Jefffrey Harpeng

Perfect Things

When she entered an accident flew in the door.

dark moth

eye-wings at the

security blinds

And somewhere out there, in the chorus of the thirsty overcast doldrum morning the plaintive mating mesmerism of a Koel, that cuckoo, feathered text, that crooked book of dreary ritual. And pigeons offered counterpoint.

Bougainvillaea

climbs over the fence

blossom and thorn

Oh turn your weary gaze, turn your tired eyes. Who is that who walking to or from, plodding through the no man's land between obligations? Some somebody's child, some sunshine, some laughter in tight skin, some little bit of now and then, weightless as pollen, weightless as spore.

tiny pale blue egg

in her palm     the weight

of the atmosphere

How rich is the earth in little good perfect things, in what has turned out well! Weeds in the garden, wild mushrooms in the compost, crows tearing at an infant possum fallen from a tree, a twig of a snake in the creek winked at by the dappled light through She and He Oaks whispering.

picking Dandelion 

puffballs and blowing wishes 

weed seeds

Place little good perfect things around you… Their golden ripeness heals the heart. What is perfect teaches hope.

There is a list of perfect things, the writing of the list looks like the valleys and mountains of a monitored pulse, cuneiform strokes velcroed together at the apex and the abyss. The list goes on and on, right, even where it is wrong.

the cat arches

its purr     a feather

is stuck to its paw

Italic text from Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathrustra (translation Walter Kaufmann).