To Bill

To Bill
freedom is the gift to be alive though dead
-Anthony Towne

rumors of dead burying undead
reach me here
but do not touch,
the flags still wave
the signposts stand,
words of welcome
and love’s strange silence
hang in the air
like the puppet acrobats and clowns
in his study

rejoice, rejoice
again I say rejoice

e.e. keeps damning everything but the circus,
and the parades of life and death
keep clashing in ever larger
ever smaller circles
death to life
life to death
silence, accommodation, mediocrity
love’s passion and longsuffering
the onceness of our passing and being
the taking up and laying down
of our lives
for others
for the world
for ourselves

rejoice, rejoice

he was always passing
from death to life
life to death
many times a day
I feel so little sadness
at this latest passing
one more glory
to glory
there is so little
that needs to be said

green and brown, life and death

Middlesex, VT October, 2010
8×8’s en route to the stump dump

ferry slip tree

This tree, dead and weathered now
lo these many years, was the first
plant that grew in the fill between
the ferry slips at the Governors
Island Slips at South Ferry, Manhattan.
I remember, when I was but a slip,
seeing the single stalk grow that year,
the only green thing in a pile of dry
rubbly dirt. That would have been
a bit of a while ago.
This photo was taken a few years ago.
Notice the abundant green of the dead
tree’s generation. And the nice paint job
on the building.

the living and the dead

at Plum Island, Massachusetts, summer solstice, 2009 Daniel Wetmore

crack, plant, and tarp thread

Montpelier High School tennis court, May, 2009 Daniel Wetmore

the first dark patch

the first dark patch
of snow-melted soil
rich and dazed
by its own new self

her one hand rests
smooth and weightless on my side
finding life
giving life