A poem to my wife in which I remember

(This is the unedited version, penned I think in 2002, but I cannot now remember.) 

Remember

how it was when we sped away

bandits in a get away - into a red-neck traffic jam,

all those laughing groomsmen

GOONSMEN! boxing us in, and forcing us to low ride

in a lurch parade

the tank

near on empty, even then.

As it is, Dennis

that righteous menace,

wired a horn

to our brake light.

We grinned and bore

the din and stare, hoping everyone would see

the streaming silly paper and the shaving cream.

We were good sports too:

We smacked lip, as strangers turned

first to frown, then to smile.

We honked our way into

each red light or curve

riding fumes to the station.

Remember those few awkward hours,

just before a dinner invitation for our evening.

(too few for breaking boundaries –

too many for our new permission.)

Silly me - I'd agreed to appease my

step-dad with a slide show of my travels

meant I guess, to impress our out of town guests.

Time that should have been ours

to talk, touch, or pray

whittled away against all these pictures

of a past life…

and a freedom I would never see again.

Later … when some guests

felt awkward for us and the pining hours

they pushed us out

into the unknown air;

My new apartment, with the new sheets

dressed for us.

And now … what to do?

We were tired to the bone.

Months of planning with a week of cram.

A big swirling wedding. A big swirling day.

Moments that would blur among the smiles

and the guests and cake

only to be made alive with photos.

(I know now why they take them --

Not so much to remember,

but to believe

that anything happened at all.)

So we arrived -

wed, licensed, and approved

to cross the threshold.

For a moment I faltered … May be we should go to sleep

I mean, really sleep.

We had waited decades, why not wait another night?

But you knew … some rituals

are not for breaking

so you sent me away, for the moment.

In a moment we would pray

Invite God to join us in the unknown

and the years ahead.

and I laid my head on you

and fell into the crest

of my worlds softest wave.

Selah.

And you,

who were

my Kerry, like your name - a high green meadow --

or …like a hidden island off the coast of Whales ..

all rustic and wild ….

We, tame Baptist or Presbyterian boys that we were,

spied your ramparts, draped under fog

But no boat had ever pressed your shore.

You called the wind aside, and bid me dock

I walked the Rolling hills, and Heather,

I felt my way along the path

of a sturdy land

that you had saved for me.

And the soil broke away

with water, hidden in the hill

and I cried out:

I didn't know.

I didn't know.

--------

Remember,

that next day

when we joined.

a clang of happy vultures at the table.

Our families had a legacy and recipe to guard,

we tried not to smile when they asked:

"So you like being married?"

(And we did.)

Remember

how it was, in that first week or month

all these forever first time things,

in an avalanche of newness.

It was kind of like being born, and seeing it.

Indeed, if something's going to be new …

Why not make it everything.

First time sheets

and first time dishes

first time popcorn popper

first time lead-crystal things that I just don’t get, even now.

first time to ever check into a motel and say …

“This is my wife”, and smile at the clerk.

Fist time shopping (would it have been our last.)

First time to hear, What is wrong with men anyway?

First time ever to come home to a candle-lit meal

after having eaten two cheese burgers

out of single habit.

Etc.

Remember, Yes!

the Honey moon - two weeks of Westward Ho!

You sat with me so close

in something like a constant swoon.

Believe, it --- you did.

Remember too

that small Texas Town--

We never really saw it, but I stood, like a Japanese tourist

under the interstate sign to GROOM.

Remember, trying to save bucks

in Austin, found the low-rent run of motels

left over from the great depression.

A quick whiff of curry and the sight of cigarette burned veneer

sent us of to better things.

Remember the concrete Tee Pees

and the way that the ground became all wide and hot 

like something wide and hot.

Remember too

the Arizona blue

that dropped into that grand vermilion absence.

Some other millions joined us on the rim

but when we slid beneath the skin

with backpacks, He could have dug it just for us;

this weird inverted mountain, like a garden

hidden in the moon.

As it is, you read somewhere that one should take

a gallon for every mile of back county hike,

so I portaged in a bathtub, while little old men

in tennis shoes

went whizzing down, then up as we lay panting on the trail

and I tried to think of written lines that went with

dying at the Pre-Cambrian.

Remember

how much harder, is the Up, than down,

and how we stumbled out near after dark

like we had been in rodeo – all bruised at the bone

and walking in our sleep,

but   (Ha!)

Not even that could stop young love!

Remember our next days --

We headed north into the land of Utah

where everyone should feel

religiously weird.

This place gets strange, the Grand is grand, but this

our cosmic treat … three cheers for all the folks who keep

Zion National Park something of a national secret.

Indeed, do you remember the flanks of Zion :

monoliths of muscle red, set like teeth in a ruby jaw.

We saw the lines of our topo-map converged

in vertigo --

sheer black

We saw,

the hills crack open – up and under

like and apple pulled apart

then pushed

We camped with cramps upon

a saddle

set atop a fertile precipice

of lunge and vibrant greens,

streams of weathered rock

cascading down like rusted trees.

At night, we stood above a

moon lit plunge where pines

grew like “j’s from the walls

and we looked down on

eagles.

(Pause)

Remember too, our final day,

walking in between the halves of world.

They call this place the Narrows and it earns its name,

two-bodies wide at stream-bed with no shoulder to the side

and a quarter mile up

We shimmied waterfalls and waded waste deep through the trail;

walking back, you joined the water in a spill…

ten foot down and broke your ankle.

Four hours later

we emerged, you on the back of our new German friend Uve

after I fell with you three times.

OUCH!

In more ways than one.

*

Remember the months and years to follow, now compressed

and filled, with things in keeping

with a joy ride

through the low parts of heaven

or the high parts of hell.

Your womb opened to the world three times

bearing gifts from God above

we trembled at the blessing, even as we cursed

the struggle.

Remember (in no certain order)

When you let me choose, just before a rapid move?

I came back with a rat-hole rental

that I found on the run.

(will you ever let me forget?)

Remember

my first job out of college?

You worked to see me through, but after

several months of searching

I had to take what came.

When I didn't make the grade at Dispatcher

I wore a stupid little uniform and marked chalk on tires,

a man with a degree, giving parking tickets

to frat kids as I walked in the burn of the sun

and broken pride.

Remember

my first wanted job:

I would take photographs for the Southwest Times

of everything under  sun

I would win awards and have a blast

as I wove in and out of worlds -  The socialites

the social blights, the hallowed fights of teams

and the dreams that mark the march of a small city.

You would struggle

with the weight of kids,

and an ever-gone husband

And long hours of your own

in the stress of RN nursing,

that I would never know.

Remember the baby

that never slept (and still fights it)

she cried us half insane -

We rocked her like a metronome

or drove her all about the town

at 3 AM.

Remember the beautiful Ede .

Something of a ditto,

less red to the head,

and those eyes that looked like mine!

We called her the Queen of Erp

when she Baptized several

in the Sunday school.

Remember our third one;

Was she ever really young?

I remember a photo of her grinning

with hair sticking up electric,

she laughed even then, but somewhere

in the rush kid-hood memories of Anna –

the Banana

stack and blur.

Remember the constant chirping chaos:

naked children jumping on the bed,

jelly in the carpet, children on the bread

children at our feet, children in our toes,

children ever yanking at our clothes

or wearing them … and

one dear child who would grab your nose

when she needed our attention.

Remember the dolls and broken Barbies

feet chewed away, headless

buxom plastic, lining the shower…

And an avalanche of clutter that collects about

kids like stolen sugar on the floor

Remember always working,

you at night or me by day

I traded every Saturday

for another chance at wedding bucks,

I’d come home to “this life sucks” --

my own melancholy bride.

Remember elusive pleasures,

stuffed between the daily grind

gifts of half digested food, held out

or flowers mixed with sticks,

the thunder of pots and tricycles, or

the discovery of the ever-new old-hat.

Remember the first worm or dog, or log, or waterfall!
Remember drawings on the wall.

And those presents … who could match them!

Remember how, something went wrong, for both of us.

Strained, pushed and pulled,  You needed more

from me, but I had little more to give

I tried to meet your thirst for security

with work, but

you needed a friend and a heart and

more order than I could ever furnish ..

Remember how your anger started slow,

but built .. till it became like a fire

at the land-fill hill, ever pressing

ready to throw a St. Hellen's. 

Remember how I hid or slid around the truth,

ever seeking your approval, but not willing

to earn it by being strong in

the places that you needed strength.

Remember (though, please -- not too well)

the night I flirted with the flames of Hell.

I’d seen some picture

in a magazine of religious art (Image):

A painting of stripper in a tavern.

(there, I guess, to address idolatry)

I bit the bait, mixed it with a little hate

and sorrow

and went to watched some dancing whores.

I hid my wounded eyes from you,

Not only then, but on those other nights

of irritated conscience,

standing at the “Y.”

I vowed inside myself to lie

come hell or high water.

(and it came)

Remember how we found ourselves

friendless, and worn.

You became the queen of scorn

And I, the king of lies.

Lie about the money, lie about the small,

lie about the grandest things,

sure to save myself from all

your immediate displeasure, only to find

you always found out anyway, and I built

distrust into every word I spoke.

And yet, we sill held on, some bizarre

wounded animal--

Half our life in Christ, half out

using the heaven' words

even as we felt the hardness

climb into our very flesh

and eyes.

Remember, later how I lost my job ..

The neighborhood, the words ..

all those ugly ugly words.

Money, money,

What the  --  honey, love, and hate

You’re a bastard, you are late …

You are just like Mr. Clinton.

OUCH!

  --

Oh dear … If forgiveness means forgetting

something, I stop here.

I have never figured out how God, knowing --

Seeing all, and no less present in our past

than in our future - or the present;

finds in his knowing, forgetfulness.

But I will choose it now. To both know and forget

at the same time.

Forget about my (our) business woes

or the words, the angry

turbulent nights, or the fact that you can never

loose an argument

or leave

any strength in me as strength, but must tear it down.

I will choose to live without the pain

that I caused you, or you cause me.

And now a riddle.

Did my sins cause yours?

Or, did yours cause mine?

Or did we fall together, like something joined

that tried so desperately to part ..

The only thing I know,

No sin of mine

has ever NOT found its way to your eyes

Cocked, loaded, ready to kill.

But then, Sin is like insecticide

I spray the wind and eat the tainted fish;

Could it be, that the notion of “one flesh”

means what is says?

We are like some Siamese-twin of the spirit

and all my sins are sins against you, and me, and us

Concurrent.  And however your sins rise

I bear the burden of this

our ravaged holy-mansion,

rooftop open to the storm

and the foul aftermath of war.

--

Remember,  the Mercy of God.

Did he let us go so far, to see ourselves…

Or did he let us go so far, because we asked to go so far?

Did he mean to teach us patience, or of grace?

Why do other couples fold, when they seem to meet

with so much less,

and why do we find our healing now

with all our money in the bank of heaven drained?

Indeed,

Remember

the patience of God --

He could of placed us,

in a Swiss Cheese universe,

one bad step, and we

would plummet down some tube

into holes between the stars.

This is too much riddle:

He who knew no sin

knows so much of ours,

and will not leave us to

our own devices.

Did He merely stand aside and wait

or was he present with us,

even as we slathered

in depravity?

Jesus, how much do I really know you?

I know that you are king, and clean, and holy

But what about this side job

In the hog pen, wading in,

Holding us above the deluge as we

Rip, flail, and snort.

Whatever he does,  

I know that,

we are tasting beauty

Everyday.

I see it in so many ways …small and large.

You, letting go of harshness or holding your tongue,

Me, letting go of lies and adulteries of the mind.

You, reaching out in kindness (sometimes even with your body)

Me, letting my pebble of a heart feel again.

You with a hunger for the word of God,

Me strong enough to stand up to you --

When you need it (sometimes)

--

Would it be that healing came in a freight train

But, (from the lyric of a song)

“You’ve come along way baby … It’s a long way back”

Or .. from an even better poem:

“How much harder is the up, that is the down.”

Remember too,

The blessings:

The prayers of parents

gifts from friends,

cleared  business debts,

a cabin in the county, fit to produce envy in a monk

(our hermitage of healing)

a slow sense of community,

you back in church,

my first new job, and now a second …

that lets you stay

home, more of the time.

Children that obey (HA!)

or better yet, these children

that plummet our lives with pleasure

as they create without fetter.

If man is like a god, how much more so children

as they fearlessly design, or give

demand or forgive,

or even demand justice!

..

Remember now –

The future:

Cause it ain’t that far away.

Remember how,

we took these separate strengths

of spontaneity and order,

ease and moral rectitude,

pleasure in today, plans for tomorrow,

a touch of fun and sorrow

And crafted a new “man”

Together.

HA!  (Can you believe it!)

Remember

how we lasted the years, learned to say

I love you,

Both in word and deed,

built a city for our kids

good for eternity.

Remember

daughters growing into women,

all these gnarly guys, and broken hearts

and dreams and promises,

our white knuckled nights,

the veils, the cakes, the kids

and some of the circle

all over again

(but we hope less – and more)

Speaking of tomorrow:

Remember when you said

(out loud and with words):

“I forgive you, for all the wrongs

that you have done against me

over these twelve years;

In fact, I plan to burn THE LIST,

and never to use the phrase

‘for the last twelve years’ again.”

Hey babe … you can do it.

I remember.

By faith I remember.

I remember well.

.

.

.