Five poems by David C. denBoer

NIGHT GRATITUDE

In Baltimore, what a strange dream I had of you,
in our kitchen, holding me from behind, tying
my arms up gently so that only my hands could move.
And below my hands, just within reach,
that old cutting board where you dice chicken and carrots.
On it now were small blocks of blood, tight cubes,
icy and bony, at which I chipped away with a steak knife.
Little pieces were clicking off, falling at your feet.
My hardened heart breaking for you
my softblooded wife?

DESIRE

I can't tell you who it is
that steps fitfully from my flesh
in the ochre hours of dawn.
Why he paces the backyard earth alone
or walks the fencetops like a child.
I can't see the form his body makes
when he pivots, stops, looks back to me.
I couldn't tell you what he means to say
as his lips tremble or where he flees
when the thin shadows of noon
dim the silent space that keeps him.
I can't tell you his name.
But what he takes from my veins
as he strides into the gray light
at morning's edge is partly mine.
What he gathers outside is soon restored
within, powerfully, as a wave holds
promise of the crest.
When he sleeps I wake.  I share
two hearts that lift and beat,
twin stallions charging in their stalls.
The hot living fields spread out before them.

DISLOYALTY

The bear wakes in December
with a terrible dream:
the immolation of the forest.
In late spring the fat cubs wander off,
discover water, are welcomed by the river.
The eagle makes a cold sound as they enter,
rises through the blue, dives and disappears.
Deer descend to the city,
dance in the traffic, delicate
legs snapping like teacups.
Elk bones are ground to powder
under the red moon.

Weeks later, downstream, the cubs
are found together, laced like logs
into a beaver's dam.  Patches of skin
washed away, clean as stones.
Uphill, mother bear is seen,
nose high in the air,
scenting for her children.
She is like a slice of the night,
her black, enormous fur believing
anything is possible.
Now she catches the thick smell
rolling from the meadow below:
her lost cubflesh...then, horribly, smoke.
Turning, her eyes find a faint rosy heat
beginning near the treeline.
All of her dreams have come true.

BEFORE CHRISTMAS MORNING

I will slip out of bed, put on
my leather jacket, thick gloves,
and hat.  Then, while huddling 
in the cold, I will empty the
basketful of small moons, small stars
I have been saving for you for years.
I will position them in the snow
in Orion's bright pattern.

Outside your window
when you awake
the seasonal sky will be resting.
The hunter's arms will be
full of venison and fruit
for you and the boy.

SMALL THOUGHTS

I think the first small thoughts
of death in a country
already filled with death.

Perhaps just a piece
of my finger sliced
through at the knuckle
by the machines at work.

Or my car might miss a curve somewhere.
Or the dust like slippers beneath my bed.
The newspapers.  The drugstores.
The hand that touches the back of my neck
with this sound, "I love you. I love you."

David denBoer is the owner of Nighthawk Design, a full-service book design and typesetting service in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He has published over fifty poems in as many journals over the years. His most recent work has appeared in New Song and the Talking River Review.

[ Poems copyright © 1999 David C. denBoer. All rights reserved. ]

Experienced poets who aspire to be featured in TW3's Permeable Looking Glass should send five to ten previously unpublished poems, with a short bio listing previous publications and awards, to Articles Editor Bill Sheldon.

---

A Not Entirely Disinterested Service of
Bancroft & Associates: Digital Publishers.