TOKKŌTAI

He had understood since childhood honor
of dying for family and country,
how at Yasakuni Shrine, Emperor
Hirohito would speak his name, sentries
bow heads in respect. Stiff as tatami
bedpost, by his Mitsubishi Sonia,
he grasps the flag from Commander Tamai
who lisps of the Shinto way. Begonia
and death poem in flight jacket, he sees
Ai’s face. Will she visit temple next year,
remember his Yakudoshi? Believes
she will. He sips sake. Vows not to fear.
In the cockpit, he hears Tamai’s last wise
words: Before impact, never close your eyes.

Roger Armbrust
September 28, 2008

HEARTS

Some I’ve scalpeled skillfully from thorax,
dissected and skewered on silver prongs,
roasted over flames until fibroblasts
grew black, signaling well done. Though I’ve longed
only to taste excitable cells, I’ve
settled for the full meals. Some have plagued me
with such passion, I’ve devoured them live,
severing breastbones with single blows, freed
cardiac muscles with violent rips,
perhaps even swallowing raw flesh whole,
tasting only blood drops licked from my lips,
belching and moaning, Oh, my damned soul.
Yet now there’s you, love. You stun me, impart
a surgeon’s touch: graft my heart to your heart.

Roger Armbrust
September 27, 2008

REFLECTION

Broadway and Bleecker. Northeast corner. Noon.
Weekday. Striding to a meeting, I pause
in summer heat. Gaze at my reflection
in McEerie’s window. I hear applause
in my head, shouts of how I’m looking good.
Suddenly my image darkens. My eyes
stare past me to the bar. He’s drooling food,
greasy semi-liquid swarming like flies
on his worn, gray Jimi Hendrix sweatshirt,
dead guitarist’s red-ink profile fading
to pink. The guy gawks toward me, face absurd
parched clay, eyes lost in flashing, cascading
electroshock. He guzzles down a beer.
It’s ’91. A year ago, I’m there.

Roger Armbrust
September 26, 2008

LEAF AND HAND

This Northern Red Oak leaf covers my left
palm and fingers, its pigment fading from
forest-green to yellow-green, a bereft
chameleon caught in the act. Right palm comes
beside it as if taking communion
from nature, and I study plant veins and
my veins, its stalk turning to lifeline on
through to leaf’s tip, while my rough-edged, stretched hand’s
line arcs from near wrist to base of index
finger and beyond. Love, do you believe
this curved furrow within our aging, flexed
flesh determines our days? Like withered leaves
we fade as the hand curls closed? Do we share
life beyond us, as loving leaves bear air?

Roger Armbrust
September 22, 2008

AUTUMNAL EQUINOX

It’s today, you know. Love, shall we call it
coincidence we lie hear listening
to Neil Diamond sing Be—of the poet’s
eye and the Sun God making our day? Sing
of sand, stone and bone? The Iranians
celebrate Jashne Mihragan this day,
hearts honoring the divine covenant,
and thus friendship. On tables they display
rose water, apples, and pomegranates,
burn frankincense and sing. Anglo-Saxons
and Celts bowed to haleg-monath, this date
its genesis. Now our source, blazing sun,
sails across the equator, impartial
to light or dark. Invites us to love all.

Roger Armbrust
September 22, 2008

PRAESEPE

Love, see how to the naked eye this star
cluster ignites astronomers’ visions.
Eratosthenes, on Cyrene hill far
from Greece, imagined shining manger, on
each side a feeding ass awarded heaven
for bearing Dionysus and Silenus
to defeat Titans. Aratos christened
it Little Mist. Stargazers around us
see a beehive. I view a jeweled face,
glowing points of forehead, cheekbones, and chin,
a moistened glistening—celestial trace
of graceful Alcyone newborn, risen
from the sea. Yes, a new myth I’ve designed.
Or now reality: Your face divine.

Roger Armbrust
September 20, 2008

POLAND, EARLY SPRING

We rest under a lone oak. Our tired eyes
follow the Sokolda’s narrow, scythe-like
curve—thin river whose genus we’d revise
to creek back home. The tree nests a grey shrike.
You call it a vagrant, too far north. Bass
break the water’s surface, large mouths snapping
at minnows. Touching the oak, our thoughts pass
to the ancient Bartek we saw, strapping
as a Cyclops, in the Świętokrzyyskies
near Kielce. You suddenly wince with pain,
recalling gnarled field of spruce carcasses
in the Karkonosze; curse acid rain.
I hold your chilled hand. Study the distant thaw
of pines. Whisper, “Like winter in Arkansas.”

Roger Armbrust
September 18, 2008

GYMNOPEDIE FOR PIANO NO. 1

Satie’s symphony somehow melding peace
and melancholy first flowed to me through
Blood, Sweat & Tears’ ’60s album release,
variations of two movements like blues
hummed by archangels suddenly rising,
mantras of modal harmony, bookends
balancing jazz-rock tracks, such surprising
contrast rushing my body from frenzied
craving to dance in speeding traffic down
to desire for floating through rippleless
rivers of holy water. My thorned crown
of hangover bleeding me, I felt blessed
still, redeemed like the nailed thief as I lay
in off-campus bed, no choice but to pray.

Roger Armbrust
September 17, 2008

I’M WRITING WHILE

Johnny Mathis sings A Certain Smile, strings
and sopranos surrounding him, while Nat
King Cole soothes September Song to Shearing’s
clear ivory keys—raindrops entrechat
through wind chimes—while Sinatra croons Stardust,
while Eartha Kitt chanteuses Smoke Gets In
Your Eyes, throaty purr of Catwoman just
sipping the milk from a silver bowl when
Mathis returns with Chances Are. How would
Li Po respond, do you think, lying by
the Yangtze with iPod, feeling spry wood-
winds caress Eckstine’s vibrato softly
over Internet? Drunk, would he still drown,
trying to embrace the moon’s reflection?

Roger Armbrust
September 8, 2008