Cary Briel

The world hums.
I hear it behind my eyelids
on mornings like Tuesday,

when loud sounds break silence
of sleep, making me look
for ten minutes or more

for what fell
or who screamed–
never, so far, to any avail.

O coffee, you beautiful,
oily friend,
your smell quite alone
will so cleverly mend
the worst day.

The clicking you do
as you grind on the blades
of my grinder, each morning,
speaks in such ways
that a Mormon can’t know.

I wonder if you
feel the loss of your soul
as you stand firm and deep
in the filtered abode
and it rinses away from above

to join my soul–
O how it quickens my days
as if born-again life,
but refusing to stay,
I’ll need souls again.

What secret is this,
for the asking,
coming in its time–
determined when there wasn’t time–

Twins divided
by wind?
He rages in cloud, as offers are made
of height and station

and Being,
and bed pillows are tempted,
and weary rest’s stifled.
He rages,

when sand lines are shifted–
and mountains are hurled–
and islands are scattered–
and secrets remain

well beyond leaps from steeples
to save familiar people–
though not known from where or when.
Let angels catch thee

lest ye be smashed, utterly–
lest banded roots perish
in desert sands–
lest He forget His Beloved.

I hardly remember
the days without care,
when my body was toned,
a full head of hair.

I’d never have thought,
if you’d have asked me back then,
that I’d be buttoning my pants
and sucking it in,

Nor would I have thought
of elastic waistbands,
nor of calorie
counting, low-carb diet plans.

What a trick God has played
that comes on us with age,
drooping and graying,
and the futile wars waged.

Waiting– I find–
time’s oceans can seem
daunting,
thus building
patience’s virtue, as Grandma would say.
Cosmological plays–
wind actors fighting
sexual wars, travailing,
catching
up children
to Grandpa’s right hand.

I don’t know if
your tooth-clenched pen
exacerbates your click, click
indifference,
but I will have words with
the silly women.
The blank stares
at sports scores and uh-huhs
belong no more
to the lore of woman,
nor to the apathy of man.

I meet people I don’t know.
They don’t speak words to me, per se,
but personalities they have
just the same.
Books–
I could write books
with what I know
about the nameless sounds
that pervade my spaces
without permission.
At times a war of words
with no words,
or simply plug my ears
and hum away the quiet.

The Queen,
our Queen,
not Alice’s today,
seated,
and perched,
while Mom shoveled away
as she watched
and directed
lest a shovelful be missed.

It’s fairly certain,
I’d say, a CD needed change,
or she’d received a text,
or something else
“important,”
else why would she call
from warmth to Mom
to bitch
of her inconvenience.

I think when I come to the end
of my days
in this blink of dream
that only seems
like reality,
I’ll only remember you.
I won’t remember
the garbage disposal that leaked,
nor the mice in the attic.
I’ll totally forget
our relationship static.
I won’t remember
those things at all.
But I will remember Misty’s howling call
to you
and to me.
I’ll remember it
because you remember,
and that’s all I’ll see.

Don’t read in
things I hadn’t said.
No glean could have
conveyed that
from word or look.
Had you been
connected
to who I am, you’d know
that I’m more complicated,
not black or white, more shaded.

“Coffee?” She asks
innocently, with tongue in cheek
I have to believe.
There’s never been a “No.” Never an
“I’ll pass.”

As I glimpse through the blinds,
Laura leaves, independently.
Scrutinizing is pointless, anymore.
The illusion of control
has passed.

I write in a dark room
to pass another day,
or simply to let it pass by me.
Or perhaps we alternate our wins. I’ll take
Wednesday and Friday.

Smelly feet–
or just FEET–
leave me conflicted,
and often sickened
well– with smelly, always sickened!

But, in general
it can be
a holy-crapshoot
whether I’ll believe, or not,
I’d ever lean

in and touch one.
Or– I’ll seethe
if one should touch me
even inadvertently!
The pedicure women

who are gloveless,
bathe, it seems,
in matter that I cannot
discuss on an empty stomach,
lest I vomit,

though I know Chris would.
Chris has made note,
cavalierly, even indifferently,
as she can on such matters,
and be not sickened,

that those gloveless fiends
will, with fingernail,
exposed as sand to sun,
scrape flesh and cuticle,
and bite their nails when they’re done.

“Doing time–”
the unfitting way to say it.
“Listening” is better–
or sounds better.
“Sacrifice” nails it.
“Love” is at the heart of it.
Can you remember this when
you’re doing time?

I can still see his look–
his eyes, mostly–
you know,
a “you should know better” look,
fixed on me quite longer than it probably was,
to which I would say back,
with equal, knowing eyes,
“I know!!”–
just hoping to make him stop
looking.

But, my God,
when I stop and consider
how alone I am now!
I am alone, you know.
Not utterly,
but without his look, I
instead turn inward,
searching for what he left with me
by loving me,
what hasn’t been taken from me.

And all these years later, I realize
that the look he held in his eyes
was not really, “you should know better,”
but, “I love you.”
I know it
because I catch myself looking the same–
at moments– at my children,
and there is never a look– never a gesture–
that doesn’t distill, simply, to,
“I love you.”

For just a moment, I believed,
as in times past,
as dark retreated and light crept in,
that I heard your footfall,
and even pictured your figure in the hall,
and remembered your disdain for waking early,

and all the years at once came rushing back.
I was sure I’d blocked them out,
those ignorant, blissful years,
when He caused me to believe,
and even fooled,
and even lied to my heart,

that life and love would not be interrupted,
that His instruction to my heart
would not lead to parting.
O foolish man!
Who fooled you– told you–
that happiness would live forever?

To write–
I suppose–
as all writers must,
dim rooms whisper our names,
tearing us from TV,
Youtube,
mp3.

Modernity,
now,
is surely the enemy,
pulling,
if not this way, then that,
risking,
well, everything.

Little people,
I say. Definitely
not bigger than the poor who
streak
and smudge my window,
as I fly
up Adams Street toward caffeination.
It’s eyes straight ahead
if I catch the light.

Latte– no diacritic.
The smudgers don’t argue.
Grande.
That’s ‘medium’ to the smudgers.
No foam.
Whole milk.
Decaf–
hmmm.
Well, only if Chris is judging me with her eyes.

I cannot–
will not–
release or part from you,
O man.
You ask
as dawn approaches fast
from night.

All through this night I’ve asked
a thousand times,
who am I,
and who are you?
I turn to ask
but you just smile, as if I know
or should.

How I am bruised and black
amidst this snow!
Did we not love,
first, I, on top
then you,
while angels faces turned blue
with fright?

Why couldn’t you have loved me
for who I was
where I was?
Who lied and said that I could love above–
with you below–
that the sun
could reflect the moon’s glow?

Prophet, no.
Teacher, no.
There is no food.
The members of my household
eat
each
other.

What is your name
O man–
you
who pulled me to the depths
of hell–
of love?
Bless me.

O come
shy muse from your depths.
Pity me
and tear back
from my dim eyes,
reality,
the ancient rite.
And tell me, muse,
of heaven’s bind,
valleys loosed,
and cows that seem
familiar–
if only in their names.

O lowly cows
that hop,
and skip,
and jump
the moon, as if their want
was heard–
though whispered only by the wind and bird.
As if the lowly–
the familiar–
cows
held sway,
their graves upturned
this winter day.

From my bed
I’d spy
first light, as it arrived,
softly cutting through the blinds,
arriving, He, in place of her reflected glory;

And for a moment,
it would seem–
He’d look–
I’d recollect my dream,
labored over many hours before;

And as I’d grab my pen to write,
I’d reach,
resolving no delay,
with names and faces fading fast
between the worlds of dream and wake,

He’d smile,
He’d wink, between the blinds,
the light of angels notified
to kindly shut
the vault of nighttime dreams.