Behind branches
thick with snow
red cardinal jostles:
my neighbor’s
red sweatshirt
as he shovels.

We left the mountains
as the snow began.
Driving south,
the golden cottonwoods
against variegated gray clouds
shone
vibrant as a freshly painted
oil canvas.
But somewhere in the Bisti,
the sky turned itself
inside out.
Storm clouds’ menacing pall
now rendered pale and opalescent
as mother-of-pearl.
In a treeless plain,
light edged clouds with gold foil,
standing in
for the dazzling cottonwoods.

Harvesting fruits from my garden,
I think of Ceres and Persephone.

Why should the pomegranate
recall Hades and the underworld?

The pomegranate’s red
belongs to the earth we walk,
fragrant as the red blossoms

of Mexican hats in early summer,
or the red of poinsettias in December.

The fruit of the underworld
might be ginger—all root—
with nothing edible above ground.

Preparing curry, I rub off
the outer layer of ginger with a spoon.
The emerging ginger
root is pungent as the sun,
lively as a yellow cat about to pounce.

Husking garlic, I think
how garlic, too, is a fruit
of the underworld,
the round bulb white
as a bulbous moon,

the papery skin
pocked purple in places
like a cratered moon face.

So why a pomegranate?

I know a mailman
who fished during his lunch hour
and near a favorite fishing spot
found bright red garnets.

He brought the garnets to me
in little sandwich bags.

The jeweler said these fragments were too small to work with
so instead I wrote this poem.

Tonight
lightning
sparkles through the skylight
like raised wineglasses
reflecting light:
lip to lip,
the clatter of wineglasses,
a sort of thunder.

How fleeting the hours,
how abruptly the day
ends.
Watch the sunset,
suspended on a curved
canvas of blue,
haltingly
labor
a sliver of rose
through lowslung clouds.

Among bare branches
of a poplar,
two golden leaves flutter
above the unflinching snow,
at the blade tip
of a slender trunk:
here
a pair of wings.

Yesterday,
branches of leaves:
today,
suddenly
the maple
drops her leaves
like a skirt.

In the gymnasium of love,
there is no act one,
no drawing of the curtain,
no finale.
So, too, the earth
turns her cheek
continually
to absorb
light of the sun,
and then releases
her treasure of heat
seamlessly
all through the night.

The red moon eclipsed
against the sky’s indigo
mirrors the pigments

of the icon of Mary,
waiting,
in the triptych.

Why is my neighbor—
now 85 years old—
leaning his splintered ladder

against his home’s sloped roof?
Watch him moon gazing
from his rooftop

now
like all the world
stunned into silence.

Uprooting dried
sunflower stalks,
the dried branches
collapse and fall
from the stem,
like the spokes
of an umbrella,
collapsing.

Summer disengages
like an empire
retreating
before winter—
then retires,
like a love
that has run
its course.

So heavy the mirror
as if I were carrying
you or some invisible
burden. Though I see
your reflection, your eyes
do not return
my gaze. Are you
really walking behind
me, in step, or
are you worlds away?
Like the moon,
your breathless gaze
weighs on my shoulders.
Cold silence unnerves
me. This mirror
I hold now, heavy
with your absence.