Bellefonte

I

Railroad spikes on the windowsill 

Corrode with the dead cicada.

It was there he watched in mourning

As the Bush House burned to the ground.

That night he stole across the river,

Past the fences and the signs,

And when he reached the ruined lot

He spirited a pair of bricks

For remembrance:

One for himself and one for a friend.

II

Down from the county courthouse

With its dome of copper green,

The lamps of main street bear

The portraits of their veterans.

The ceiling of the antique store

Leaks above its wares,

The jadeite bowls and Bakelite scoops

And carousels of yellowbacks,

And among them, placed with care,

The buckets catch the rain.

III

The windows of the plant are broken

And the playground is forgotten:

The paint and rust fall off in flakes

From the iron ladybug.

He drives his Chevy Blazer

Through the deserts of the quarry,

Among the derelicts of weeds,

The deer skulls and refrigerators.

The drakes hold fast upon the stream

As the rounds of his rifle sound.

Reviews

[Eilis]

You have a lovely way of mixing a kind of journalistic reportage of time and place and the inner mysteries that plague us. The things we cannot know because others do not share them. Much of thought is conjecture, when we're dealing with others, because seldom do others share the depth of what is housed within them. There is a sense of fullness and a sense of emptiness intertwined here. Most of us are two states unless we use books and books of energy to try and be something that is not natural. I felt an energy here like the 'he' was beginning to understand the self that was hidden under years of believing in things because they were customary. Illusion seems to shatter eventually for most who hoist it above reality. But so often the illusions we carry are much more real to us. The human mind is such an immense and unpredictable thing. The animal eats grass. The human watches the animal eat grass and wonders what it would be like to steal the animal's life or pet the animal or eat grass himself. But the human doesn't just eat grass. Thought is such a driver for us. And a private and solitary one so often. One can become trapped there or allow it become the dictator and lose all sense of what it feels like to live. All these words are me trying to articulate how your poem makes me feel and what it makes me think. I'm still not sure I've succeeded at all. I enjoy your deep dive into the everyday psyche disguised as a description of a moment in time. It is excellent.

[Casey Truax]

The "he" in this poem was a good friend and indeed even then I cannot say too much about his inner life. This poem is about a sentimentality that informs both our perception of decay and our desperate efforts to preserve what we cherish.

[Eilis]

A big part of my reading was the sense of finality at the end. That was an alternative comment that I chose not to explore. I wasn’t sure if it was death or death to a version of the self, but I could feel that sense of loss. I’m sorry to read it was loss. The poem feels like a map to me. Hopefully you will understand what I mean by that, but maybe it will only make sense to me.

[Casey Truax]

I'm reminded of the old poetry workshops where I was so reluctant to impose upon my readers' interpretations that I never made any outright statements on the meaning of my work. I still place great value on your thoughts even if I don't completely understand where they come from, and it is quite possible my readers can pick up on things that I was not aware of.