C l e o Q i a n —

selections from “Garden Views”

ARBORETUM

Light runs, fleet friend of time passing
Rain makes a home in the rock face
Leaf friends form tribes, and are sharpened
Leaf friends form polycules, are tender
The beech tree articulates the sky’s softness
A passerby sees it and cries, “Lovely!”
One mind exhales for a long moment
The bench numbers some shapes of green
 

MACHIAVELLI

One morning three days after the bad night
She said, “So you are ready to lose me forever”
Machiavelli praises the cruel prince
He uses the term well-used
A dread of punishment…never forsakes you
Virtue … lasts only when death doesn’t
Most mornings I don’t speak upon waking
My heart was no walled city-state
I’d opened the gates to an organ
 

BODY

And even after the hours – I’d inflicted – tried inflicting – and make pass –  with pain – my body still propelled itself – running – meeting the rain-muddied slope – feet taking the mud slip’s momentum – running to stop itself falling – at the bottom I stood – in firmness –

 [That night is a flesh of its own kind]

Commandments for the body

1.     That night is a flesh of its own kind.

2.     That miracles have a light pulp, like lychees.

3.     That hate is the pith of old sweetness.

4.     That parents are frightened by children.

5.     That the cake requests to be eaten, be eaten.

6.     That feeling is expressed by the spine.

7.     That silence constitutes a music.

8.     That the blue world leaves out our motions.

9.     That bees are engulfed by their sweetness.

10.  That our bodies were delivered as arrows,

We straighten under pressure of night.

Landscape Study with Cloud and Saturn Return

The planets, hard teachers, have schooled me

small things don’t annoy me as they used to

the root of my ear has grown firmer

I want more than I have and for nothing to change

still, it is a work in progress to make peace

with the pieces of my self that grew smaller

the pieces that I picked from the ground

the pieces that I do not know whether will

grow larger or fall off

the pieces which are visible masses

the pieces which are invisible masses

cohering to make a self that keeps on changing

with the wind and with the forces

as a cloud shaped in the atmosphere…

last evening, we saw a cloud shaped like a staircase

what is a cloud, she said

I recited from the encyclopedia

a mixture of water droplets, ice crystals, or both that is suspended in the air

a cloud is a shape without a core

usually at a considerable height

I trace the outline onto my elbow

I Google the images of clouds

blue clouds, Chinese shan shui clouds, Jacob’s ladders light through clouds, anime clouds,

Japanese sumi-e clouds, stratus clouds, circus clouds, nimbus (water-bearing) clouds…

can you breathe a cloud, she says

can you light up the atmosphere with their lightness, she says

my recitation continues: as a mass of air ascends, the lower pressures prevailing at higher levels

allow it to expand

In expanding, the air cools adiabatically (i.e., without heat exchange with the surrounding air)…

you will change more, she said

there is no telling what you will become, she said

there is no telling who will stay around you, she said

we are all traveling alone, she said

her shape is like an outline before it blurs

I wanted the winds to take me, no

I wanted the winds to take my life

external pressures shape us, this makes us irresponsible

I lay away my claim for the present

I lay away my claim for the future

I grow older and sometimes, less certain

only certain particles in the atmosphere induce cloud formation

people have always dreamed of flying

the king’s true love was a migrating goose

I lay away my claim for the old past

I am satisfied sometimes, sometimes not

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