the bath-girl with a pretty mole and a

red skirt is watching me:

am I

different?

the baby boy

on his back, dashed with scalding water

silent, moving eyes

inscrutably

pees.

the daughters

gripping and scrubbing his two little daughters

they squirm, shriek at

soap-in-the-eye,

wring out their own hair

with grave wifely hands,

peek at me, point, while he

soaps up and washes their

plump little tight-lip pussies

peers in their ears,

& dunks them in hot tile tub.

with a brown-burnt farmboy

a shrivelled old man

and a student who sings silent night.

—we waver and float like seaweed

pink flesh in the steamy light.

the old woman

too fat and too old to care

she just stands there

idly knocking dewy water off her

bush.

the young woman

gazing vacant, drying her neck

faint fuzz of hair

little points of breasts

—next year she’ll be dressing

out of sight.

the men

squatting soapy and limber

smooth dense skin, long muscles—

I see dead men naked

tumbled on beaches

newsreels, the

war

A VOLCANO IN KYUSHU

Mount Aso       uplands

horses, rimrock

the sightseeing buses crammed.

to view bare rock, brown grass,

space,

sulphury cliffs, streakt snow.

—whiffing the fumaroles

a noseless, shiny,

mouth-twisted middle aged man.

bluejeans, check shirt, silver buckle,

J. Robert Oppenheimer:

twenty years ago watching

the bulldozers

tearing down pines

at Los Alamos.

EIGHT SANDBARS ON THE TAKANO RIVER

Well water

cool in

summer

warm in

winter

white radish root

a foot long

by its dark

dirt hole

green top

her son.

cherry blossoms

the farmer never looks up

the woman serves sake

the tourists are sick or asleep

gone wild

straw berry vine

each year more small

sour

mulcht by pine.

white peeld logs

toppld in sap

scalpt branch

spring

woods

dragonfly

why wet moss

your black

stretch-stretch-

wing perch

strawberry time

walking the tight-rope

high over the streets

with a hoe and two buckets

of manure.

straight-backt

swaying stride

twelve-foot

pine pole

lightly,

on her head.

ASLEEP ON THE TRAIN

Briefcase, tight garter

over the knees

peep of fat little thighs

roll and lean with the fall of the train

eyes

shut.       mouth open.       so young women

tire with the rest       tired workers,

jerk with the speedup and slow

go-ahead signals flash by

the Special Express

has only one stop

where they wake from their trance

to themselves.

FOUR POEMS FOR ROBIN

Siwashing it out once in Siuslaw Forest

I slept under    rhododendron

All night    blossoms fell

Shivering on    a sheet of cardboard

Feet stuck    in my pack

Hands deep  in my pockets

Barely   able   to   sleep.

I remembered    when we were in school

Sleeping together    in a big warm bed

We were    the youngest lovers

When we broke up    we were still nineteen.

Now our    friends are married

You teach    school back east

I dont mind    living this way

Green hills    the long blue beach

But sometimes    sleeping in the open

I think back    when I had you.