Notes from Madison

You drop me off at the hospital
each morning.

Beer at the Union later and I walk
down the aisle

of the music department
listening

to the sounds of a clarinet and
a past left behind.

Evenings, I watch police throw teargas
on campus,

from a hill above the mayhem, losing
breath to tears.

Thrown your way, but you assure me
you are safe,

documenting the action from the smoke
among friends.

© Gail Bartlett, all rights reserved

Heartbeat of a Horse Galloping

I open the freezer of forgotten memory
to the sound of a strong heartbeat
repeating,

repeating, beating fast. Beneath boots
in stirrups, hands holding the reins,
frozen ground

shimmers. No other sound but breathing,
your heartbeat repeating, galloping
beyond here.

© Gail Bartlett, all rights reserved

Farm Supply

Diamonds don’t belong
but talk of locals

belongs in the old hardware
store when I order

custom pink paint
for the woodwork in

my sister’s bedroom,
the women’s room,

where spirits of the past
visit, and starlight looms.

Talk of trucks and land belong. What
about the cows sleeping

on the hill? Yes,
ghosts of cows in the snow

when I was young belong,
and memories of

the barn. The stories we told,
and the stories we heard

from the old men on the
loafers’ bench, as they carved

maps in the oak
for us to find.

© Gail Bartlett, all rights reserved

Road to the Lake

I am flying down the road to the lake
when the muffler rattles.

My boyfriend left the MGB with me
for days and I’’m headed for

Claytor Lake, feeling the sun, top down,
wearing my pink polka dot

bikini.. Pulling in to the local garage
I tell the boys I need to use

the pit and the lift and several pieces
of wire. I climb under the car

and tie the muffler tight in three places.
Damn it, Jim, I’ll keep it running.

The young mechanics grin and cheer
me on my way; car still humming.

They have never met a girl who loved a car
and loved a man a few years older.

Then later when you call on the phone
in my dorm and ask me to move

to Florida and transfer and stay together
I say no, no, to your green eyes

with hazel, to your tousled dark curls, and
no, even to the green MGB.

© Gail Bartlett, all rights reserved

Thinking in Pictures

I get off the ferry and cross the highway
until I see the Dalmatian out front,
make my way through the lobby
take the elevator to the right floor.

Down the hall and through a door,
I gown up, mask up, leave my baggage
in the vestibule, enter the sterile
room looking out on the East River.

The view from NYU Hospital
is magnificent, the room luxurious.
You crashed one night before,
Blue cart and all, a real shit show,

you and your doc friends say privately.
In your shared war zone of medicine
they hover; you are going to make it,
because you could be any one of them.

I smooth your hair and settle into
the life the life we know this moment,
stem-cell transplant, heart failure, hope
for remission, you lived through the night.

© Gail Bartlett, all rights reserved

A Closed Herd, An Open Sky

Lifting from the back porch stairs to the sky,
I fly, weightless, with a breath of joy,
gliding over grass and thistles, clearing
the barn road fence and up into the mist.

Rising above the clover to sight the north
ridge, I feel how effortless it is to stay afloat.
But I must keep flying forward or gravity will
pull me down. Holsteins graze on pasture.

Soaring beyond my path, I hear the cry of
the red-tailed hawk’s warning screech demanding
that I bank to the left, and turn my attention
to the crop land, the open rolling green fields.

Glancing toward the old orchard I swoop low
for a closer look. Twenty-four yellow townhomes
stand, fumes of fresh paint, where apple trees stood.
I am soaring with the red-tailed hawk to home.

Landing lightly, I walk up the old stone steps
to the porch. There is work to do, years of
work to save this farm. I wake and put my feet
down; no townhouse will ever stand there.

Beneath an open sky the red-tailed hawk hunts,
the closed herd thrives with healthy calves,
the fences hold, the fields produce feed for them,
one-hundred and forty apple trees stand.

© Gail Bartlett, all rights reserved