Sewanee Review

Those who live to have it andthose who live to give it.

Of course there are those for whom both are true,but never in the same measure.

Those who have it to give arelike cardinals in the snow. So easyand beautifully lit. Someare rabbits. Hard to seeexcept for those who would prey upon them:all that softness and quaking and blood.

Those who want itcannot be satisfied. Eagle-eyed and such talons,any furred thing will do. So easyto rip out a heart when it is throbbing so hard.

I wander out into the winter.I know what I am. [End Page 259]

Baudelaire, after dinner, a dinner he ate from a chipped plate in hislap, legs crossed and a corner of the sheet laid over his thighs as if itwere a napkin, and he did wipe his fingers on it. After dinner, a platenow licked almost clean that held a thin, impossibly tender slice ofroast beef, creamy little potatoes and some bread. Just enough towhet the appetite for more, more being—a vanilla candy in theshape of a sugar cube. More being—tea to stretch by after a mealwith wine. Yes, there was wine. And why not? Without memoryor future. There where there was nowhere else to be, where evenwith the window open the room smelled thick with want and anold chair, want and the dresser's open drawer, want and a too softbed that made a good grip not impossible but damn near, want andpapers grayed into the color of those unwashed sheets. Everythingaround him threadbare and old. Naked, with no way to hide anyflaw thus made flawless in such a place. Even the curtains hid nothing,the soot wafting in on a breeze that failed to cool the evening. [End Page 260]

Because I used to andnow the years have gone byand some of them without me.

And my passions have driftedor heightened and either waythey have my attention.

Because there are some who don'tmind and will meet me where I am.

And those who simply like the right nowno matter what the right now holdsand there is danger in going back, remember?And what is there ahead if our feet slip nowbecause we refused to see where we stand?

Look, there is a summer cottage where a couple sleepswithout food. Stolen shelter. And thereis an old man who won't see his family againand can't recall their faces not because his mind won'tlet him, but because he refused to see his familyand now, can't. So many cruelties in the now.

And if we lose this moment? We lose our balance,the promise inherent in the well-worn waking hours. [End Page 261]

The house that keeps me from movingThat lets me rest because I must, restThese legs that have mastered the stairs    for now, maybe, for a whileThis face that you love, that I will never    loveAnd this hair I refuse to press that you        press your face into        and no one near me knows how to        comb, which enrages me since        I have been trained to manage, to cut                to arrange anyone's hairForgive me this rage that means we may        not visit South Carolina, though            I am used to Tennessee and North                Carolina—This rage that makes breathing difficultI pant in my sleep as if running        from what chased my kin and would        see me dead if I am not carefulForgive the truth that I won't stop        speaking to you and othersWe know how others hate to be seen        through, and there is nothing a man            won't do if a mirror is held before himForgive my inability to keep friends close        but you would not love those who are            unkind, and...