New England Poems for Seamus

I

Old Houses, their
refelctionless windows and walls
date stamped for vindication.
These are the houses of a revolution
seemingly remembered but long forgotten.
The revolts here are between yacht men and teens.
There is a struggle in the iron river.

II

On first look, the river glazed in ice.
The night brought wind and
the ringing of a single bell, chained
above a window outside the house.
On second glance, great chunks
of ice missing, carried away by the wind that rang the bell.

III

This morning the river moved sluggishly,
plates of ice housing the brittle dark banks.
Bridges, iced metal.
Roads from dreams, houses stacked with windows,
an absence of grass, and the red shutters
of a house built for a revolution.

winter is not the time for a poem

december is young;
the ice has already chewed through her.
she is so frozen now that she cannot tell
a poem from a hole in the ground.
There are moments of white and
a series of grey months that do not lead to words.
she sees shadows and shapes that are not there;
glimmers of nothing caught in the pre-dawn silence.
The days will peter out into wordless nights and
she will cut holes in things with a sword.