David Kaufmann
Husbandry
Blue wash in the season’s idiom blue
Ash in the fire tipping cherries blue cast to
Tulip headed branches. A catalogue
Of buds. The keeping of bees. A list
Of flowers and the pruning of trees a
Reminder. I called. Please call. As
Water flows downward so the stream cycles
Clouds in their swift determinations. The fog
That Zoe carves. That Lucia craves they love
It. The snow at best a memory so
Remember that they love it. We skied
For a moment and this was our fill we skated
Down the steps then I fell. Do what
You will say what you like nothing will
Change remember. Remember the aphorisms
Of delight the composite models of joy. Freezing
Rain keeps the farmer indoors, but he can
Get ready. He does. Get ready. Freezing
The frame as if it were joy. It was. It
Is. Now do it. Wash the car, prepare your
Dinner make a list of all the day
Requires. It’s sufficient. Will do. Now
Do it again. From all this you know. We can
Predict the seasons through unsettled skies.
I think he means seasons, not skies. First it
Snowed then it rained and then we melted as
If into the rocks. A simile. Some polka
Dots. Enough now. So take it.
I could go on forever so let
Me begin. Begin again. A novum in
The parkland on the parkway a driveby
Experience as if by the sea. I love you. The granary
Sensation. The sifting of chaff. Dust settles in
At the end of the line as if
The air itself were falling. It’s not. It’s
Falling through the air, hold it
A second now
Smile. Misreading star lore as
Star love is certainly a start. So is planting a vine
Or mending a trellis. So do it. Resume
The position and tell me your name. Myrtle.
Redbush starling and thrush. Immediately
The winds rise stars slide headlong through the
Skies. Mists and obscurities, travel
And rain. And all this in
Our orbit so try it again. I’m writing today
About husbandry resources it’s all I can muster to
Tell you. Such is my wisdom. Not
The blanched hues of August but
The blissed-out recalcitrance
Of Spring. Evaporation. Earth. Less
Loamy than clay. Clayey.
The water
Sits on top. Waiting. For the sun
Perhaps or to seep down to our
APT FOR RENT. Everything underneath it
It all comes up. Eventually so to speak.
Breathless in its transparency not
Waking or between. Merely breaking
Ground. My obdurate fears my obvious
Fears. The obvious recital. A cock’s
Crow of morning where no
Cock crows. Except in a somewhat dirty
Joke that doesn’t work anyway so don’t
Even try. Please. That this won’t get
Read. That you won’t care. That you’ll
Be dead. Of all displacements
This. Onto all displacements
There. You talk about fallow let’s
Talk about seed. Kernel
And shell. Seed the clouds seed
The stars. Cede the stars their influence. O
Stars and starlets o
Riven complexities both
Fear and desire my c.d. collection in
Its battle array. Let’s talk. We’ve
Been talking about Jackson.
Ever since the fire went out. Fires
Everywhere fire away. Stubble
In the field ignited. Why.
Virgil doesn’t know. Bakes out
Blemishes clears the bile hardens
And binds the damaged veins. Whatever.
Whatever does for the glands still
Does for me. An operative membrane.
A garden. My slight protective skin.
What erotics of knowledge. What
Ecstasies of reading what.
What you need to know. Tulips.
Dafs. Agriculture as far as it
Gets around here. The Japanese
Maple stunted by
The shade of the neighbor’s
Spruce. We love the shade
The maple the neighbor’s spruce all
At once. Dryads o material
Memory. Leaves shoots the ground
Breaks without my help blood
Not mine keeps the squirrels
Away the weeds at bay now look.
Crocus self-understanding. Trees
As the process of producing them-
Selves. True I intervene
Somewhat. But not that much. I mean
Mulch. I mean water. I mean what
I mean when I mean it. Sometimes
I don’t mean a fucking thing don’t
You get it. Some grassy thing that seeds it-
Self I thought it was a weed
It’s not. The bulbs have come back
Regardless look. You don’t have
To love it just live with it. Or
Not. Please live with it please
Live with me please
Live. O gods
Of the foregrounded moment, nymphs
Of the requisite dew, this
Is an ode o let us live. No let
Me begin. Or yes let’s . An apotropaic
Move a gesture with hands as if
I really could begin to ward them
Off. The bees. They scare Zoe
So much. With a simile no
Less. There. I did it it worked
Well at least for a moment there.
I am praying not so much to
The works of my hands as to some
Stupid words I got
On the cheap. It’s sunshine and
Smoke. It’s the woodchips of a summer’s
Dusk at a campsite in the Shenandoahs whose
Very name’s a song evocation an invocation
Of campfire and dust. Zoe loves
Them Lucia too. The whole damn
Thing’s a song they love it
Isn’t real. In any normal sense look
Normal. Be natural. And for
Goodness sakes real.
Like a tree. Not an asherah
A beautiful tree by a pagan
Shrine these words not a kneeling
Stone nor an oracle.
But a few choice words. This is
Already the past remember.
No labor but the sumptuous ardor
Of work its lustre. Doesn’t anyone
Else clean up around here? Isn’t
The field guide any kind of help? Well
No. My father’s death was
A quick affair my father’s
Affair lasted longer. I remember little
Of this with any pleasure don’t
Remember much of it at all
Unless you ask me so ask me. What was I
Going to say I’ll say it anyway. There.
Call and response slapstick or
Engaged. A version of holiness from my
Amen corner amen. I think about
G-d a lot only abstractly I
Think about gods a lot even
More abstractly like the trees in
Zoe’s book do. She doesn’t get what
It’s about but it’s pretty it’s
A story and she really loves
A good one. She’s five. I’m almost
Fifty. Somehow that counts.
And not in my favor. Necessarily. Yes
But it’s really too early to tell. Tell me,
Does my domestic revanchism in words
As a form of deed in my dreams at
Least of deeds bother you at all. Or just
A bit. It bothers me I raise my voice.
A simple fact it scares me.
Irretrievable. A buried bone. The maple’s
Doing poorly under the spruce. A
Cherry would be a pleasure in the spring
For a time at least. There’s so much
To talk about taxes
Housework the careful construction of
Countless things. A list. I let slip
I didn’t mean. Necessarily. And there’s
I ignore. Some of what you say about
Me is probably true. There
Are spirits in the wood smells
Amongst the trees little voices in
My head not literally. Turns
Of phrase amphbolies. They live
Elsewhere in the water hanging
In the air. That’s between us. Just.
For everyone else I require
Action firmness of touch the promise of
Lots of skin. An orphic flower. Some of
What I say about me is not
Altogether true. Context counts. I didn’t marry
My mother. Exactly. And so there’s
Hope. Prometheus says this Zeus
The old windbag can’t unsay it or
Say himself can’t say a blessed
Thing I remember but talks and
Talks and talks. Some of it scans some
Of it is lovely. Some of it might count my
Curses remain. Peripheral at best.
Isn’t anyone in charge of this
Shit or does it just
Happen. Snow in the middle of April.
I mean to say. The tulips actually
Flourish in this neglect a dead
Head frost against all expectation but
The fruit the papers say won’t make
It. Mere rapportage. The framing
Premise of lucidity only
Mine. There are pills for that. A swarm
Of words of waxy cells and relations A body
Of thought with its pleasures. The body
Is a situation. Indeed. A not-so-spacious
Not well decorated room with a rented
View. Live here then move but where. And
When. Don’t think about that again
And again. Mistaken prepositions missed
Connections the sheer dislocations of
Any given day. This I
Believe. In the merest brevity of this
Flawed spring dream what you can in
The most obvious sense without
The aid. The unconscious. Try
It. A magnesium shot of sun.
Honeyed words either dissolute or
Dissolved I envy them in spite.
Of all the things to try at home.
Son flower soon flower Zoe’s
Orthographic innovations. Lucia's linguistic
Quirks. First there was thunderwear then
Wonderwear all in due course. Butter on
Their matzoh honey on their bread
Acacia lovely word o my life
And light. Sometimes even the clichés are
True. Sometimes even their names
Are true. Of everything. Perhaps.
Perhaps the proper articulation of
Love is fear but unwillingly. At first.
Most serene objects
Of my manic desire o women
Children into the lifeboats first o
Captain not a captain me. I
Invoke me. In the accusative how
Fitting. But who’s keeping score said
The little brown fox a few little sprinkles
And wind. The forecast for today
And on. Talk to the accountant and pick
Up the forms. Drop off the forms. Adhere
To the forms that you claim you make
Up. Which is freedom and destiny all
Rolled into one. Modernity on
The phone will you pick up.
Leave a message when you hear
The beep. You could always finish
That line yourself, If you make it on time.
Failed Latinity eloquent genius of
The crossroads hear me out. This is
Less about loss than about losing
The maple to record recorded
Winds. Don’t be fooled by these
Displacements there is a language
Of gardens. I don’t understand I
Can’t even name. The trees on
My block. What don’t I know about
Women. My beautiful daughters my
Beautiful wife. That they are. Object-
Ively. The magic of compound
Interest the agency of the smallest
Degree. I have a house of rooms
And time to walk pondering.
My sons and daughters. The long tiredness
Of passing passing by. This is a block.
To walk along. I have a lot. These
Are trees now in bloom the leaves
Appreciating this spring’s chill now
Reciprocate. A blessing for the first
Leaves a blessing for the blossoming
Pear a blessing for each single
Part. Nevertheless. I worry in
Spite or because a register of im-
Precise concern. Make a clearing
In some symbolic. Sense the smell
Of grass the acquisitive heat
The stuttering flight of bees.
Forsaken points invocations equi
Distance all measure here. The vox pop in
A lower key. Map of busy life. Yup
I am America sound
Of the trees the silent groves. Consider
The names of streets consider
ELM and OAK and MAPLE. Consider
The pebbled drives. Consider
The curving residential so-called
Lanes the lights of the numbered
Houses yes the rage of fermentation
Yes what can be saved can. Surely.
Make soft gatherings under palms such
Sedulous waste take it all. In tents
In houses in apartments like
Yours. We looked out on
The night and similar clichés.
The count your brother. The demo
Cratic vistas specimen days my
Self the vast republic of forest
Trees. An orchid. We rode until tomorrow.
Public silence is nothing in
Deed such profligate beginnings
Numinous ends. Salience. Redeem me
Now names to bring it
On Lucia Zoe light and
Life. It sometimes works
The great circuit clock be still.
At home just be.
Angels of inadvertence guardians of
My. The paint splashes wood stains oil
Burns off the engine. The slim shank
The thinnest bone. Welcome to the risk
Pool welcome to the deep. End. The ongoing
Trend is the transfer of risk. From corporate
Entities. So much for individuals so much
For the bees. Is this right. The colonies
Actually collapse, the hives empty
This is not. A metaphor. So much
For us in the water so much for Lucia
Running through the sprinkler. O bliss
Of suburbia unnecessary sylphs. Brown
Grass on the lawn if we had one. A
Year’s a perplexity in a month it’s
Gone. Both the heat and the humidity.
Old standards tell they do. Tell
Me about yourself. O Orpheus pity
About your wife. If you had kids
Well so much the worse. All
The manifest dangers of
Retrospect. So much the worse for
Cultivated plants cucumbers dates and
The trellised vines. So much
For the fruit and the fig tree. For
Animals both domestic and wild. For
The children and for each of the
Infinitesimal sources of care. You know
It admit it it. All just rips you apart.
