Three Poems by Steve Klepetar

 

Three Golden Stones

In the backyard she found three golden stones, 

each inscribed with a verse. All around 

she heard angels fluttering in the pines.

No one was brave enough to dig with her, 

so she shouldered her shovel alone.

Halfway to the grotto, she paused to drink, 

and rest in the shade. Two boys slipped out 

from the birch trees. Their hands were soaked 

with rain. As they ran to her, she held out her arms.

How strange to hear them speak in rhyme. 

How odd that they wore such flimsy coats. 

Together they sat and feasted on bread and olive oil. 

The boys held her hands. They leapt into the pit, 

which must have led to another part of the world, 

for they were gone, as if nothing existed, nothing 

to prove the truth of that ancient and fragrant land.

Music of the Spheres

They tell me to listen to the music of the spheres.

Listen to the windows and the sky.

If you concentrate, it’s easy to see they are in love.

Sometimes the sky breathes its passion to cold glass.

Sometimes a window flings itself open to embrace the sky.

Listen to streetlights singing when the sun goes down.

Listen to pine and birch and oak.

Listen to puddles and rough language of the streets. 

Listen to sidewalks as they stretch out toward infinity. 

Listen to the stars that cluster in darkness near the moon. 

Everything, they say, is singing all the time. 

Listen to feet as they march,  

try to hear the dark, mysterious mice.

Listen to the flags and curtains and the cousins from out of town. 

You are the harmony and the tune. 

Play it as you lay yourself down to sleep. 

Let dreams carry you far from earth on waves of sound.

What You Promised 

Was it you who left that strange bottle 

and unsigned note by our door?

Of course we accepted the invitation, 

though we were never sure 

how to reach the top of the hill. 

We didn’t know what to wear 

or even which tools to bring. 

Still, we couldn’t wait for evening.

We had to drive across the bridge, 

if only to be moving before dark. 

We cursed the railroad crossing. 

So many cars, rolling slowly 

back and forth. 

We cursed the tunnel of terror, 

with its giant potholes.

We arrived out of breath, 

bottles jingling in their paper bag. 

Twenty motorbikes scattered in your yard, 

a scarecrow with an eyepatch, 

a raven eyeing our flesh from a dying tree.

Steve Klepetar lives in the Shire (Berkshire County, in Massachusetts, that is). His work has appeared widely and has received several nominations for Best of the Net and the Pushcart Prize. He is the author of fourteen poetry collections, including Family Reunion and The Li Bo Poems.