Greg Masters
TERMS OF GRIEF
for Alice Notley (1945-2025)
It's sort of a betrayal,
isn't it, when a friend
dies upsetting a silent
arrangement that worked without
seam for so many decades.
She was my ally, still is,
though absent in physical
body, enough to uphold
my assessments and share a
fervency or affirm an
abomination.
Seven beats a line. I thought
Alice would appreciate.
POEM
I'm a figure in a 19th
century landscape painting.
Actually, I'm simply walking past
the guys seated at the outdoor
tables of the village's one of two
places to have a drink.
The street is quiet, a car
passes through perhaps once
every 15 minutes, some slow
down to a stop to exchange a
few words with their acquainted–
friends, neighbors, fellas they've
known all their lives in the
Luberon region of southern France
where it's a 20-minute drive
to the next village via one
narrow road through valley
and snaking mountain passes.
Views of the immense green
landscape sloping up foothills
to the Alps.
Patches of tilled land here
and there amid the vista,
olive trees and vineyards.
The men don't seem to take
much notice of me strolling by.
I'm uncertain whether to
wish them a good day or
pass by without a fuss.
Doubtful I'm in danger of
being pummeled just because
I'm obviously non-native.
That doesn't seem to be the
tone I've been feeling in Europe.
In fact, I've been relieved of stress–
that unspoken-of sense in NYC
while walking the streets that
any moment an eruption
in the social order is as likely
as not to fracture my well-being.
It's there like a shadow to haunt
the effort to be more than surviving.
I stroll by with a casual effort
compromised by my lack of fluidity
in the language, so unable to join in
the simple chat and comradery–
content to be on holiday from my
usual parameters.
HARVEST
If I were to be murdered
in my rooms at a rental
in the south of France,
likely the perp was not a
resident of this building
as each of us has a fob
that chronicles each entry
through the front door.
I'd start the investigation
there to eliminate five or
six artists resident here.
There is a mode of egress
through a side gate that
opens on an inner terrace
and a door from the terrace
into the main house that
is unlocked, so that's likely
how the suspect gained entry.
What they wanted from me
is a question. My laptop
or iPhone? Unlikely. The
euros and credit cards in
my wallet? Perhaps. Or
was it a remark I made
in the car en route to a
farmers' market in Cucuron,
something about a failed
relationship that offended
my neighbor so egregiously
that she struck simply
as a matter of honor–
the opposite expectation
of my days and nights in
a quiet village where risk,
it seems, is as distant as
the geography separating me
from the east coast of America.
Greg Masters is the author of 11 books, all issued by his imprint Crony Books. His latest is A Million Revolutions.