Yield

He was summer burned, he was winter blown — Jimmy Webb

The crops have been rotated, and next year
We’ll see alfalfa in the eastern field,
Where unexpected aliens were sealed
Beneath the hops. We used them for the beer,
But couldn’t grow good barley. You may sneer,
And you might claim our talent was revealed
To be absent, but a pretty decent yield
Came out of this squat northern pasture here.

The land is redolent of what was planted,
All that we hid under the open ground.
The fertilizer seems to be unsound,
But when the newly dark brew was decanted
It looked all right. The sunlight, sharply slanted,
Shone through the glass, appropriately browned.

Sweet

I hoped it was my prowess in our bed
That made you love me, but I don’t suppose
My kisses made you swoon. Several of those
Would leave me gasping, but my turning red
Proved nothing: I turned red alone. Instead,
I thought perhaps my wit was what you chose,
So I produced a hailstorm of bon mots,
Enough to make you frown and smack my head.

Loving you, I had won the lottery,
A run of luck so thorough and intense
That nothing comparable to that recompense
Was ever met with such futility:
What had to be the reason you loved me
Was your sweet pity for my lack of sense.

The Women Lying There

                                                        after Aleksandra Tsibulia

An old man, knowing all about regret,
I think back on a life lived fitfully:
There was that time a beauty married me,
Those girls who wouldn’t kiss me on a bet,
Nights after sharing dreams in the sunset
And mornings stifling my humanity,
And I remember climbing a tall tree
To see the world, and everyone I met.

I heard you: “All the women lying there
In the dry grass have aged, their sunbaked skin
Appealing to no man now, some too thin,
Some with their ancient curves, some dark, some fair,
With only the warm sun’s caress, the air
Their only lover.” Here’s where I begin.

Between the Notes

I faced a urinary tract infection,
A monster with a horrid overbite
(How in that case had it escaped detection?)
That sapped me of all possible delight
In this or any other world: a dark
Noisome despair filled me with shame,
Sustained by piercing glances, cool and stark,
My father's forlorn hopes, my mother's blame.
It has been ever thus, since petticoats
Impeded ladies playing on their spinets,
Suppressing hearty moans between the notes.
What will you do to face the awful minutes?
I have no answers. I have just one thought:
Smile when you spy an unredeemed red spot.