Frank: Sonnets
…And to smudge beauty is to discover ugliness. And to smudge ugliness is to be
knocked back by splendor…
Day 31: #TheSealeyChallenge
Deepstep Come Shining
…
She will still be up when we come in. Our floating host. She will be at the door in her pleated nightgown. Admit us into her air-conditioned nightgown. Her glory cloud.
...
Day 30: #TheSealeyChallenge
Genetics
From my father I have inherited the ability
to stand in a field and stare
...
Day 29: #TheSealeyChallenge
Seasons of an Island Life
…
How clear childhood seems
in spite of everything,
filled with promise,
each season a temperament, predictable.
The long summer has its passages.
I grow older, wanting
the vivid flower, perfect fruit
no matter what the season.
Day 28: #TheSealeyChallenge
SHE IS THE PRETTIEST OF CREATURES
…
I have made this poem tonight
And I pin it in her hair
For she is the prettiest of creatures
O all like a strange queen is she.
Day 27: #TheSealeyChallenge
Waiting
When I chewed a bay leaf and rubbed
sage on my hands and arms, I believed
it was in order not to scare the deer.
Which was true. Later I thought it was
so my soul could be read by God.
…
Day 26: #TheSealeyChallenge
In a Tree House
…
Love will surely bust you wide open
Into an unfettered, blooming new galaxy
Even if your mind is now
A spoiled mule.
…
Day 25: #TheSealeyChallenge
The Angels
…A rust-stained pipe
Where a house once stood, which I
Take each time I pass it for an owl.
Bright whorl so dangerous and near.
My mother sat whispering with it
At the end of her life
While all the rooms of our house
Filled up with night.
Day 24: #TheSealeyChallenge
A Meadow
It was a riverside meadow, lush, from before the hay harvest,
On an immaculate day in the sun of June.
I searched for it, found it, recognized it.
Grasses and flowers grew there familiar in my childhood.
With half-closed eyelids I absorbed luminescence.
And the scent garnered me, all knowing ceased.
Suddenly, I felt I was disappearing and weeping with joy.
Day 23: #TheSealeyChallenge
Chinese Foot Chart
Every part of us
alerts another part.
Press a spot in
the tender arch and
feel the scalp
twitch. We are no
match for ourselves
but our own release.
Each touch
uncatches some
remote lock. Look,
boats of mercy
embark from
our heart at the
oddest knock.
Day 22: #TheSealeyChallenge
Telescope
This is the pipe that pierces the dam
that holds back the universe,
that takes off some of the pressure,
keeping the weight of the unknown
from breaking through
and washing us all down the valley.
Because of this small tube,
through which a cold light rushes
from the bottom of time,
the depth of the stars stays always constant
and we are able to sleep, at least for now,
beneath the straining wall of darkness.
Day 21: #TheSealeyChallenge
A PURSE.
…
A purse was not green, it was not straw color, it was hardly seen and it had a use a long use and the chain, the chain was never missing, it was not misplaced, it showed that it was open, that is all that it showed.
…
Day 20: #TheSealeyChallenge
and though the odds say improbable
…as i leave i touch the table
where they sat. they ain’t superhuman. ain’t always able
to save the children the men or even your silk presses
but whatever they touch. somebody’s good god blesses.
Day 19: #TheSealeyChallenge
MISTRAL
… Don’t you see
That between the people who want
To be machine and the machines
That want to be people women
Are still, still at this late date
Running?
Day 18: #TheSealeyChallenge
SNOWBOUND / A RESISTANCE
…
///// ///.
Womanhood is a lost paradise
The slightest mistake
could bring disaster
///// ////.
Down weakly in a snow bank
she slid into her own self
Day 17: #TheSealeyChallenge
The Townspeople Circle the Boy’s Body
…
Alfonso lies next to them in the snow. Wraps one arm around her belly. He puts one hand to the ground. He hears the cars stop, doors slam, dogs bark. When he pulls his hand off the ground, he hears nothing.
…
Day 16: #TheSealeyChallenge
Reading Ovid
…
If only to watch understanding take his face like the swan-god took the girl.
But rage makes for more rage—nothing to do then but run. And because rage is a story that has
no ending, we’d both have to transform into birds or fish: constellations forever fixed
in the starry heavens, forever separated, forever attached.
…
Day 15: #TheSealeyChallenge
surreal suicide
savior complex
remembering Stanley
after lola falana on tms
…
earth control to birth control, who
has invited us in to skip her for what
a professor lucked out in for landing?
computer door to my baby, macaboy
island closed, your handsome voice
left with the burden of your body. you
were meant for me, and i was meant for you
fresh off your chronicled boat, as space
angels led me to you out on fire island.
…
Day 14: #TheSealeyChallenge
To Fuck
Not a subject God
Knew much about—
His bodiless body
Immune to its charms.
They were on their own
In this department
And chose to trust
How part responded
To part—not just
Cock to cunt
And cunt to cock,
But also heart to heart.
Day 13: #TheSealeyChallenge
Hand Washing
…
Knobby points that touched public places
And maybe the edge of our dinner plates,
An accident that could cause disease.
If she had asked, What are you doing?
I would have looked up from the basin,
Curl of steam like incense,
And answered, I’m saying myself, and you too, love.
1997
Day 12: #TheSealeyChallenge