Sample Poems by Peter Carroll

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Hoppin' John

Fog hangs all night like cotton-wool
on drowsy willows, the new year
slowly wakening. A pigeon stalks
along the sill, looks me in the eye.

Back I stare, amazed at time's toll,
that far January First, chance unlocking choice.
Young that winter, I shovel snow,
she invites me in for a cup of mercy. 

She warms me in her steamy kitchen,
black-eyed peas soaking all day, boiled
with onion, rice, vinegar-drenched greens.
Hoppin' John, she says, foreseeing luck.

That irreversible moment: jumping over
the broomstick, a lark, a sacred promise--
but a tie that age unbinds, separating us
from those we miss, its kiss irresistible. 

Pea-jon, I breathe, pondering my visitor.
First day we meet again, time to start over.

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The Nearness of Her  

Soundless dawn, but for the nearness
of my favorite woodpecker, drilling
her beak into a sleepy oak. Forty years
I've lived on this street, seldom hear
a peep from the other neighbors.

Nat and Patty split up, he disappeared. 
Dave, Ralph, Dale--the men drop
like overripe fruit. Their kids mature,
move away, slouch back. Widows stay,
indoors. I wonder what they do.

Maybe being so close explains tall
fences, shuttered gates. Maybe shame
of seeming too lonely. Maybe a fear
of falling for an old fool. Maybe
they already have my cup of sugar.

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Digging In

I've dug in deeper, invited my trees
to circle the land, forming a windbreak,
a veil. Safer to live in shadow,
no saviors come to ring my bells.

After the ravens invaded, blue jays
vanished but this morning one returned
yapping, drunk on the red berries
of the firethorn bush.

The axis tilts but my neighbors stay.
Mrs. McCoy moved in when she was 30,
celebrates her 90th year. In eight houses,
five men died. Their cars sit in rust.

I might try to know them better
but living close incites privacy.
Only the sound of motors, stray voices,
tell who's where. No more.

---

White Fields Waiting

Two weeks before spring equinox, wisps 
of pollen powder the yard. Any minute
the fog will lift, inviting hummingbirds
to jitterbug with my budding magnolia.

Back east, it's snowing. As my fire leaps
into dry sky, ten inches have fallen there,
exciting memories of swollen cloud,
wind stuttering first flurries. At dawn,
 
the milk truck would pioneer a trail.
In boots buckled with metal latches
I attacked virgin yards, bashed snowballs
against trees and slow-moving cars.

I picture white fields waiting for a boy. 
My mother also waits, though I'm going
gray. Outside bees are singing to lemon
sugar, sirens begging me not to go home.