In Writing: Dale Hobson

Just Before the Fall

Once this side of the field was cleared
of sumac all the way back to the wall,
the sprawling japonica was beaten back
to where the mower could keep it in check.
Dead limbs were lopped, grape unravelled,
leaves raked, and all laid neatly on the pile.

Each year a little more in order, the yard
expanded outward like the progress
of empire, as shown on successive
overlays in World Book Encyclopedia.
There was a fenced garden square, new
ornamentals, a Buddha shaded by lilac.

And so it stayed for a while, the way
the tide hangs at the high water mark
for a beat, neither rising nor falling,
while you moon contentedly at the beauty
of the sea. So the Romans must have felt
within the pristine marble of Constantinople.

But in these latter days, the signs of decline
are clear, sumac and japonica resurgent,
whole pine trees that lie where they fell.
Buddha leans now on his overgrown plinth,
like a ruin of Numenor in the wastes
of Middle Earth. The tide turned long ago.

Slow retreat has taken sway, the outer
provinces sacrificed to bulwark the center.
I now concede the stone wall will never
be re-squared, the unpruned apple will give
its small blemished bounty to the deer.
It was hubris to ever think otherwise.

The sugar maple turns early, as grandiose
a display as any I might have devised. The sun
is just as warm where the wraparound deck
might have been. Drowsing in this buttery light,
I can’t recall now why I ever turned conquistador,
or later, turned away from the far frontier.

Dale Hobson
9/22/11

In my dream a slender young woman
with short black hair and large dark eyes,
wearing a loose black caftan with flowers
picked out upon it in embroidery floss–
green, blue, purple, yellow and red–
perched upon the railway ticket counter
and sang to the clerk this astonishing song.

Its melody was devastatingly sweet.
The verses–well-turned, heartful–
broke to a soaring chorus, and once
to a meandering bridge that found its way
back to tonic through an odd modal twist.
The many stanzas slipped from memory
as soon as sung, and the yellow cheat sheet,
to which she twice referred, was a scribble.

Waking near to tears, the shape of the tune
at least remained. But I couldn’t keep hold,
having neither staff paper nor aptitude
for musical notation. Nor could I have sung
the thing, lacking range and a proper grasp
of relative pitch. So vision outstrips strength,
and now even the gist is lost, leaving only this.

9/10/11

Men at the Library

The youngest men at the library make war
with unknown adversaries all across the planet.
Behind cubicle walls they flex the iron thews
of their imaginations, making mutton of all comers.

The next cadre came a-jog with high-tech strollers,
to nursemaid towheads promised a good story.
Sitting cross-legged on the carpet, they murmur
baritone replies to a steady stream of soprano inquiry.

Then there are the unemployed, who email
resumes like candle lanterns set afloat, and
the discontented, who grind their many axes
with reluctant pen pals in elected office.
      
Older men relax behind the paper, happy
to be out of the house, for whatever reason,
and despite the fact that the very same paper
was on their doorstep as they went out.

Saturday in the library, one can be undisturbed
among company, a particular masculine pleasure,
like holding court, but without the nuisance
of issuing orders or hearing pleas for judgment.

A few are like me–bookish men–basking
in the convivial presence of their peers
(as represented by the long rows of volumes)
who spent their lifetimes scratching at the page.

In time, I may be among the eldest, who nod
in the best chairs, absorbing obscure tomes
(apparently by mental telepathy), whose friends
are long buried, whose labor is no longer required.

Even dull company is company, I suppose,
when days go on and on like Tolstoy translations.
Somewhere back among these stacks, no doubt,
is a book–cogent but neglected–upon this very topic.

Dale Hobson
September 3, 2011

I’ve been taking a little time off from work, which would seem like it should be a good time for writing some poetry. Strangely not. Our St. Lawrence Area Poets group had its monthly meeting last night and I had set the challenge to the group–write a poem a week. I did walk in the door with four new poems–all written in the three days preceding the meeting.

Two were haiku of undistinguished quality. Another was based on Anglo-Saxon riddlery–and could be considered a success–in the sense that no one could figure out what I was talking about.

The last and best of the crop was even shorter than a haiku. Consider it a new addition to my occasional series of how-to poems:

How Guys Catch Gals

Deer run fast
but dogs run long.

I sat down with NCPR book reviewer Betsy Kepes a few weeks ago to talk about A Drop of Ink and to read a few poems. Through the wonder of editing–the removal of many ums, digressions, brain freezes, and irrelevencies–the final cut makes me sound like I know what I’m talking about. It aired this morning on the NCPR news program The Eight O’Clock Hour. You can hear me read three poems from the book: “Afterword,” “Coyote,” and “Water Prayer.”
Interview/reading with Betsy Kepes

Old Songs Community Arts Center

Had a great road trip to Voorheesville (west of Albany) on Sunday. I read at the Old Songs Community Arts Center as the featured guest of the Sunday 4 Poets series. It being my first reading following the publication of my first full-length book, I told the gathering that I felt like I should wear a yamulke, say “Today I am a poet,” and read a passage from “The Waste Land.” Poetry humor.

Voorheesville has a great infrastructure for poets–the venue, formerly the public library, now hosts world-class music performances and was running its annual 3-day music festival nearby, to the delight of 6,000. I drew a somewhat smaller crowd. Also, there is a nearby tavern, which serves great food and reserves a “Poet’s Corner,” where the notorious discussions and disputations of the word-smacked can continue without undue disruption of the public order.

And nearby Delmar is the base of operations for my overnight host, Alan Casline, whose Benevolent Bird Press published my chapbook, The Water I Carry, in 2008, and whose Rootdrinker Institute has North Country roots itself, in the magazine Rootdrinker, printed once upon a time at my old Potsdam printshop. Alan laid on a historical exhibit of Raquette River Printshop artifacts before the reading, including work I had long forgotten, and some I wish I could.

This week it is on to Clayton. I will be reading Thursday at 5 pm at Winged Bull Studio on James Street in Clayton–the stomping ground of Greg Lago, whose wood engravings add so much to A Drop of Ink. We promise to wrap up in time for folks to grab a bite before the Orchestra of Northern New York Concert at the Clayton Opera House.