Letter to My Son From the Other Side of God

                                      from a bus in a blizzard

                                        

You asked me if I believe in God, when

I stopped, and how that happened, a question

I prayed my father would ask years ago

when I shirked that yoke of love and glory,

that guilt and story, all that sin and and faith.

You believe in physics, you say, and the way

you talk my belief sounds so distant, like

some Greek tragedy or dead Latin tongue 

chanting ancient truth from a lost monastery.

The truth is I am a prodigal, an 

amnesiac, a fraud, a minor criminal 

who bets the house that he's one confession 

removed from rebirth or salvation, one miracle

removed from the prayers I offer up even now.

But the truth is that, like you, I am godless.  

I am as empty as the void of the universe

and all that dark matter you think about,

and yet for me there will always be 

a holiness in that time before time, 

when God created order from disorder,

as if we could ever really know that 

kind of disorder.  I believe that she plucked

matter from antimatter and spun the cosmos

like a giant cotton candy machine,

spinning hot threads of pink and gooey-sweet 
substance and that this led to the great 
swirl of galaxies and light and after it all

cooled we had The Great Ocean and The Great Virus 

and aeons later The Great Lightning cleft 

the human brain so that idea and image 

might smudge and separate and lead to 

human order.

I only know I believed and then I 

did not, and when I did not I felt the 

cold.  I trembled, not out of fear for 
my soul, or guilt, or a savage sense 
of repudiation, but more the loss

of story, the loss of theory, a sudden 
solitude, so much inconsequence, 
the indifference, the lack of anything 
within the atom or the quark or the 
spaces between all that microscopic stuff -- 
it turns out there's nothing substantial about 

the cosmos at all, it might as well be 
the idea of matter, the story of matter, 
the belief in matter, in the end it's
still all an act of faith, no?

What I need to tell you, then, is about

that coldness I felt, that loss, I knew then 
that that indifference was God.  I felt alive

for the first time, son, void of feeling, the way

the universe must be like at its very core-- 

elemental and paradoxical, lacking thought 
or purpose. I was sitting at the kitchen table,

writing and listening to Chopin, my hands 

trembling, I was alone, and a dead star 
smoldered inside of me, and between the

sustained notes of Chopin, the etudes and 

the nocturnes, I felt the dark matter. 
I was a nomad, a prodigal seeking redemption
or absolution from the world surrounding me
and the terror within.

Letter to AG

Writing from the other side of God, I

need to tell you something about love.

Not that I'm expert, believe me, but

I've learned some things, I'm no prophet or

preacher but I've studied the Bible, I've done

my share of prayer, I've given witness, offered

my soul to Jesus, read Holy Scripture, 

delivered sermons, served as an acolyte 

and watched God's breath whisper across altar candles, 

passed out communion wine in tiny 

plastic chalices, dropped the body of Christ 

onto the waiting tongues of those seeking 

redemption, I've eulogized the dead, hugged 

those who were losing God, witnessed the 

holy spirit blossom from the lips of 

my mother when the insistent urge to live 

vanquished.  

                       God is not a judge.  She is a not 

a malevolent, vindictive god any more 

than she is one of those dumb nodding 

velveteen dogs you see in the back car window,

bobbing at every passing car.  She's not 

into guilt trips or sin or any of that stained 

by the Mark of Cain crap.  She doesn't believe 

in Original Sin or the birthright of evil.  

She believes in redemption because she

knows it's hard enough to find salvation

in this world.  She believes in sex and the

divine laws of the physical universe, 

the wondrous tantalizing senses, beauty, 

she wants you to enjoy yourself in this world.  

That's why she made  potato chips and 

Sugar Babies, the summer solstice and 

fireflies, mangoes and avocados, fingers 

and elbows and lips.  God is a precious 

song, a prayer, a sacred poem filled with the

 pagan stuff of life.  God does not care about 

the little things, all the wicked mind machines

we carry in our heads.  She does not want us 

to wrench ourselves into knots over 

indiscretions or the pleasures of the flesh,

over wine, over desire, over the 

contradictions of petty moralities.  

She wants you to love yourself, to accept 

yourself, to breathe and eat and love, 

to dance and make music, as we entered

the world, naked and unashamed and

holy.

SHITTING THE QUICHE/WAUWATOSA

Look, lady, I don't know

if the quiche your dog ate 

is fresh or not, it's been

in the snow for days, it

was awful, an that's why 

we tossed it out the window.

It froze, and then the fucking

squirrels got at it, they 

ate the crust, but even 

the raccoons that shack up

in the sewer wouldn't 

touch it, maybe they don't

do quiche, but they pluck 

everything else from the trash,

the jellied ham, the rotting

zucchini, the box

of bisquick, I guess

we were hoping some 

coyote might sniff it up 

and drag it off and poison

the son of a bitch but I guess

that won't happen now, 

seeing how your dog 

wandered over here and

ate the whole thing, tin foil

pan and all, jesus, all that

brie and ham, parmesan,

onion and peppers,

I mean he wolfed it down 

in frozen hunks, I don't

know how without breaking 

his teeth, jesus, imagine 

the ice chunks sliding down 

his gullet the poor son of a bitch

but I say look, lady,

we're not running a

goddamned brasserie 

here, it's a goddamned house, 

a three-ring circus of 

burnt pancake pans and

a sink full of cooked broccoli

and Kraft cheese whiz, scalded milk  

and empty wild turkey pints-- 

it's serve yourself or suit 

yourself--if your dog is 

shitting up the carpet, 

or puking lakes of yellow 

cream, or just wishing 

he were dead, his guts 

bloated like a dead opossum

on the road, I don't give 

a damn, he should have

picked the fucking

turkey tetrazini or the

pea soup or pork hocks,

but he made his bed, I

suggest he lay in it.

ARRIVING

All day we migrate south.

First, a bus that trudges 

the blizzard, gathering 

angry passengers who bitch

about cancelled flights, airport delays, 

the snow ashes drowning the world,

and the fucking cold--no wonder

no one ever takes the bus! one shouts

as we prowl deeper into the storm,

blind and blurry wet.  We make

Midway five ours late, shivering

in serpentine rows lugging 

our baggage past gates of  

the stuck, the delayed, the postponed,

terminal's  an insane sleepover,

faces hypnotized and narcotized

by florescent gloom, deep sea creatures 

insulted by the endlessness of waiting

and the gray gathering of snow, 

anxious and apprehensive, the phantasmagorical

huddled hordes, each seeking asylum

somewhere else.  The announcements 

arrive in muffled staccato, more

delays, cancellations, gate changes, 

and with each garbled message 

a wave of discontent washes 

through the terminal like

an anguished flood.  This 

should not be happening.

We deserve better, don't we?

But when our plane finally arrives

like some great ghost 

from the cold migraine,

a hideous phantom, 

an icy monster, 

an antediluvian horror 

in the fog, we board, 

in silence and shame--gone 

are the flamingo dreams  and conch shell 

cocktails, glimmers of pink crab bisque 

and sand dollars, palm trees 

and sun-drenched cabanas 

and manatees floating

gracefully in cabbages and 

mangrove swamps.  All of these 

fantasies have been rubbed free 

of the minds' wrinkles. We rise 

into the night, exhausted 

and transported into the great darkness 

that surrounds us all, the absolute zero 

of our lives, alone and drifting south, 

into the starless flowered land,

the land of hibiscus and camellias, 

of gladioli and exotic banyan trees, 

of Florida, that  great dying land 

where we all must go to die

some day.  

LETTER FROM SANIBEL ISLAND/PUNTA RASSA

Walking this old shoreline, 

this heap of shells and sand, 

this abandoned port

heaved from the gulf of death

all of the old questions return,

all of the masquerade and greasepaint

washes off, the harlequin tattoos

and carnival blues, the jester bells

and tide pool marketplace smirks

until nothing remains when

the dark psyche spills its banks,

the sun sloshes your skin, palm fronds

waver across your mind, 

the warm, bitterswet water 

laps your feet, your eyes burn like old stars, 

sacred stones, you are being 

unborn.

- - - - - - - - - 

You have known this feeling

before--a pilgrim walking the coast 

of Manitou Island, its shipwrecks 

and green lagoons, its rookeries and 

steep dunes sliding into the west,

the buoyant couplings in Lake Michigan's

cold waves under the aurora borealis,

the failed schoolhouse and its fallen apples, 

the abandoned graveyard, making love 

everywhere in this island of ghosts

and lost ancestors, apparitions

dissolving in the morning mist,

unspoken souls wandering

the water's edge, seeking asylum

in some forgotten tongue.

- - - - - - - -  - - - - - -  - - - - -  - - - - - 

Or Northport, tiptoeing the cold

slippery stones beyond the lighthouse,

sliding and teetering in the slick muck

and rocks, like learning to walk

all over again, balance betrayed, 

you follow the shallow glimmerings,

the fabulous petoskey stones, 

scarred with ancient star eyes!,

where waves criss-cross,

an eternal dissection of diamonds,

the silver ripples on the surface,

and the luminescent light looming

across the stones below, you are now

Atlas, straddling two bodies

of water. infinity spreading itself 

everywhere before you.  There is

only expanse, only the north, 

only the unreachable and unreadable.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

Years later, across the lake,

what you never tell anyone,

getting lost in Death's Door,

chanting poems on an outcrop of stone, 

blue lips trembling those words

haunting the cold November shore

like angry ghosts, the mist 

of naked birch, the fear of fear itself, 

the ache in your soul, the longing

for the end of longing, when

the dark psyche spills and

runs amok, and there is 

nothing left but you on the stones,

the water lapping, the chill,

the shivering, the fear. 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  - - - - - - - - 

So, what exactly are

the old questions?

What are the words that remain

after all of the hubbub, the

flotsam and jetsam, the debris,

the trappings, the endless propositions?

They are inscrutable, the signs

and symbols inscribed in a world

of nouns and verbs, a deep grammar

deeper than anything we can know,

lines and marks, smudges and tempestuous

mood, quotidian derivatives,

tones and sounds, scents and flavors

of stone and metal, lodestone,

something we can only know

and not know, and knowing,

never fully capture, or translate,

or get down in anything like 

apprehendible form before the 

the ashes vanish into ghosts

breathing across the water,

abandoning all form and time

and being.

SEARING BLINDNESS AND CAMELLIAS/SANIBEL ISLAND

Lying in bed this morning, the sun

pouring through my eyelids like some lizard

fixed on a rock, the molten alchemy

sears my optic nerves--I awaken blind

to the rattle of the island wind 

and the smell of camellia floating.

Well, I'm not really blind.  I mean,

the core of everything I see is black,

surrounded, like the sun, by a

corona of flames and, in the periphery,

floating on the camellias, just

blurry distinctions, smeary sun and

the faint suggestions of apprehendible

form.  Like St. Paul, stricken on the road

to Damascus, I have been blessed with 

divine vision--I see sacred flames 

everywhere!  And while the loss of that old

visual field is mildly amusing, I

do not mourn it!  All is holy! Emblazoned

in sacrament!   Pentecostal!  Serpents 

and fiery symbols, black hole vortices 

pulling everything to the godless abyss!

My eyes: stone ashes!  What would I trade

for this gift?  Would I swap it gladly for 

all this stumbling in the world of built form?

Groveling in the gravel driveway, falling

in the stinking ditch of cattail muck 

and algae scum?  Of floating camellias 

and brick?  All those memories of wonder?  

The Chagall chalked seascapes?  The Northern Lights 

bursting across the night like waves crashing 

the firmament?  Your naked body diving 

like dolphins knifing up the coast?  Your back, 

the river of desire, and the camellias 

floating there?  No.  I would not trade those 

for these glowing stones, this searing beauty, 

this pagan agony, for any of that. 

WHAT DO WE DO WHEN WE KISS?

Last night I dreamt

we were getting married!

Odd, given the facts,

we don't speak and

I don't love you 

and you don't love me 

and we're both married

to others.  A groomsman

was helping me with my tux,

my carnation boutonniere 

and I thought wait a minute!\

I don't even know you!

We haven't even dated,

or necked, or held hands,

hell, I don't even know 

your last name and now

this whole thing's fate,

odd, isn't it?, I'm almost 

ashamed, my only thought

was what do we do 

when we kiss?  I mean, 

since we've never kissed?

And this wasn't about you

or me but the congregation,

those people waiting for us

to seal the deal?  

Would a simple 

peck on the lips do?

Or something more intimate?,

a suggestive brush of wet

softness, or one of those

histrionic dipsy-doodles? 

A real lollapalooza,  a passionate

tongue-swimming circus!

But it was a kiss of shame--

shame that I did not want

to kiss you, that I did not

find you kissable or

attractive and of course 

knowing that you found me

repulsive, a hideous wretch, 

but wouldn't admit it, not

at the threshold of our joining, 

yet knowing this was stupid, 

that this little moment

was such a clear sign 

of how our marriage 

would unfold, a passionless 

arrangement, a quotidian 

agreement to honor

each other's schedules

and machinations.  And how, 

I wanted to know, does one

kiss another bride in front of

one's wife?  But again, that had

been arranged.  This was more

like Judas and Jesus 

squaring off for their mythic

moment in Gethsemane,

a kiss neither of them 

wanted either, a kiss of

sacrament and shame,

a kiss of indifference 

in some passion play, 

the way a kiss should 

never be.  As we approached

the altar I watched the candles

flickering, the smoke curling

into curlicues, the brassy cross

shimmering.  I could not

look at you in your dress

of white roses or listen

to the prayer of the pastor,

I could only think of

the fate that awaited us,

ambivalence, disregard,

sealed not with a kiss

but the awful knowing 

of that kiss.

CHRISTMAS DAY/SANIBEL ISLAND

No miracle last night except shrimp

and crab quesadillas, tiki torches

and the faint lights of fishing boats trolling

home, the fussing of pelicans shrouded 

in palms, all the Russians and Germans

smoking in Charley's Cabana and 

shouting across the globe into iPhones.

No, today is the celebration 

of salvation, the birth of redemption,

there are three sage ibis stalking the docks, 

stray egrets and heron minding their flock.

The Euros drink coffee at poolside 

and their children eat waffles and smoothies

in silence.  The morning mist dissipates

and the island burns under the sun.

Sailboats anchor offshore, filling the air

with Neil Diamond songs and the smoke 

from charred steaks and when Charley shouts 

"Hey, you want bloody mary's?" above the jet ski drone 

and the waves lapping off the cigarette boat wake,

we know a miracle has been born.

What it will be we do not know, only

that the the myth is written in our blood 

and takes us years to understand.

CHRISTMAS EVE/SANIBEL ISLAND

One thing is for certain in the world
tonight--surrounded here by tiki flames
and fountains, palm trees languishing the shore
and the primal darkness of the gulf:
the world turns just like a great big wheel
just as the night swirls above the firmament--
stars of spilt ash from God's great bonfire
aeons ago return in the cosmic wind,
prehistoric birds roost in the mangroves--
you can hear them muttering among crickets
and the muted trumpet jazz piped in from
Charley's Cabana.

Two thousand years ago the old story
kicked off, a star, a manger, an innkeeper
and a couple seeking asylum.
Are we any less forsaken now, Son of Man,
cast on the edge of the desert of the great
Babylon? Sprawled on the poolside deck chairs,
our skin illuminated by the day's sun
and the eerie watery glow, the flickering
tongues of the tiki torches, ignored by
the concierge and obeying some
inscrutable impulse to please someone
we do not know--are we any less chosen
to these portents in the sky, these omens,
these signs burning in the ancient night?

Tonight is the night of the great story,
the story of our great belief, here, in
this ring of tiki torches, these palm trees,
these fountains and heated pools, this jacuzzi
bubbling and steaming, this savage night
of ancient birds and loneliness and betrayal--

it is the only story we know, the only story 

we tell ourselves, the holiness of 

making it through, of wondering, what do

the stars hold for us tomorrow, what do

we do with ourselves until then?