Birth Chart

to Simone

Wandering off under those astrological signs

charted just for you, my quiet trekker—all

those houses & planets so perfectly straight-faced

but still baffling at birth—don't think badly

of me when I'm dead & you've gone deep

into the distance of love tangles, moneyed

interests, & old-fashioned commutes—into life

in other words—I did what I could for you, knowing

it might not be enough—I see now that I can't

save you from suffering, & trying to hurts

if I'm not kind. Tho I still want your life to be

untroubled, & am afraid for you, a fear made

out of my own fear of a future I can't control—

the world so often a human heart that eats itself—

places like New Orleans the Swat Valley Fukushima—

the names of those remote destinations for film crews

and symposium panels are places people die

native to those regions & out to kill or defend

life from itself—there is so much misery there

that refuses to call itself misery & that sees itself

instead as the unimpeachable power of a righteous day.

And there are criminals & dunces elsewhere—

hideous partyline whips, Saxon in outlook

and proud of it—there are the bodysnatched

and the inane candy-stripers & the greedy

and the martini narcissists high on the rising year—

but let's take the long view: these are not

your true companions, & out of my reach your

life will make itself in struggle & love perhaps

dependent on the strength that will come

if I only let go when you step out the door

as hazel-eyed now as always & maybe more so

this morning in slate-gray Gore-Tex.

Source: Standoff (Graywolf Press, 2016)