THE FIREMAN POEMS

by Richard Smyth

A long time ago
before gods danced in the language of man
before the electric tongue
snaked into the brain,
before even brains and trees and chemical sex

there was this Fireman
and his bright red truck
shiny new
solar powered
thick tires mudbuggying through the soup
the first teenager driving wild
in the bright night
the first child playing with fire
in the nothing world

WHEN THE FIREMAN WAKES UP TOMORROW (listen to mp3)

Tomorrow sleeps on the couch
like a drunken father.
The Fireman is young,
before fire found a home
within him, the deep fire, that is,
the one that burns slow and long
like stars or embers on cold winter nights.

Something is happening,
he must wake up this father:
life is happening:

he grabs him by the shirt,
shakes and shakes and shakes.

THE FIREMAN IS BURNING BRIDGES (listen to mp3)

There is a way to make sure
you are always going forward.

There is a way to make sure
that nothing nothing nothing

takes you back to that season of fatigue,
that time of hibernation

when the sun was too far away
to make a difference:

burn the bridges of addiction,
watch in wonder as smoke fills the air.

THE FIREMAN INVESTIGATES THE PROPERTIES OF ASH (listen to mp3)

The Fireman is cold again.
He's always cold
because the universe is a cold place.

He lights a fire in a fireplace.
The wood burns and burns,
burns out.

The wood looks old and grey.
Tired the way old men get tired
toward the end.

But it holds the shape of wood
the way bone holds skin.
Until the Fireman pokes it with a stick.

Then it falls into flakes,
transformed by breath or wind
into something that scatters.

THE FIREMAN CONSIDERS THE MYSTERY OF SYNERGY (listen to mp3)

How things come together:
prokaryotic bacteria,
multicellular organisms,
churches, unions,
all of the groping for community,
the phenomenon of heat-seeking creatures:

the Fireman only feels cold when he's alone.
Or feels alone.

THE FIREMAN AND HIS SEARCH FOR GOD (listen to mp3)

Sometimes
the Fireman is afraid of living.
He used to pray to a Big Daddy God
but he's lost his faith

in anthropomorphism.
He believes that God is Fire.
He believes that God is Everywhere:
candles, sunlight, nerve cells.

Here's his problem:
if God is Everywhere,
then there's no place to go
to find Him.

THE FIREMAN AND THE DARKNESSES (listen to mp3)

The Fireman knows the darknesses.
He has known their cloaking,
their ecliptic ministries.

For him, they are what makes living possible.
But they are also what makes living impossible.
Alas--another paradox.

The Fireman knows the meaning of paradox.
That's the problem with being conscious:
so much knowing.

THE FIREMAN AND EMPEDOCLES (listen to mp3)

The Fireman is familiar with presocratic philosophies.
He has read of Empedocles and the volcano.
He knows why he jumped.

He too is lonely.
He too longs to return
to the Great Fire.

But it's his job to bring fire to the dark places.
It's his job to burn brightly.
The Fireman is as lonely and tired
as stars can sometimes be.

THE FIREMAN DISCOVERS DARK ENERGY (listen to mp3)

Astronomers speak of dark energy
as a way to explain what's inbetween
all the stuff of the universe.

The Fireman knows about dark energy.
He has felt these dark forces within
as when he grapples with black angels

somewhere deep within the stratosphere
or when the secret candle of his soul
flickers in the storm wind

and he holds on to life
like a spark among the ruins.
When he crawls inside himself

he feels the dark energies
open up within him
like a new geometry

and he dances like a superstring puppet.

THE FIREMAN IS BURNING THE CANDLE AT BOTH ENDS (listen to mp3)

The Fireman has burned candles before.
He knows how quickly wax melts,
knows the physics of energy transfer.

Yet he still does it: he still burns
both ends, never wondering
where the energy will come from
to wake up tomorrow.

Perhaps it is possible to burn more slowly.
Perhaps it is possible
to go the distance.

THE FIREMAN AND THE POET (listen to mp3)

The Fireman sees a poet
scribbling in his notebook.

He sees the lightning bolting
through the pen.

The poet is channeling powerful forces.

The poem holds energy
the way molecules hold heat.

The Fireman sits by this fire
in the winter of history

warms his hands
shivers a bit as he takes it in.

THE FIREMAN DRILLS FOR OIL (listen to mp3)

Not the thick viscous distillate
of dead dinosaurs
but the deep oil within,
what is left after all
that has died within him
has been crushed under
the weight of aging,
ground down to its
essential essence
in the alembic of the soul:
an alchemy of energy,
the body a crucible
for crushing blood from
the stone of ages.

In this metaphor depth is recognized
as signifying significance,
profundity, meaning.
Never mind that the metaphor
is long dead: in this poem
things long dead
still have energy
that must be unlocked
like the door to heaven:
no need to knock
when you have the key.

THE FIREMAN INVESTIGATES HYDROGEN ENERGY (listen to mp3)

The Fireman studies the nature of life,
the source of his life-energy,
and finds himself asking questions
about the quality of fuel.

Having read the prophets of hydrogen fuel cells,
he now knows of decarbonization
and attempts to extrapolate a model
for all other types of fuel:
religion, literature, nutrition.

The real question for him
is how to burn bright
and hot and clean:
a true force of life
in the universe.

The real question, that is,
is how to be
a small sun.

THE FIREMAN HAS A BRAIN TORNADO (listen to mp3)

Because brain storm does not describe
what is happening in his brain:
a storm of electricity
bolting through the gloam,
the sun's energy canalized
through space, plants, meat,
nutritional fission and cellular respiration
to fuel this
neuronal rewiring

and the only question to be answered
right now
is to where
will it funnel forth?

THE FIREMAN READS OF MEDITATING MONKS (listen to mp3)

The Fireman reads of meditating monks
who control their body temperature
by sitting still and doing nothing.

Such is the remarkable capacity
of the human brain.
Such is the energonomics
of the disciplined mind.

When the time comes,
the Fireman will try to meditate,
tune the thermostat of his soul.

THE FIREMAN SURVEYS A BURNT PINE FOREST (listen to mp3)

The Fireman visits the Sunshine State
where evergreens grow leaves the size of needles
--the sun comes in through the tips.

The Fireman looks around:
many trees are like this:
palmettos, palms, pines.
He realizes:
So this is how you live
so close to the sun.

THE FIREMAN GOES LEAF-PEEPING (listen to mp3)

He has seen photos in books
but they never capture
what it's like to be there
in the presence of maples

blazing, early fall

in colors there are no words for,
not even in the language of fire,
the one spoken by stars and storms
and single-celled creatures.

THE FIREMAN VISITS MINNESOTA (listen to mp3)

The Fireman returns to Minnesota,
a place he lived when burning was hard,
when the cold was inside him like cancer,
wanted his blood thick like six-inch ice
on sidewalks and streets.

It is late September,
before the Iceman cometh.
The leaves are turning,
the air is crisp and brisk.

Though he knows what's coming,
he longs to stay,
to fight the ice like nights
in white armor,
blue crescent moons
on their crests.

THE FIREMAN SAW SUNFLOWERS (listen to mp3)

The Fireman saw sunflowers
in Minnesota,
icarus sunflowers
on the northern shores
of the Mississippi,
a thousand flowers,
a thousand voices saying
yes
saying
we will sing in September,
knowing the cold awaits us

To see them growing
among the broken stones,
where roots hold tight
the way angels hold storms,
to see them speaking the language of color
and mud and minutes
in the crisp autumn air,
waving in the wind,
is to know, if only for a moment,
the sweet electric energy
of an immanent god.

THE FIREMAN AT THE BURNING BUSH (listen to mp3)

This is not just any burning bush.
It is the Burning Bush,
the one Moses spoke to so long ago.
This is the bush lit by the Big Bang
at the beginning of time.
This is the bush that never burns out,
that never turns to ash:
the ultimate fuel:
a small sun.
This is where the Fireman comes
to remember who he is:
a man of Fire,
one who has come to keep people warm,
to share his life-giving energies.

Whole worlds arise in his wake.

THE FIREMAN CONSIDERS THE WHITE HOLE (listen to mp3)

Astronomers speak of black holes
that suck the light from the universe,
cosmic child drinking a sweet milk.

They theorize also the white hole,
the place where light emerges,
the birth of light:
god-hole,
breast of energy,
life filling the spaces.

Life is like this:
a giving and a taking.
Somehow all of it is holy:
the giving and taking
the light and the dark,
the black and the white--
every point in space holy:
matrix of creation,
moments of unfolding.