What’s the Hurry?
By Quentin Baker
Copyright 2001 Quentin Baker
Smashwords Edition
cover image a vector purchased from 123RF, an internet stock photography company
Val
(It was a short life)(To the meter of “Old Dog” by William Stafford)
Up the gentle incline of Laguna,
Past modern hardware stores, Queen Anne condominium conversions,
A new church, A dilapidated three story ripe for urban renewal,
Except that the Japanese Senior Citizens and others are keeping
a tight hold on this that they have left,
Past the Victorians that line the street with elegance,
The trees shading the past just barely,
A past replete with soldiers ordering Americans into trucks.
Now, across Bush, the hill gets steeper.
Our breath comes harder.
You, Val, begin to lag behind,
Your nose experiencing a world impossible for man.
“Come, girl,” I say, “Come on, Val!” I slap my leg for emphasis.
She grins and beats her tail and catches up.
We make it to the Up Up Park, named so by children
who liked it there very much but not the climb
The walk levels off a bit.
There are trails and bushes and other undertails and wags and noses,
And never a fight because this is dogs’ public grass too,
Territory not at all a problem ever,
All “our place.”
And now the incline back toward St. Francis Square.
Why is it she slows so even down the streets,
Happy at the stop light on Pine?
“Come, girl,” I say, “Come on, Val!” I slap my leg for emphasis.
She grins and beats her tail and catches up.
And now I wonder what the hurry was.
I hardly ever go up those streets:
Once perhaps in six months or so.
The car’s the thing, booming back and forth, up and down,
making the orange with just the right spurt.
Waiting for a red, though, I glance my eyes about:
There’s that fat row of Mammy Pleasant’s fragrant eucalyptus;
There’s where that cat that hated a chase would lurk ‘til the last,
Then leap inches to spare through the barred window, open a cat’s heighth;
There’s where many times a smiling tourist stooped to pet a friendly
head and look at the person and his dog who really lived here;
There’s me.
For sure I wonder what the hurry was.
January 1990
Nurture
for Sarah Jean Baker Johnson
Long of face, weary of eye,
Later years’ lines hinted,
She plods across another day of mothering, an endless seeming way.
Milk at 5:30 a.m.
Then at 7:08
Again at 10:22
And at 3:00 or later if she’s lucky
Diapers stains and infant smells
And so and so on,
This day’s toe hitting next day’s heel,
Soundless screaming tedium straggles a twisting path.
No respite from those Belly pain cries,
Nor from his discomfort of being on his back on his side on his tum
or propped sitting sort of, pillow cushioned.
And only an occasional, barely learned smile to cheer her up,
To turn her face toward happier highways, different times.
I wonder, did Joseph take Jesus for a back or belly or donkey ride
up some trail to gain a spate of stillness
for the sleepless, beleaguered wife?
And did wood or cloth pacify his suck, suck, suck?
Thus does it matter little
That his birth was a grinding joy;
This tedious nurturing weighs her down,
Malaise asks the hardest question yet:
Will she do it?
Will this mother’s daughter take his hand ‘til his roads
diverge in that yellow wood?
We can only hope so
But never think it easy
To bring forth anyone who will make a difference.
December 1990
Luxury, Discovery
This morning, with the loud Seattle rain streaming against our window,
It is your feet and legs, your brow wrinkled with watching,
Kicking, kicking, pushing against my chest.
Yesterday it was your voice,
So strong the coos pleased everyone in earshot,
Especially yourself.
Tomorrow it will be your neck,
So stout, holding up that mighty head for minutes at the very least,
Preening unconsciously for my Pentax
Very pleased indeed with this miracle your body.
Happy times these:
Luxurious discoveries.
They bring us growth
Joy.
6:55 a.m., February 19, 1991
Footnote: as I read these words to Nolan, he listened with rapt attention
as though my voice was telling him everything he needed to know for now.
A Murderer
No need then to take a life,Silence its voiceStrew its brains across the gutterShred its fibers into pulpWhen bold MacbethHas done it for me:I’ve heard his heart knocking at his ribs,Staggered with him from the king’s bedchamberBedabbed in gore,Hunched in the dark with not two but three henchmenIn Banquo’s path,And waded so far into Fife’s red poolIt was easier to go o’er than turn back.We two, famous murderers,Have had our fill.
November 1991
Salmon River
I’m going to sitWith my loveOn the grassy bankBeside the soft sparkle flow of the Salmon RiverNear Challis.We will dangle our feet above the small smooth rocks
that have dried themselves in the hot August sun.A hundred year old willow’s meager shade will overhang usAs we munch crackers and cheeseAnd swill bottled water,Kiss,Think about the past,The future,The now.Two dragonflies, a large one and a smaller will twist, coupled,Up across the water,Land on a small green leaf of a branch above,Remain oblivious to everything for many long minutes,Motionless.A small trout will leap out of the current, “smack.”A magpie will flutter across the river far below and
land in a large cottonwood.
We will sit some more. You come sit here too.
August 1994
Hope
The hope of America
Strides across the morning Safeway parking lot
Heads toward Raphael Weill School
And the downtown 38 Geary stop at Webster.
One an apple for her class,
Dressed smartly in a short frock
With knee-high white stockings,
A red sweater with a matching bow,
Her Cookie Monster lunch box clutched securely,
Bulging blue jean backpack snug.
The other a plum for her commerce or high finance,
Wearing a business suit, nylons, and walking shoes,
Her brown briefcase gripped.
They stride toward Albert and me.
“Can I pet your dog?” the little girl asks.
I stop. Albert stands calm, appreciative of the small hand
stroking his head.
“What kind of dog is he?” the woman asks.
I reply and then say to the girl, “You like dogs.”
The woman explains, “We live in the towers back there.”
“Can’t have a dog?”
“Yes, but they charge you four hundred dollars for deposit.”
“That’s a lot.”
“Yes, but that’s the way it is I guess. Thanks for stopping.”
“Thank you.”
“Have a nice day.” Off they go chattering excitedly.
Albert and I watch them.
He, though curious, smells them only as an interesting
reassurance.
He doesn’t invent their lives together in the concrete walls of
the seventh floor
Nor wonder how they got to here
Nor espy in them a special kind of hope.
April 1992
Ontario Morning
If you have a dog with you,Or you’re power-walking with your wife,Each in a handsome, bright sweat suit,Or if you’re just alone in powder blueBut have a color-matched Walkman on your head,It’s okay,The neighbors newly-wakedOr the breakfasting family down the roadWon’t mark you for lurking and call the Sarnia police.
You can saunter on,
Tobi straining for those odors in the tall grass at the gravel’s edge.
To the east, immense gray clouds pile up, pile up against the horizon,
Rising higher and higher in a race against the sun to block its way.
Their magnificent tops turn soft now—lighter—white.
Out of the west and now quite overhead, silhouetted against
the light blue of this side’s morning sky, A V of geese wheels.
By the time Tobi and I reach Blackwell Road,The geese, this time incessantly calling each to each wheel back west
across our path once more.They’ve doubled their strength now,Stretched out at least a mile in two long lines,Practicing in earnest for the annual north-south, south-north ritual.Ontario has been good this year,Especially this morning.
Late August 1994
Polaris
A homeless guyProbably under thirtyHas moved onto the concrete space beneath our bridge,His dark back showing below the soiled sweatshirtThat rides up as he tosses in his sleep.
There he staysDay after dayWhere the bridge takes a sharp right upNot thinking, he litters the sidewalk belowWith fast food cartons, wrappers, top ramen cups,Even a sockOne time a single battered Nike.
He never asks for money.Usually he sleepsOccasionally he’ll glance at me when I go byHis odor penetrates five or six yards outwardsSo there is no escaping himBy looking the other wayOr shaking my head “no”Because as I said before,He never asks for money.
A mother’s son, he,Perhaps even a father himself,And most certainly a brother.Flotsam of our timeThe simple economic product Of that dismal scienceThat builds Polaris submarines,
Arms them with nuclear warheads,
And flaunts them
In the nightmarish hell
That’s called anti-communism
And drives us to desperation
And restless afternoon sleeps
That make our soiled sweatshirt ride
Up our dark backs
As we scrunch up against the metal and concrete bridge
That connects this side of Geary to Japantown.
June 5, 1993
Wedding Photograph
Dear Rachel,Though I know why all too wellAnd have struggled through some of your tough details with you
And have learned to expect the worst,
It still hurts
That you took you and Bill
Off my shelf
To replace yourselves with Baby Nolan,
The one I picked,
The one with just a trace of tear.
Frozen in time
Your wedding smiles were still
So sweet and shy and innocent
They re-evoked
An overflow of gratitude
That floods the chambers of my heart.
I dance again with the women of your wedding:
Princesses called Jean
Bill’s boss,
Sister Beulah
Bridesmaid Diane
Tracy
Mrs. Duffy’s young cousin
Lisa
Sarah
And the others I remember less
But who may have been,
Well,
In an old man’s recollection,
Astonishing,
Our faces splashed in champagne smiles,
Legs and arms and torsos
Abandoned to the beat
A wild, rock, Chico kind of dancing
That went on beyond the contract with the band.
You wore sunglasses.
This morning I looked up there to see my children
And you had fled.
You had to take you both,
For that is the photographic way
The camera frames life the way it is,
Stark white
Absolute black
Unforgiving
Capra’s Republican shot, falls
Eleanor talks with black-faced, white-eyed miners
Ghandi spins still his daily cotton cloth
Edward basks at Mrs. Simpson’s feet
Walker’s gaunt children stare from Oklahoma porches
And there’s the pity—
Wanting you to stay the way you were
Joyful
Loving
Hovering there just on the edge of greatness.
I remain, Lovingly yours,
Quentin
p.s. It hurts. Or did I say that once before?
April 1991
Visitors
At the Writers Club meetingFridayGeorge Washington High SchoolThe stage set with an empty stool for young writers
The fluorescents offI visit my mother,Her hair white now,Whiter than ever I remembered.She barely sees me:It’s those thick, thick lensesThat replaced her cataracts,But she senses me.Her mouth at first smiles,Then breaks,And she begins to cry.“Old fool,” she says,Angry at her own tears.“Why are you crying, Lucille?” I ask,Aren’t you glad to see me.”“I am, I am” she blurts, holding her lips tight,pressing them hard against her teeth.
“Then why?” I ask again.
“It’s the kids,” she bleets.
I knew that answer. “They’re gone.”
Gone from home she meant, None of her house more
and
Never again,
Except as visitors.
November 1991
The Guns of July
“I am the grass.Let me work.” — Carl Sandburg
The sheer cliffs above ocean roarNear Muir BeachAre dotted with gun emplacements,Cement and steel-plated half circlesBuried deeplyIn the rocky sides.Giant, tall-stemmed yarrow and cowpen daisy, beach morning
glory and hedge mustard, blue pod lupine and
monkeyflower, silver phacelin
Push around them,
Burrow into the soil that the wind and rain have slowly
Deposited onto the reinforced roofs.
An occasional buzzard
Glides slowly above these empty warnests,
Searching, wondering.In the hollows of these relics,Civilians have tagged the back walls with names,With a heart and a cross or two, and with sly comments.
Forlorn after fifty empty years, these gray cement mouths speak not.No plaque, marker, or seashore sign reflects a purpose.Their builders and the young watchers who manned them do not testify.
The gulls ignore them
As do the brown pelicans who flap and then coast single file
but two feet above the blue waters below this day’s brilliant sky.
The young men who watched there, big-cased shells at the ready,
wake up gray, some white.
Not a few are dead.
This is good.
Off across the wide Pacific
Jungle tangle and roots have consumed the uniforms, the buried and unburied bones,
Joined together with the salt and seaspray, relentlesly
destroy the debris of war,
Save perhaps a forgotten bulldozer
Or one large wing from a downed fighter.
Poppies have flourished for eight decades in the
rich blood of Flanders
The sands of Normandy sparkle in the Channel sun.
Centuries hence earthquake and the relentless toiling waves will
crumble these Muir Beach bastions,
These warnests,
These constructs of man’s folly,
Man’s fear.
June, July 1994, May 1995
Valentines or the Lost Poem
For Lisa
Many years ago
Would it be 1969?
I wrote a poem for you
Concerning relationships
And the agony of race.
You were a kindergart’ner then
At Raphael Weill
Your heart song trilled of love
Your soul song joy
No one could contain you
Though Jean dressed you little girl
And you had to wear the hated shoes
(Corrective building of the arch)
Your enthusiam knew no bounds,
Leaping from our noontime table,
You’d rush out and slam our door,
Clatter down hall and out the front door,
Tear across the lawn
And linger at the fence
To talk and smile and yell
With “my children” as you called them then,
Borrowing no doubt a teacher’s loving phrase.
They would greet you as a sister
One white face among their dozen darker ones.
Your animation brought them joy,
Valentines Day was suddenly upon us
You made one for each and every child
Replete with one pink or blue candy sweetheartTaped carefully on back or front,You said their names with relish,Adding a detail here or there to enlighten us with character.You dragged home that day in tearsNot your first cry nor our lastBut somehow so uniqueIt has stuck with me up ‘til now.I put the words down then, I know,But that paper got away.It went something like this:
“You were so excited with your clutch of valentines that day
The buzzer couldn’t bring school to you too soon Off you breezed,Shoes thudding down the hall
Grady Sessions’ party was the most that any child could hope for
In one lifetime up ‘till then.
You came home empty-handed,
Not one valentine in return,
Tear-streaked,
Disbelieving
And so were we, to tell the truth:
I had pinned my hopes on Martin
Knew Malcolm had seen it clear
But these dreams were too abstract back then
To smooth your bitter way
Or bridge those troubled waters.
You paid the price of pasts back then,
We are paying still today.
But don’t get me wrong
Paying is what Americans must do
Must do Must do again
Until we get it right.
undetermined date, first in 1970, February
Daniel’s Wedding Day
for Eliot
It’s Daniel’s wedding day!
It could just as well have been yours,
The perfect groom
In your straight-arrow dress blues
Parading with your bride
Through an arch of gleaming Wilkinson steel,
Your mates stern
With pride.
Instead,
You stare through
Your 2 x 2 secure window
Towards the bridge and the little bit of the city
Visible from the T.I. brig.
I can only hope you think
Of the past,
Of Daniel
Of your sisters
Of Jean
Of the time when you and Dan got excited about a red-tailed hawk,
Sighted high atop a tree on the cliff above Capitola beach,
But I can’t do it for you.
February 1992
Special Note: If you have liked these small efforts, I ask that you send 13 cents to me (PayPal accepts small amounts) or to your favorite charity. Had you been lucky enough to live in Brooklyn, N.Y., before the Civil War you could have bought one poem from Walt Whitman for a penny. He peddled his poems door to door! Thanks! Quentin Baker