Bless you,
water, in all your streams,
said Auden.
The element
of languor,
of making
oneself into a water baby
and swimming
away with the other
sad babies,
under the
rushes,
and of
course the oars of the old sheep,
impeded by
the claws
of crabs,
sweet little
crabs, said Alice.
A scorpion
in a puddle.
Phlegm.
Hey Phlegmy,
play a card.
I don't like
being called Phlegmy,
but I do
love messing about in boats like Ratty,
or even
better without a boat,
just a dock
and few clothes,
gooshing my
toes
through the
Mississippi mud.
And who
drowned? Mainly Ophelia,
Shelley, I
guess,
the only
poet with absolutely
no
personality,
David my cousin Gene Levno's son.
I went trout
fishing in the Snake,
waded and
rested my butt
on a tuft of
sand
as I looked
at the Grand
Teton up to
my right,
Mt. Teewinot, Mt. Owen
as the river
flowed south.
Now here in
my Hiawathaland
home,
all those
sucking Mississippi ravines
covered over
by roads and driveways
Friendly,
suffocating, soul-quenching.
Bless you,
water, in all your streams!
And those
muddy tarns
near Dry
Creek west of Pueblo,
sustained by few cloudbursts,
harboring minnows, skinks, and salamanders.
harboring minnows, skinks, and salamanders.
ever stronger
power to god
water be good
at point of need
ready prophet
quench advent
thirst water
mind the world
water be good
at point of need
ready prophet
quench advent
thirst water
mind the world
