Poetry » Winter In Eden Poems

Three Poems From

Winter In Eden Robert Schultz

Marriage Fires

Where on the spectrum of living fire
Do a man and woman walk this morning
Through woods above a shallow river
Late in March? In winter they dozed
And smouldered coolly, or flared inside
Like ice on skin, a flame that numbs.
The grass lay matted and bleached by snow,
And so did they. She painted their walls
To peach or lavender, blocking the reach
Of clouds and plains, that white on white.
He traveled widely, books in his lap,
Sailing the floorlamp's pool of light.
They did not know they had been so sick,
But, convalescent, they slept together,
In each other's arms in separate dreams.

In the woods today the early blossoms
Shine like snow: bloodroot, snow drops,
Dutchman's britches. The man and woman
Breathe cool air. They did not know
They had been asleep, but now
The sensation of slowly waking. The sky
Behind its lattice-work of empty branches
Starts to their eyes a different blue,
Like a run of music or sudden breeze
That lifts a curtain. Low bushes thrust out
Pointed leaves, green on one side,
Red on the other, little fires
Breaking out on the branch.

Which way shall they walk? The path
Divides. One trail rims a limestone bluff,
Climbing through cedars, then opens high
Where she wants to lead him, hand in hand.
She thinks of how the river looks,
Reflected sun from rippling shallows
Seeming to burn a thousand holes
In the world below. He wants to go down.
The other trail descends through hardwoods,
Skirting a creek. He remembers a pool
Where runoff floods have tumbled the rocks
And once he scooped up spheres of granite,
One in each hand, to strike together
And hear them ring. Though water flew,
He saw their spark, saw the arc that tracked
A glowing chip and smelled like smoke.
So they stand at the branch, each holding
In mind a different way. They do not know
Both end in fire.

 

                             

Vietnam War Memorial, Night

To the left the spotlit Washington Monument
Jabs the air, progenitive, white;
Beyond trees, to the right, the stonework glows
Where Lincoln broods in his marble seat;

And here, between, in the humid dark,
Where curving pathways lead and branch,
Sally and I step forward carefully
Somewhere near the open trench.

Choppers shuttle across the sky
With jets for National crying down,
But we've lost our way. The intricate dark
In the center of town moves all around.

There are others here: white T-shirts drift
In heavy air. Then three bronze soldiers
Caught in floodlights across the field
Stare hard at where we want to go.

From above we find the wall's far end
And begin to descend. Ahead of us
Soft footlights brush the lustered stone,
Dim figures trace their hands across

The rows of letters, and others, hushed,
File past in the dark. At first we are only
Ankle deep in the names of the dead,
But the path slopes down. Quietly,

We wade on in. in the depths beside
The lit inscription, men and women
Hold each other, mortal, drowning.
Many have stopped at a chosen station

To touch an absence carved away.
From deep inside the chiseled panels
Particular deaths rush out at them.
The minds of veterans gape like tunnels

To burning huts. We are over our heads.
Now Sally turns, sobs hard, and stops.
We cling to each other like all the rest
And climb away with altered steps.

 

                             

Winter in Eden

There are no fences, no gates in the snowy
Fields and wrecked orchards; only the sword-blade

Winter light swings north to south, east to west
Where the straight horizon locks itself with ice

To a sky too bright to look at. We are free
Among the trees of knowledge, gleaning

Shriveled apples and berries, sweet
As they melt in our hot mouths. Memory

Flares as we walk beneath the torn limbs.
At home each night the dream arrives, insistent

As a chanted word: the slim trunk rises,
Branches dense with scalloped leaves protecting

Their fruit-globes the colors of perfect bodies,
Naked, shameless in the tree of life.