Combing, Gathering Stones

submerged
all
but up to the eyes
the stone
buddha

Combing, Gathering Stones

While I slept and woke and slept and woke

again and again the ice was firming up

under the stones I’d stole away

from all the beaches my feet know.  I wonder:

if they could talk what they would say now,

shapes they are likely to remain for an ever

not having to bang and bang

against companions the day and night

tide bring in and abandon them to,

finally having gotten its way with the whole

shoreline before going in ahead

or our in its own ache to break against

the face of the moon hung sometimes

above the water ribboning while the wet salt

tried to seduce what was left of it, crescent

today and always breaking in her own way.

Between the clouds and the cold breathing

of all the creatures who stand chest

to chest and keep warm, that breath rising

alive the only alive thing to rise and I,

between being asleep and being

awake, make my brain rake itself shape-

less the way my gaze waits the first time

I’m returning after a long long time away

to that beach, the first time I reach

down, its summer in my head, and pluck

up some water-glazed rock and I never

really know why but I pocket it and walk

and pocket more and walk, no thought

in the choosing other than knowing I have to

leave, and bringing them all with me, like a soldier

watching his girl at the gate before the plane,

idle still, will take him away to kill, how he breathes

into his palm, discreate and she, some sweet

of her still in his teeth, breathes miraculously

back into him and he’s gone all the way

solid like this coming to rock and stone

and falling bit by bit while he fires

his guns and plunges between whatever legs

can bide his time between until, completely changed,

he cannot be seen when he gets back not

as he was when he left, maybe a piece

that falls on the platform at baggage

or the one he’s carried with him all this time

and lets drop and watches it fall

and like that tide pulls out or rushes ahead

                                (depending on the wind)

never considering it will glimmer some Sunday

summer morning just as the sun comes up

and some lady will take it and taste it and make it

bear the coming winters far off inland

shouldering the ice beside a stone Buddha

and a young young pine randomly sheltering

and taking root beneath the dying yet still

stunning every single year maple.