Celeste, I’ve just received the test results,
And any reservations I may have had
About bisphosphonates
—high liver enzymes and all the rest—
Are dispelled for now.
The words persistent osteoporosis in the spine
Will do that, but the morning was marked
By good purpose as I was able
To ignore the piles of manuscripts,
My forlorn treasure, and just write
And write with the desperation
That has been given me.
But now, out and about, let us turn
To an appreciation of this gorgeous afternoon,
The rich green of the grass and the dappled light
That sets my heart aching in love of the earth
To which none of us are forever bound.
But something else, Celeste, the restless yearning
That drove my long arrested alcoholism,
Some longing for more than the world can give.
Transitions occur in the way that they can.
I am now in the Whitney, where Kennedy’s head
Is blown off yet again and “He’s So Fine”
Plays from a jukebox I can’t see.
My school was down the block.
We wore a blazer with a crest.
Maybe that’s what I’d been thinking:
To be young without being physically young—and free.
A painter named Ellsworth Kelly showed his colors
In red and blue and green, the note
Reminding me that these are primary.
Gratitude was mine to have,
As it is important to build on a foundation
Of fact, wherever the mind might flee.
And now I am here, in the museum garden,
Eating a banana and sipping chamomile tea,
Where I periodically glance at women
From a place of relative neutrality.
More to come, Celeste. More to come.May 2004