For Sigrid, our lovely, talented daughter

Amusing The Beasts
by Don Brennan

Ideas
powerful as
great sea beasts
stirring in her mind

She walks the quiet beach
barefoot as a woman at rest
dreadlocks wrapped in the wind
eyes on the horizon
taking a break from downtown
in rolled up baggy jeans
thumbs hooked sideways
in her pockets

Taking a breather from work
left a little early
lied a little to the boss
needing to get to the beach
needing a breath of the ocean

A group of gray whales at rest
just outside the surf
spouting now and again
suspending their tonnage in the currents
murmuring to their children
singing songs on the way to
Baja

A notion stirred some current in her heart
as though someone else had been
moving inside her all day
drifting inside her
leaving her unmoored

The cold sea kisses her feet
soaks her to her knees
makes her trousers cling

She thinks just then
she hears a whale sing

Just the setting sun perhaps
wringing colors out of clouds
or the wind
whispering through her hair

But she thought
she heard them singing

Her own self laughing perhaps
soaking wet from dancing
spalashing like a fool
in love with someone new

Someone she had never known
or had probably forgot
like an old school jacket in a vacant lot

Some new notion of herself
giggling in the surf
amusing the beasts at sea
dancing to their tunes
getting foam all in her hair
almost forgetting she is freezing
almost forgetting to take her wet self
back to the train
before dark

Whales don’t rest long
in local waters

They begin moving south
towards a deep and fertile bay
where they like to love and play
when they are free.

In Memoriam

Robert Bruce Gilmer 1969 - 1971









SINCE HE LAY HIMSELF DOWN
Don Brennan

We take all but a mile or so by train
walking six blocks to the station on
one of our hand-in-hand days.

Sun and clouds, a few sprinkly drops
talking about a shower coming on
wondering if the rain this spring
will ever quit, something to mumble about on a lazy Easter Sunday.

Underground, the train rolls to a
stop, nine cars to the airport, full
of travelers and luggage,
two seats together facing backwards.

Talk about last night, seventeen
for dinner, gumbo with crab, sweet
potato pie, laugh about sleeping in
‘til nearly noon, encouraged by
Lao Tzu: “…non-action is achieved.”

Get off with three or four others
at Colma, follow the crowd onto the
elevator, walk a mile to the cemetery,
buy a few flowers, carnations and a
spiky white thing.

Mausoleum open 8am to 6pm on
Sundays, enter the west door, walk
steadily among the dead, several
entombed on either side since the 1920’s.

Our toddler’s remains are on the east end,
in an open court, gone to ashes when he was two,
thirty six years ago, lay himself down in your arms
with leukemia when he was two.

For nearly twenty years you did not
visit his grave, simply could not go near
where he lay, but now it’s ok to drop by
several times a year, talk to him.

Tell him his sisters and brother are doing
alright, (of course he already knows that)
and thank him for all the help, that you don’t
know how we’d make it without him
looking out for us.

Often fail to mention that he has been in your
thoughts every day since before he was born,
since he lay himself down against your breast
and stopped living.

You don’t have to tell him
what he already knows.

ON THE EXPOITATION OF THE HUDDLED MASSES

ON THE EXPLOITATION OF THE HUDDLED MASSES
by Don Brennan 8/1/07

it’s the anger
not the love
running us now

the love
not the anger
fueling our fury

orphaned lambs, we crowd against any
bloated belly to stay alive, ignore
the risks

suck the fat fingers that would
strangle us

watch for false
moves

a head fake, the
scrape of a blade on
stone pushes us to
the center

leaving sisters and brothers
behind on the fringes to
do the feeding
do the dying

good shepherds have brought us
here, good butchers engage in active
bidding

we are divine sacrifice, our
revelation, the babble
of the auctioneer.