Richard Allen Taylor's Poetry

If we ever lost the number three, then two
might be a crowd and trouble would come
in fours. Triangles would be missing

a side, two lines pointing somewhere, or nowhere.
Pythagoras would become puzzled, perhaps
unemployed with nothing to ponder, no theorem to sell.

Secondborn children would be followed by
twins. There would be no third-party candidates,
no rebellion against the two-party system, or else

limitless candidates would lead us to anarchy.
Each century would have a gap, the missing year
absent as a lost tooth. Imagine the rise

in tricycle accident rates, as small riders, suddenly
minus a wheel, go hurtling over their handlebars.
There would be no "other woman" or "odd man out"

and with the three gone, all its multiples could not exist,
meaning that nine, twenty-seven and so on would disappear.
There would be no cubic feet, no cubic anything--

not even ice cubes to chill your drinks. We would all miss
the third dimension, become flat people crawling on a map
of the world. And if you think that's bad, try removing

that probably gets worse later
as I watch the days flowing much too fast

white grains
once immeasurable inexhaustible cheap common

now spilling like diamonds down the sinkhole of time
and I am leaning over the side

grasping at the avalanche just out of reach
and I cry wait

but there is no wait
only the counting of lost dreams.

I should have paid more attention
learned more about art

airplanes geology
theology insects

even love
I thought I knew what that was

but now
in the fullness of wisdom

I see that I know nothing
that life is always

one answer forward
two questions back.

And I ask
is this imminent emptiness so bad?

There is
something

in the heart
that craves open space

virginal blue sky
a smooth sea without ships

a cottage in the unpopulated wilderness
a yearning to clean closets

toss out junk
forget

start over
make room for the new.

Perhaps hunger
is a preparing to be filled

longing
a thirsty desert flower opening to the rain

death
the last drop of wine on the lips

She was never happy in Charleston,
though I love the warm sultry nights there, the silken breezes
from the harbor where the Cooper River joins the Ashley

and dark ships plod like old mules past
Patriot’s Point, plowing into the fog beyond Fort Sumter,
stern lights fading to nothingness.

She grew weary of the moist softness
of the South, found our mountains mild as broccoli,
our steamy lowlands sticky and tame.

She took me to her desert, a crackling skillet
of wildfires, burnt sagebrush, soot-blackened ponderosa.
On the way to Tahoe

she showed me painted poles by the road
over Mt. Rose, put there, she said, to measure the snow
and guide the snowplows away from the edge.

The Sierras, in a hurry to fall down,
tossed boulders like dice across the brown valleys.
She loved living where desert and mountain can kill.

Dear Wednesday Night Poetry Group

Thank you for your kind assistance
in revising my poem, "The Bird Feeder,"
in which I sought to weave
with the grace of swans, a narrative
of how I suddenly discovered
the true meaning of life.

Thank you for your gentle suggestions
for removing excess commas to improve
flow and for your wise advice on enjamb
ment (though opinion seemed to be divided
on this). Your not-so-subtle hints

that the poem might require major surgery,
that many of the original twenty-four lines
were too literal, too obscure, too preachy,
too concrete, too abstract, too much, too too
were a little harsh. I know you were joking
when you suggested that my poem might be better

as a short story, but to attack
the poem's heart, blood dripping
from your teeth, I thought excessively brutal.
I would have appreciated a copy of the email
changing the Wednesday night poetry group
to the Tuesday night poetry group;

nevertheless, I thank you for your input,
all of which I have incorporated into the finished
poem, which I now submit for your review:

Not for the titillating sight
of sexy waitresses my daughter's age
in tight silk pants and necklines too low
to be called necklines, though of course
I appreciate beauty wherever I find it
and it is pleasant to meet "Geri"
who signs her name on a paper napkin
and asks me to let her know
if I need anything.

Anything. A weary traveler, I do
need cold beer, hot wings, beer-battered shrimp,
civility, celery sticks,
and have no plans to ask for more

but Geri
is pretty and smart and she thinks I need more.
The Hooters Swimsuit Calendar, she says,
on sale for only $25.99. No thanks,
I reply, unless your picture is in it.

A clever dodge,
I think to myself, but she persists. If I could put
my picture in it, would you buy it?

Of course, I answer, smooth as her silk pants which,
for some reason, I find necessary to mention again.
She vanishes, then reappears moments later
with a Polaroid of herself

posing in the stockroom,
one hand on a jaunty silk-panted hip, the horns of an owl
molded to the curves of her perfect breasts, her cover-girl
smile framed by the golden parentheses
of her corn-silk hair. She presents the photo
for my nodding approval and drops it
between the pages of my new calendar,

for which I have no use.
My wife has no appreciation for this kind of art in the house
and my boss forbids this sort of thing in the office. And thinking
of no one on my Christmas list for whom it would be
a suitable gift, I will carry the calendar around in my suitcase
for several weeks before stuffing it into a hotel trash can.

But tonight,
the food is delicious, the itemized fifty-dollar receipt,
now rendered unusable for my expense report, an expensive dessert.
The photo of Geri I keep as a bookmark. Tucked safely
between poems, she smiles the sweet smile of commissioned sales
and reminds me that