort, How much could that have given?

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He leaps into street light, a hungry hunter pumped up.

Social Insecurity - Susan Snowden

She sees his weapon, flees in terror, connects him in a lineup to the identity he lost in the Office of Assistance.

All he did was greet her with the remains of his manhood. Shocked society caged him, to punish the crime and polish his manners. Free now he stalks her, "for revenge," says the detective who sleeps on her futon.

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The sad-eyed philosopher who taught that the end is the end contemplates the bust of the blind poet, the millstone of Alexander around his neck. He gazes down at the prophet who seems indifferent, the blind lids dilated.

Aristotle's Bust of Homer Marc Widershien

The voyage aged him.

The seas have opened, the earth journey done, the cosmic just begun.

They gaze into their own logos a bust on a table, an expression.

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Wherever Homer dwells the human cannot know.

It's a Billy-be-damned day. Not because the sun is slanting through the goblined house; not because wind blows last year's leaves across the yard like last week's news. No. Not even because the barometer falls, lower than yesterday's polls. It's a B-b-d day because goblins rule the house, the sun is setting and leaves can make a convenient grave
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Terry Thomas

Ren Magritte: The Flavor of Tears - Ida Fasel The worm eaten leaf-bird mourns its passing, like my peach tree mauled by borers, cut down. In time we both found happiness the old stump with a sprig of green its way of saying I forgive.

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We stand here saying, No. Can we grow to sing birth to ourselves - Will Inman They stood there. And said, No. And those others, over yonder, they shook their heads. I looked around. That group, beyond, they all frowned me, No. I looked into all of them, into every pair of eyes. I took my time. I looked all the way down deep. They spoke with their lips, but their eyes wanted different. They all wanted a way through. Their mouths said me, No, and kept saying me, No. But their eyes were pleading. They wanted other answers. They did not want old hard lines. They were weary of denial. They just didn't know how to turn it around. They didn't know how to
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change. Part of them knew one thing, and part knew different. What could I say? Who was I to tell them? What did I know that might help them beyond holding fast? I looked into me. I looked into them. In a quiet voice, I said, But there's another way. There is another way. We can let go the Past. We can let ourselves be born naked. We can mother and father ourselves, we can brother and sister each other. We can choose to be who we really are. We can let our mouths know what our eyes can see. We can tell the world to sing. We can sing each other, Yes!
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from The Lucid Stone #21, Spring 2000

literary arguments and labels freeze polarities out of potential syntheses hard fixes out of would-be paradoxes : life is process not a solid-state medium, and I will walk two directions at the same time down the street of partisanship with you

Didactic Paradoxes - Will Inman

even in its saddest bars the anti-didactic ones

I was glad when I heard that Schiller first wrote his poem An Die Freiheit (to Freedom) and changed it to An Die Freude (to Joy) to pass the censor's edicts . . . and that Beethoven knew, when he put Freude to music, he was singing Freedom all through his Ninth Symphony. As if there can be freedom without joy or joy without freedom! when our work invokes serene harmony-with-all-that-is, when the human struggle seems remote, our work is not indifferent: we're remembering a future in which joy will be the weather

and i tell

I am for anti-didactics I am for didactics: i tell the didactic ones Mozart's 40th Symphony may not carry a note of politics but it affirms life all the way

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of our lives.

when our work rides rage against injustice and human suffering, our work is not only temporal: anger reflects the larger harmony when it is not present in our lives: love turns to anger turns to trust when we share our pain with hope, and trust working in our mutual hands can bring love deep into our days a sundance aligning sun and moon with earth in our every step

reality works in paradoxes i walk two ways in one street with you

when we need to sleep, sing ourselves to sleep when we need to waken, sing ourselves to waking if we don't know which is when, truth can become a fiery sting in the tongue yet sometimes we need stinging

so, dear brother, don't tell me i must be didactic and, dear sister, never tell me truth is anti-didactic: joy grows deeper than admonitions truth (like freedom) does not occur in a vacuum
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we learn on the run down our many ways of our many streets of all our lives for joy? for freedom? for truth?

from Minotaur 18, 1989

Twenty years ago when it became obvious The War Between the States was going to be settled with guns, my brother was one of 300 officers in the US Army with Southern roots. I knew George would resign and bring his training home. The South needed him; he was Virginia born. George was raised knowing the right way. Our family was shocked and shamed

Judith Thomas, 1880 Kit Knight

when my baby brother refured. Promptly, I turned his portrait to the wall and I never looked at it again. For 20 years my familyand most of the South has denied him. George led northern troops against Nashville and Yankees idolized him as "The Rock of Chickamauga." Today, I got a letter from some fool researching the early lives of famous Yankee generals
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wanting to know what made them win. I winced. The damn Yanks didn't win, they only starved us into submission. Nothing to be proud of. That clown, Lincoln, ordered Virginia's coast blockaded even before my state seceded. Politely, I answered the letter by writing, "George was raised right."

Everyone agreed It's better than he deserved, This simple stone and weeping willow By the little stream called Apple Creek, Nearby, the old clock tower, Telling legends of kindly time.

Here Lies - Paul D. McGlynn

Drank like a fool and beat his wife; Kids took off as fast as they could. One daughter says, I hope he burns in hell, And maybe that's where he is, A slab of stupid meat in sizzling juice, Senseless in nasty smoke.

But you'd never know it from this pretty place, A graceful tree and stone and stream Remembering a worthless man.
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Margaret's dead. Crabby Aunt Margaret. Found her on the kitchen floor. Died that night. First the priest, the mumbles, Heavenly Father, forever and ever. Turned out to be such a nice day. Coffee and cake in the parish hall, The talk, I remember when she. So do I: Quick first sketch of resurrection. Appearing in glory, the New Margaret, Generous, gentle as a baby bird, Lamb grazing in a sweet green field. Aunt Helen can't forget the day, So nice to little Billy. People new knew. Margaret transfigured, crowned with stars. Choirs of angels, Beatific Vision. Done her wonders. Should've died sooner.
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Inventing the Dead - Paul D. McGlynn

I believed if I'd be good to her if I tried hard she'd love me if I treated my enemies with respect they'd reach out if I were strong I'd be heard but they sneered I believed if you showed talent they'd seek you out not steal your precious bundle I believed if you were kind they'd love you not cannibalize your outstretched hand I knew a random bullet would strike the boy beside me others in my platoon might never come home but not me
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Lies I Told Myself - Gerald Zipper

It could never be me I knew age would treat me well grant me the aura of wisdom the tone of respect but joints erode breath weakens I still hold on to desire still retain hope still tell the same lies.

a fear of ghosts it began as, misty figures at the edge of the bed, scurrilous noises in the walls, the pipes, the afterlife, this life, unable to get their directions straight

Haunts - John Grey

that's just love, my mother had said, this other thing that enters the room but doesn't quite make itself known

before I knew people could leave, they were already back, ganging up on my nerves, disputing the laws of nature with my goose-bumps

that's just love, so many said to me, as much a broken record as my nights

as you do pain, squeezing it all up into a form acceptable to the stories you tell your grandchildren

you get used to it, that's the stuff of life isn't it, accommodating phantoms
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fear nothing you tell their own previous hauntings, or at least, only fear that they won't be by

One day I felt sick but I still swam because I adore the water and afterwards, I dutifully contracted pneumonia and was holed up in my room from where I could see the lake and the splashing crowds but have no part in it. At first, the thickness in my lungs poked at my cramped rib cage, exulted in its revenge but, tired of that, it, for the rest of its time, merely was, a heaviness that no longer hurt but shifted my center of gravity,

Sick Child Memorandum to Himself John Grey

dislodged the parts of me unnecessary to the act of swimming, sent them wandering.

Thanks to it, heart and mind found each other, melted, fused into this other whole thing I could splash and play in. Sickness altered the landscape forever. Through long solitary days, I saw my face shimmering out of the stains.

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A narrow, hardy leafy vine wraps around the trellis. While I have grown one way, it has sprouted another, not strong enough to straighten up on hardy bones but grabbing the wooden frame for skeleton the wind, the light, for sustenance, for blood.

Trellis - John Grey

I've learned and lived and loved for every inch of that wiry plant. It felt some days, when it all broke down for me, that it became my perseverance. From the shaky vantage point of my self-pity, I could almost see it spurt ahead, take the next cross-beam for the sheer single-mindedness of the taking.

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I think of my brother Jack singing "Danny Boy" at the Officers' Club at McDill Air Force Base to much applause from his fellow officers. This is the same brother who played cars with the fouryear-olds till he was in high school. He was a major when he died in his early forties of a cerebral hemorrhage. (this is not going to make much sense.) He stayed a child so long that I never got used to him being grown and an officer. We both sang a lot growing upanything and everything. He changed a lot, became party-line, politically conservative over time. And then suddenly he died. It's a hot night in early September in Austin, Texas at Dolce Vita and I sit outside over coffee and people-watch through the window and there's a drunk on the bench by
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Something About Windows - Albert Huffstickler

the bus stop talking to himself and laughing and if loneliness sold for a dollar a pound, he'd be a millionaire. And I am almost seventy-two years old. I was in the army when I paid my visit to the Officers' Club, a private doing my two years. I was a terrible soldieralso a terrible husband, father, provider. Jack was a good husband, father, provider, soldier and he died young. And sang 'Danny boy" in a sweet clear voice at the Officers' Club at McDill Air Force Base in Florida not too many years before death claimed him. And this is what I'm remembering now in Austin, Texas nearing my seventy-second birthday and I told you it wasn't going to make much sense and I was right.
Sept. 7, 1999 First appeared in Rame in City USA #15, Eugene Oregon

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She thought she was holding her family togetherin lieu of having a life of her own. Then, one by one, they died. First, the husband who'd left her because he couldn't handle her privateness, then her bipolar, alcoholic sister and finally her mother. One daughter succumbed to drugs, the other drifted away. Suddenly she was in her sixties and alone. She solved the problem by going to bed. Luckily, or not, she had money, could pay people to look after her. Time passed.
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The Sins of the Father Albert Huffstickler

She aged without grace, skeletal and secure in her conviction that she had failed. Somewhere inside her a little girl was crying, the little girl who cried when her father moved out because he couldn't handle her mother's privateness, And life went on as she watched out the window from her bed. And somewhere inside her, a little girl was crying. And crying. And crying. And crying.
Dolce Vita Dec. 15, 1999

First printed in Cerberus Arcadia FL XXXVIII, 2000

ISSN 0197-4777

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