— unpredictable thoughts

Home for Thanksgiving, W.S. Merwin

I bring myself back from the streets that open like long
Silent laughs, and the oth­ers
Spilled into in the way of rivers break­ing up, lit­tered with words,
Crossed by cats and that sort of thing,
From the know­ing wires and the aimed win­dows,
Well this is nice, on the third floor, in back of the bill­board
Which says Now Improved and I know what they mean,
I thread my way in and I sew myself in like money.

Well this is nice with my shoes moored by the bed
And the lights around the bill­board tick­ing on and off like a bea­con,
I have brought myself back like many another crusty
Unbar­bered ves­sel launched with a bot­tle,
From the bare regions of pure hope where
For a great part of the year it scarcely sets at all,
And from the night skies reg­u­larly filled with old movies of my fin­gers,
Weight­less as shad­ows, grop­ing in the sluices,
And from the visions of veins like arter­ies, and
From the months of ply­ing
Between can and can, vacant as a pint in the morn­ing,
While my sex grew into the only tree, a joy­less ever­green,
And the winds played hell with it at night, com­ing as they did
Over at least one thou­sand miles of empti­ness,
Thump­ing as though there were noth­ing but doors, insist­ing
“Come out,” and of course I would have frozen.

Sun­day, a fine day, with my ears wiped and my col­lar but­toned
I went for a jaunt all the way out and back on
A street­car and under my hat with the dent set­tled
In the right place I was think­ing maybe—a thought
Which I have noticed many times like a bold rat—
I should have stayed mak­ing of those good women
Happy, for a while at least, Vera with
The eau-de-cologne and the small fat dog named Joy,
Gladys with her ear­rings, cook­ing and watery arms, the one
With the limp and the fancy sheets, some of them
Are still there I sup­pose, oh no,

I bring myself back avoid­ing in silence
Like a ship in a bot­tle.
I bring my bot­tle.
Or there was thin Pearl with the invis­i­ble hair nets, the wind would not
Have been right for them, they would have had
Their times, rugs, trou­bles,
They would have wanted cur­tains, clean­ings, answers, they would have
Pro­duced fam­i­lies their own and our own, hen friends and
Other con­sid­er­a­tions, my fin­gers sift­ing
The dark would have turned up other
Pover­ties, I bring myself
Back like a mother cat trans­fer­ring her only kit­ten,
Telling myself secrets through my mous­tache,
They would have wanted to drink ship, sea, and all or
To break the bot­tle, well this is nice,
Oh mis­ery, mis­ery, mis­ery,
You fit me from head to foot like a good grade suit of lon­gies
Which I have worn for years and never want to take off.
I did the right thing after all.

W.S. Mer­win is cur­rently poet lau­rete — more >