There is a plane going by and it could be you. I’ve been somewhat obsessively thinking about you all day. It was stupid of me to not insist on spending more time with you, but I so often felt like I was a piece of a life you’d left.
Written 14 April 2012 in Anchorage, Alaska.
Brian Fuchs, “12:07 am 4.14.12” from Okie Dokie (Scissortail Press, 2019)
The whole world started ripping apart from skies and ground,
shaking those Okies into a frantic state.
Run into the path of tornados,
sink into the cracked ground,
nothing is there to save you.
The politicians and tigers are waiting to eat you.
Written 11 November 2011 in Anchorage, Alaska.
Brian Fuchs, “Earthquake Season” from Scissor-tailed Flycatcher (Scissortail Press, 2020)
I itch for the subtle way joy emerges
from your face – overcome with yourself,
with yourself.
It’s lovely. You’re lovely.
You aren’t so familiar, aren’t so unfamiliar.
In the long months between,
everything misses you.
My senses feel achy and empty without
your enchanting aura of smoke and wine.
I smile, thinking of that laugh,
you know the one,
that erupts accidentally when you’ve
amused yourself.
God, I love that laugh.
You blew in on winds you could’ve
ridden forever, resigned to not settle,
loving the feel of the dust
whipping through your pores,
hair, teeth.
You seem reluctant,
you seem reluctant,
reluctant. Or is that me?
I decided to write you a poem,
a poem of you, the you I know of,
the you who is only a slight version of you.
It took four years to say
things about your loveliness,
about the smoke and the wine,
about Oregon and Alaska,
about loving your laugh.
It wasn’t just joy, was it?
I detected some shame,
loved that shame, if that’s what it was,
wanted to live in that feeling.
I’ll remember that face,
remembering how much I love you,
and I’ll exist for a few seconds
in that moment, that feeling,
inside a space you created.
I believe in horses and you,
I believe in me and you,
I believe in you
and you.
Written 25 October 2011 in Anchorage, Alaska.
Brian Fuchs, “Daniel Naranjo” from Okie Dokie (Scissortail Press, 2019)Continue Reading
Genevaa squash blossom
perfect and lovely
so often overlooked.
Written 3 January 2010 in Anchorage, Alaska.
Brian Fuchs, “Geneva” from Okie Dokie (Scissortail Press, 2019)Continue Reading
We struggle for life, gasp for water
and we die, wriggling and contorting into position.
Our dried carcasses serve as amusement.
Fifty years we’ve been on display,
dust gathering in our rigid and bony structures,
souvenirs for those whose lives were more exciting.
They pull us out to reminisce about their wild youth,
our magic now stripped by time,
and they talk to each other about us and how they miss us.
Some of them forget about us,
about how we thrived in the waters before being rescued,
collected as memorials.
They don’t know about the vibrant reefs like we do,
about the others who didn’t make it or we carried back
to other grey places where they too would be forgotten.
Many of us are labeled for easy identification,
classified and sorted so onlookers can gaze at our husks
in wonderment or disgust… or a bit of both.
Our tiny bodies have become too numerous,
too many have been broken or discarded,
but most of us will fade into the dark obscurity, lost.
The new fashion has been to provide a tank,
to adopt a bit of our habitat and collect several specimens,
lives lived with names and memorialized
as members of families, temporary and disposable.
We exist as novelty, and still a part of their youth,
a part of that colorful past they will talk about one day,
sharing the photos with their children and grandchildren.
They’ll talk about us, about how much they love us,
pulling us from the drawers and boxes to prove themselves,
they’ll show videos they took of the tanks filled with water,
convinced that they are showing great love for us.
But when they are no longer beings asked to show off
their specimens, their carefully curated collections,
they’ll put us away again and go back to their real lives.
We will keep wishing that our dried bodies would stop
finding their way into souvenir shops of those who
do not want to dip into the water and experience our lives.
We don’t want to live in tanks either, playthings of people
who do not understand that our beauty has not been for them,
that our magic was meant for ourselves.
The sun is coming up on the horizon,
Christopher Street is quieter than it used to be,
and I wonder if a generation is coming
who will realize the world that was fought for,
and I wonder if they will long for the days
when they were precious trinkets of other people’s youth.
Written 1 July 2009 in Anchorage, Alaska & 5 September 2019 in Payne County, Oklahoma.
Brian Fuchs, “Seahorses” from Okie Dokie (Scissortail Press, 2019)Continue Reading
Bea
The swan lands, awkwardly gliding
into water among strangers, among friends.
On the far horizon, the ponds edges
kiss coy stars, lurking in the dusk.
The swan gracefully turns her long neck;
her eyelids close softly — contentedly.
A world escapes behind veils of thin skin;
the murmur of voices fades to silence.
Gently, the elegant bird tucks her beak
under her wing and lets peace take her.
4.26.2009
Written 26 April 2009 in Anchorage, Alaska.
Brian Fuchs, “Bea” from Okie Dokie (Scissortail Press, 2019)
The deities are losing cellular cohesion, gasping desperately for breaths as they become liquid and evaporate.
The poets have been usurped by melancholy memoirists,
aching to have original lives.
Every story seems to be told, despite repetition
despite repetition
despite repetition,
despite…
repetition.
I keep sweeping up the dried remnants of fallen giants:
Thoreau, Dickinson, Whitman, O’Hara;
I even find Baum and Steinbeck and Spyri in the wreckage.
I collect the bits I can in a beautiful vessel where they remain safe, more pieces having been spared than expected.
Few search for the treasures, worried they’ll cut themselves on the old words of masters.
Picking through the pieces still brings me joy
even if I’ve no one to share them with;
I wish I could be as beautiful whole as they are in shards & residue.
Written 16 February 2009 in Anchorage, Alaska.
Brian Fuchs, “Literary Debris” from Okie Dokie (Scissortail Press, 2019)