A Castro Renga

We saw rain clouds over Marin
We had planned to stay in
But felt new Fennel shoots on Castro Hill instead

Sitting on blankets, snuggling
Against the cold watching fireworks

Everything is carnival now. Go-Go dancers in the window,
A tuba playing Star Wars-sun does it

Day-glo nuns play parlor games
Eager novices adore

"Oh, it's a study! One must photograph."
"Do it now, Jean, I swear -
Sorry queens - all they have is publicity and here I go."

Caught on super-8, black and white
Crowns of crystal condensation

So we have insured the 12 Davids,
A robe of St. Bartholomew's
But the bones - little fingers - lost, all lost.

Twisted into tiny knots
Clumps of hair form strange God's eyes

The medieval purse
Was not filled
With gum or crumbs

But kept a heart still beating
Wet flesh bag to keep it warm

I cannot see much from bed
But a stream of women back and forth
Wet towels hot go out, damp towels cold return

A steaming pile of sweat mops
Discarded by workout drones

There I will lay down my head and buckle my knees like a foal
I care so much to be sound
I am in love with sleep and round nose breaths

And rounded with a sleep, she
Said my snoring sounds like rain

Freckles have fallen on our hands in the night
Perfect snow
We are still and try our eyes

Squeeze lemon juice to bleach me
White like bones, white like dead skin

I will be all in the air tomorrow - desert night
So for you, buried along the lines
Find cans of tomatoes to drink and so cool your tongue

Dowsers follow ley lines but
I feel lost without a map

You can feel topographical maps
So oop! There I am on all fours
Palpating ant hills for the truth from the source

Counting the bumps on my head
A blind masseuse tells my fortune

"You know all there is to know about winter
There is - something - a cavernous structure on the bay
Something about a bicycle bell and the last days in a place."

Dry, crisp sounds in the cold air
Not yet the wet sounds of spring

We dragged the mattress under the Willow
Jumped up, pulled branches, skinned our hands, fell
That's when Momma let us know about lice

It's not like sleeping on clouds
More like a rocky streambed

Have you ever heard a thousand rocks
Scooped and dropped like Jacks by a wave?
I don't want to pick even a few stars out to make a crab or archer.

I'm a sad astronomer
My planets all turn into planes

My bicycle is a gangly puppet
I am heavy on her and her bones sag
Still we tear down the hill calling that comet the last

Shooting like Roman candles
We expend ourselves for her

We three walk up the empty road at dusk
A few bees left in the air
And barks

The sun sets with a soft thud
Too tired to hang without help

"Pick your feet up when you walk!
Confederate you ain't, though you sing and eat shoes.
Consider the Lilies, and one more for the Gipper, you, up!"

Make out like Tipper and Al
Grow a beard and wear wise eyes.

Persimmon trees still bagged at the roots lie in the drive
We watch the column grotesques flash as we shelter
"Oh, Father - what have we forgotten so long ago?"

I remember ripe fruit
A hedge maze of berry bushes

Shotzie straddled me, and his Ramses shadow
Was the word so corners spoke
I had telepathy and the love of everything taller than me.

Hear me think then
I promise not to shout.

What is a renga?

Haikai no renga is a style of linked poem that reached its height in the work of the Japanese poet, Bashô (surname Matsuo, 1644-1694), and his disciples.

A renga is a group of haiku-like verses linked in any one of several special ways. It is usually written by two or more poets who take turns writing the verses.

In classical renga, 3-line and 2-line verses are alternated, beginning with a 3-line verse (a hokku, usually approximating 5-7-5 syllables) resembling haiku and indicating a season. A second poet composes the following verse (2 lines approximating 7-7), linking it by one of several methods (not too obviously, please) with the first. The next verse (of 3 lines), composed by the first poet (in a 2-person renga) or by another (in renga written by more than 2 poets), links with the second but not with the first. And so on and so forth.

Most classical rengas are at least 36 stanza's in length.