Monday Poem

What does it mean exactly,

the chronic return of a partridge,

which, swaddled in melody,

follows an accumulated bullet list

of things my true love gave to me
—what must I have missed?
—

We start with a partridge in a pear tree

—Bosc or Anjou, Bartlett or Comice?

No one knows —but there the partridge sits

among fruit, inchworm green or of early
sunlight blushed with red  —hiding? Could be.

No one knows, but as a poet said, “if it’s

information you want, ask the police” who
today will surely know where a partridge lives,
not to mention how a partridge loves or beds.
—

The next bullet point posits two turtle-doves

which, when you think about it, is an is oddly alloyed

name for a beast, which suggests that a dove who coos

through feathers and a turtle that snaps from shell

are really not individual at all but joined as one
—at least this is what the lyric tells.
—

Then again, here comes the partridge and her pears,

or his, since it isn’t clear if gender matters,
anyway, they’re back, and joyful in inclement weather,
snow to knees we might suppose. But exactly why
frost in lacey loops on glass will scatter, few know.
Meanwhile (in another poem) reindeer beasts
on rooftops clatter.
—

Now come French hens to join the gifts
that he or she is given; three to be exact,
perched beside the pair of turtle-doves
with the partridge and the pears while
(to keep tradition and its climate straight)
wind-blown snow is driven. But why French?
There are other hens with musical ambition:
hens that cluck like wood blocks in orchestral
percussion sections, or who utter reedy oboe slurs
as they proudly strut around the yard:
red-combed as Rumpless Araucanas,
or cloud-like as booted Bantams, none of which
are French, so again, as this love song goes
(and goes), no one knows.
—

The next line gives us calling birds without stating who they’re calling.
Are they asking for some mating, or are they simply chirping mysteries?
But it’s all a mystery —no one knows what base metal lies beneath
any gold or silver plating, or to whom these birds may be relating.
But since the season’s tone is up, let’s just assume true love
is what these birds are demonstrating.
—

Then soon, turning from biology with all its life and death, the song goes
swinging on a tangent to geometry and stuff that shines and glitters,
stuff that’s more about inertly filling space than enjoying life and breath.
So, five gold rings are at this moment given, and conspicuously hung from limbs.
They dangle near where partridges are sure to come again in lyric sequence.
So again we wonder: has the singer of this song been offered rings
for love or lust? Who knows? Who knows if they’re for those, or are simply
joined as logo for the muscled-winter-concord-of-Olympics?
—

But then another twist— our receiving lover, still singing, tells

of how this true love of hers follows up his piling on of gifts

by sending geese (a cage of six) all at once a-laying,

dropping eggs as if this lover’s world was meant for geese alone.
Was this true love a poultry farmer or did he run a rescue home
for birds? Who knows? We only have this melody, and words.
—

At this juncture, yet other Aserinae are dropped off by UPS.
It’s swans this time in plastic pools in which every single one
is swimming. Why? We have to guess. No one knows
the finish of this mythic tale of which we’re in the midst.
Each day’s a harder thing to fathom, some are bad, some are blessed.
—

Eight days in, the story shifts to mammals and the signature
expression of their breasts as eight milking maids appear
to give and give and swell our coded Christmas myth of song,
without a satisfying key as to what all is meant.
—

But now the stage is set —ballet companies arrive (harking back to
day eight with swans), they’ve come to dance upon a pond of tears
—nine, all ladies, bound by love, and curse. And one, Odette,
who longs, like many, for one she’s never met.
—

In Fanale: ten leaping lords arrive in limousines, a cavalcade
of SUVs, all black, with tinted windows so those
behind these mystery gifts, cannot be seen —as if
the song’s un-named true love was really not, and
only meant to sell a nightmare as a dream.
—
But our singing lover never flinched.
She was old enough to know that against
the hope of Christmas lies a Grinch.
—
Jim Culleny 12/23/23