Smooth As Water, Flat As An Envelope

It is rough around the edges
but that will eventually work out-
the water will make everything smooth
and flat and standard like an envelope.

I will let you in on something:
when I was a boy
my parents were octopuses.
Do not task me

with explanations.
I just knew. Okay. It was a certitude.

When I went to sleep my father
had to lie in bed with me.
I had recurring nightmares.
Each night the room was filled
with ghosts who wore red fezzes.
I know it has Freudian overtones,
but who knew then. Not even
my father, who was a human.
I think my mother sometimes kept
him company, which settled nothing.

Anyway, I grew up, you might say.
And I am acceptable,
at least on the surface
and that takes up most everything.

Where I Live

I am not Chinese.
But I am married to
a Chinese woman.
And I have observed over years
that if a Chinese person
comes upon a patch of earth,
they will fetch a pail and shovel,
bring some seeds and plant
a garden. It is all those years of agrarian living.

In my building there is an OC
who had allergies. Instead of going
to a doctor, he chopped down all the trees
and bushes and every living green thing
outside his window and then sat back
pleasurably.

Mao Zedong took care
of the sparrows in China.
It was called The Great Leap Forward.
Sparrows ate grain so the Chinese destroyed
their nests and killed them off
by noise and terror and exhaustion.
Of course, sparrows ate locusts
and when the sparrows were gone
the locusts consumed all the crops.
This was The Great Chinese Famine.

I am very partial to sparrows.
When I approach and they hop off
I find it very gratifying.
In Montparnasse on the steps
of Sacre Coeur Basilica
I once fed sparrows from my hand
and it was secretive.

Talking To The Tree

Looking up at the tree
its heart hanging there
aimlessly still
I could see its
filigree leaves and catkins

planning something:
perhaps to pay a debt
or fill an old order.
There was an idea
doubtless
germinating in
that bound body.
I stopped my aimless
wandering, my body
stiff with age, my hands
in my pockets, empty
but for small change. What would I say to the tree?
If we were in the same world
it was only because of our bodies.
The mind of the tree and its body
were close together.
My mind had flown from my body,
a bluejay screeching
in the uppermost branches.