from this week in January, 1974 (I was 29)
The Smoking of the Universal Joint
The dip stick was dry
and there was oil all over hell
I was a defeated man
so I left it there down at the garage
I went to Ben’s for a beer and a pepperoni
sat on the bench in front of the store
Windy as hell too blowing dust
The damn thing smoked like hell
The mechanic was the garage owner’s son
overworked and pissed off
He could bury it for all I cared
Damn rolling jail
September 21, 1971 (I was 26)
Cabin 89 Sunol
There’s something about wood
that makes me feel good
Walls stained only with age
ceiling and beams
exchanging breaths with me
open and receptive
rather than painted reflective
I believe they release energy
to make room for mine
and what I breathe of them is fine
old images mellowed myths
fit for ballads sung with lutes
secure fables from the past
Truths lived here seem to last
September 3, 1977 (I was 32)
Sunol
Some might say I’m living an escape.
They speak of a hideout in the woods
for a part time recluse.
To them, it is an amusement
quite romantic, naively idyllic,
a place of dreams in which to dream.
They intimate psychological retreat,
these worldly heroes who leave the room
to avoid a spider, who contract poison oak
thinking about trees, but this place is real.
The deer are feeding in the hills
the turkey vulture circles overhead
the raccoons come to the porch
the possums hang from the oaks
the snakes hide under rocks
tarantulas march across the road in September
The actuality of the place cannot be denied
It has not been created in search of ignorance
It creates itself in the image of its own truth
February 22, 1971 (I was 26)
Winter Evening in Kilkare Woods
The sun is set below my sight,
I shiver in the half chill of half night.
The leaves of trees and grass are wet,
silver coated in the cold.
The sky reflects an empty mirror;
the wind makes haunts of dog howls.
Oaks grow gray and twisted as martyrs
beneath the Eucharist Moon.
November 18, 2007 (I was 63)
Kilkare Woods Cabin
Because we were young
we could live in a rented split log cabin
that leaked heat and sometimes sewage
from the jury-rigged joints of plastic pipe
strapped under the house in a decline
to settle underground into the septic tank
I’d reattach them and rake out the muck
Up a no-exit winding road into the woods
it most often seemed an adventure
in Sleepy Hollow or Sherwood Forest
an affordable daily vacation
a rural retreat for the kids and cats
too secluded for poverty
too exclusive for the rich
June 17, 1978 (I was 33)
If you buy groceries in Sunol you buy them at Ben’s
it’s a lesson in the cost of convenience
to learn to pay his prices gladly
Time is the main thing Ben deals
When Ben does business quietly
he is out of sorts
One uncharitable might say disinterested
Still most often he’s flashing gold from the teeth
Knowing you Ben will joke and flirt with your young cousin
and ask how things are with your work
And when someone calls to him
Hey Chink, where’s the beer?
he hands over your bag and thanks you
before showing him where
January 25, 1974 (I was 29)
The Smoking of the Universal Joint
The dip stick was dry
and there was oil all over hell
I was a defeated man
so I left it there down at the garage
I went to Ben’s for a beer and a pepperoni
sat on the bench in front of the store
Windy as hell too blowing dust
The damn thing smoked like hell
The mechanic was the garage owner’s son
overworked and pissed off
He could bury it for all I cared
Damn rolling jail
September21, 1971 (I was 26)
Cabin 89 Sunol
There’s something about wood
that makes me feel good
Walls stained only with age
ceiling and beams
exchanging breaths with me
open and receptive
rather than painted reflective
I believe they release energy
to make room for mine
and what I breathe of them is fine
old images mellowed myths
fit for ballads sung with lutes
secure fables from the past
Truths lived here seem to last
September 3, 1977 (I was 32)
Sunol
Some might say I’m living an escape.
They speak of a hideout in the woods
for a part time recluse.
To them, it is an amusement
quite romantic, naively idyllic,
a place of dreams in which to dream.
They intimate psychological retreat,
these worldly heroes who leave the room
to avoid a spider, who contract poison oak
thinking about trees, but this place is real.
The deer are feeding in the hills
the turkey vulture circles overhead
the raccoons come to the porch
the possums hang from the oaks
the snakes hide under rocks
tarantulas march across the road in September
The actuality of the place cannot be denied
It has not been created in search of ignorance
It creates itself in the image of its own truth
