Friday Poem

For a real man not to dream to be a flower:
that we must see, is the cowardly thing.
……………………………. — Martha Nussbaum

I find in my notebook – “My desire is an Antony,”
and think, if it were, it would not be in my notebook,
so, consciousness is a dialogue with one’s self.  Well,
who else a better listener?  even when trapped in a
corner chair by the bad poet.  I see that I’ve become
two again – bad poet, sullen listener – life the dialogue.
Let’s leave these two (See how we’ve become four?) and pay
attention to this multitudinous world as it swings
with its sisters about the sun, as the sun about the galaxy
that mote in the expanding universe.  Yet, today’s
ticket will not carry us that far.  We must get off or
the eternal conductor will catch us out.  Let’s leave
the bad poet and the surly listener at La Cafe de Deux
Maggots drinking cheap red wine and arguing about
the existential moment.  Let’s come back to Judith’s
garden where Iceland poppies open like mistresses
before the sun king.  Let’s stand in the garden, still,
quiet, – all about us green fire.

by Nils Peterson