Sample Poems by Eric Rawson
Cherries on the Branches
We could call it autumn the air
Having cooled so quickly almost
A disappointment--we have pain
Trapped up in the branches with the
Sunburnt cherries--there is a wren
Up in the tarnished leaves testing
The redness--we are sitting on
Wire chairs our feet scuffing the grass
I am looking for excuses
And you are helping--looking for
Excuses--we have learned to watch
The shadow of a tree shadow
Of cloud and the slow days passing
We have agreed never to lie
Or blame taught ourselves the order
Of a small country learned to hear
What one hears when every word
Is meant to answer for a life-
Time--we have pain trapped between us
Above us--it is a moment
In which color dominates--there
Is a blue dress a milk-colored
Sky and sky-colored lawn chairs black
Shoes red cherries and green leaves--we
Could stop speaking--we could watch as
The wren feeds on the cherries and
The cherries drop to the trim ground
We could say that each cherry is
A part of pain and that the wren
Is helping us--you could hum your
Mozart--you could make up lyrics
You could step out of your blue dress
And into the triangle of
Light the sun leaves under the tree
As it goes--it rained all after-
Noon--our fight was ordinary
Brief--then you sat by the mirror
Watching yourself pare a lime in-
To a glass of soda and the
Bitter odor calmed us--but now
Pain cannot escape into an
Odor or a glass now we have
It trapped and it has us trapped--we
Do not look at each other the
Cherries are hypnotic swinging
A little when the wind decides
To move or the wren bounces on
The branch--the cherries are all things
Red the unhealed wound the stain on
A sleepless eye they are the pain
We cannot let go--the night-blue
Spreads behind the tree like a fan
We have only a few moments
We could let the dew that has more
Power than we start to settle
We could join the stuttering of
Insects we could end it right now
We could we could kick over the
Wire chairs and crawl over the grass
And shake the slender mossy trunk
Until the cherries shower down
Around us pelting our shoulders
And arms our forbidden faces
Picture with Two or More People In It
Greenness hardness coldness--the juice
That makes the leaf and stone and ice
And you--what is that part of you
Who is the ancestor of self
Begetting a swarm of others?
You are not you like green is not
The leaf but like the leaf is green
The toad sitting in the cornfield
Knows no loneliness for others
But you--how do you know yourself
After living so much last night?
Each day the shadows knot like rags
On the windows and in the trees
The husks of the ones we have loved
Occupy their yellow armchairs
Or chained from one moment to the
Next wander back and toward the back
Of the yard leaving our houses
The snails on the terrace at night
The wind the night-blooming jasmine
At least the squirrel in the palm
Uttering her anxiety
Wants nothing but nuts nuts nuts nuts
At least the clouds go on and on
You say won't you stay you don't have
To say too much you don't have to
Stay but won't you stay you don't have
To but won't you you don't have to
Gradually everything is
Suddenly torn from the background
A gaggle of geese a guggle of green
Brook streaking through a furry field
From a farmhouse on the hill (white
Stucco a muddy little yard)
One boy one girl descend along
The sunburned groves of oranges
Purple clouds of jacaranda
Such was her oxygen all her
Little life long even later
The words the ones a bird would speak
Owk she said that's the way the goose
Goes when she goes for you you fool
Of course the children are missing
From the family photograph
Which is also missing because
The family is missing as is
The homestead (so to speak) the school
Companions and the goldfish bowl
On the counter--life goes on in--
One finds a missing child in Nice
With a spy for a surrogate
The majestic seascapes subsume
The past in a blast of beauty
The raw sand the biblical sky
Of which one is the missing child
Come hither closer next to me
You take the left hand I'll the right
And then dive through hedges to find
Beasts and new knowledge to boast of
From a hilltop in Hollywood
A coyote comes to guide us
Follow the gray fellow my friends
In amazement into the missed
Of this valley of paradise
There are many--not too--of us
Paddling around the pond through bright
Red hyacinths and lily pads
The palm fronds like shutters flicker
Oh peace how do you find us here
After juleps and a hammock?
We might have been satisfied--but
Now this including an egret
Too soft the air soft the water
The city recedes into mist
And all its criminal traffic
Retires to shadowy bedrooms
I am just sick with happiness
My eyes sting with the sight of you
What is it you think when you think
What is it you dream when you dream
That you dreamed that your body was
What is it you wish when you wish
That the broken-coated moon would
Not catch in your throat as it does
That is the life that is at last