AUTHENTIC PRESENCE 

by Erica Bodwell 

AUTHENTIC PRESENCE 
—after Chogyam Trungpa

The dragon breathes out lightning and roars out thunder. That brings the rain.

                                                    I watch my neighbor’s son dive and surface,
                                                    dive and surface in the backyard pool I keep up
                                                    just for him. Seven or eight, he has home-sheared bangs
                                                    like my brother’s in a school picture from the 70s. The boy
                                                    sees me watching him, offers a tiny wave, goes under.
                                                    Away in the city, too far for gathering in, my son
                                                    has diagnosed himself manic.

The tiger walks slowly through the jungle. It swims through ferns and vines like a wave.

                                                    Whose time in the tangle is so smooth
                                                    it feels like swimming, parting the lush green stroke
                                                    by stroke? My jungle years were dark,
                                                    damp—something fetid grew in that place. A madman
                                                    trailed me mile after mile. Many days, I felt his breath
                                                    on my neck. When at last I took to the trees,
                                                    caught a glimpse of vast sky, the madman
                                                    kept right on running. To him, I was leaf.

The snow lion roams the highlands, where the atmosphere is clear and the air is fresh.

                                                   My brother at eleven swings his bat—ping!
                                                   Aluminum meets leather, white speck
                                                   sails skyward. This morning, my psychiatrist friend
                                                   posts photo after photo of bright red birds
                                                   looking at themselves in a mirror, preening
                                                   in their bath. They never get tired
                                                   of their own fascination, he says.

Their actions are always beautiful and dignified.

                                                  My brother turns thirteen, stashes a pipe
                                                  under his mattress, smashes empty fifths of vodka
                                                  against the stadium fence. What do I want? The end
                                                  of needles, bottles. To have spotted my brother out there,
                                                  at sea, to have hauled him, stroke by stroke,
                                                  out of deep water, dragged him to shore.
                                                  My neighbor’s boy, splashing in the pool—
                                                  what will his body become?

The closed and poverty-stricken world begins to fall apart.

                                                 James Baldwin: He was Sonny’s witness
                                                 that deep water and drowning
                                                 were not the same thing.
                                                 Maybe my son is manic, maybe
                                                 he’s just having a life.

Earth is my witness. I touch Earth, touch ground.

                                                 We walk through the woods,
                                                 my neighbor’s son holds treats for the dog
                                                 in his pocket. Rain rests
                                                 on each leaf. The dog barks, the boy
                                                 smacks a branch. Suddenly,
                                                 we’re soaked.

Erica Bodwell is a poet and attorney who lives in Concord, New Hampshire. Her full-length manuscript, Crown of Wild, was a finalist for the 2018 Four Way Books Larry Levis Prize and won the 2018 Two Sylvias Press Wilder Prize. It is forthcoming in spring 2020. Her chapbook, Up Liberty Street, was released in March 2017 by Finishing Line Press. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Beloit, PANK, APIARY, HeART and other journals. Her website is ericasoferbodwell.com.