Jack Ecton Carver

Cristof's in Santa Fe

We strolled the square,
ducked in a shop, Cristof's,
to see black, brown, beige, cream,
Two Grey Hills rugs
combining shapes of native dreams
to hang on walls
we built apart
whose warp and weft, like us,
regrets the loom but loves the art.

We turn to leave,
pass a case
displaying more alchemy of love.
Eternal band of gold and turquoise
finds a home
on my bare marriage hand.
"Let's take it," you say.
Unablehb even now to take it off,
It stays.





 

The Collector

I gather days to build
an architecture unsubstantial 
as the head 
that slippers down
a stein of beer.

Days pass.

But nights!
You come less fragile,
more concrete
in dream, till sunlight
wipes my screen, deletes,
brings desperate gasp
that leaves me licking
lovely condensation on the glass.

Protective  Coloration

Widows of the Christ wore black,
berobed as nuns in costumes bold,
outrageous in display of grief  
that shouts atonement in their clothes.

In time, they too, lost graphic flags of mourning, 
Now, like me, no clothes, no clue 
provide the evidence of death.

Some say the color white befits
the vacuum grief can hollow in our souls
more honestly than black.

I will wear white today.


 

Moving 

I’ve moved.
not on, just over, 
giving your phantasm space
my narrow widow’s bed.
You need so little now, I sometimes fail
to feel you slide beside me in the night
As you seek heat from my heart’s fire still.
I beg you press against my spine
cupping vertebrae as breasts, and
gently, as the potter’s hands hold clay.
Just stay till light.  
 

  I Miss Your Voice

A test today to hear
The silence singing in my ears.
Four years it stings
For years we spoke each day
Fourteen hundred ninety-one.
As I grow graduslly more deaf
Yet still I hear
Not with my ears
But with my heart.

  Timed Tears

I beg that time
May heal me never
Erasing with its antiseptic balm
My thoughts of you.

This wound is my companion
Now that you are gone
I long for nights of pain
When tears are proof
You lived.
The liquid manifestated truth
Made plain
That you were here
And I was loved.

Death Days

A Day of death,
Not ulike one of birth,
If left untended by
An interferring hand,
Comes,
Causing us to gasp
For breath
And grasp
For moments lost, compressed.

We keen
Despite illusions made
To trick ourselves
with some demonic
Slight of hand,
Now comandeer
Reclaim the  power
never ceded,
never really ours to feign,
On this celestial plane.  

Jack introduced me to my first fine wine at Mr. Stox in Los Alamitos. It was a Chateau Lafite Rothschild and cost $100.  I'd never had a wine that wasn't a chablis, burgundy, or blush and wasn't in a "jug".  One of many many good memories when JPI was THE FORCE in equestrian filmmaking and eventually TV production.  Definitely the Good Ole Days!  Bonnie, we miss you guys!

I Find You

I'm sure they thought
They'd taken you away.
That was their only task
That day, in fact.
And yet they failed
so gloriously well.
Then others took
their well-intentioned leave
Leaving me to walk these rooms alone.

I find you everywhere.

A paperback sits tented to the place
Last page, last word you read.
Coffee cold and crusting in your cup
awaits its rinsing in the sink.
A paper creased just so
to frame the crossword
DOWN still blank
and tiny snips of beard I trimmed
collecting in a bowl.
Your clothes with mine
atangle on the bedroom floor
hide finger-smeared eyeglasses where they fell.
Still warm,
the pillow molded to the echo of your head
and sheets shout out sweet scent.
And then,
I hear
your chocolate-colored broadcast voice
instructing calling guests:
"You've reached the Carvers.
Leave your message at the beep."

I find your everywhere.

Jack & I played a lot of tennis and bridge together.  I like to think I helped him toward his Life Master.  Our thoughts and prayers go out to the family.