Poetry: Selections From Mather Schneider

SEVERED

I found 12 severed hands 

in a plastic bag the other day 

tossed down behind the gas station

removed from their owners, for thievery, por rateros,

the kind of bag

you put beer in with ice

but no ice for these hands, rancid

in the Puerto Lobo heat, flies, dried blood. 

I’m sitting in the car outside our little house.

For three hours I’ve been here

afraid to go in and face Natalia

sick in bed.

I think of that beautiful sad story 

I read long ago 

about the man whose hands got him into trouble

when he only wanted love.

It was real, that’s the problem, 

it wasn’t a metaphor, 

that plastic bag full of severed hands. 

I’ve stolen things. Hasn’t everybody? 

One time when I was young I was too sick for school 

and I was home alone, in bed, 

and a man snuck into our house like Death 

and came into my bedroom. 

I woke up and said, Who are you? He ran

stomping up the stairs and I heard the door

slam and his truck tires throw gravel out

of our Illinois driveway. 

I drew a picture of him

and they used the picture to put him in jail. He only lived 

a few miles away. I drew that picture  

with my own hands and everybody

said I was a real good artist.

I just hope

it was the right man. 

Now I am old and have grown

into my old man’s hands, 

these hands on the steering wheel

thousands of miles away. 

Some peoples’ hands have scars,

some are grotesque. Some  

don’t work well, they tremble.

Some are beautiful and smooth

as buckeyes. Some are so calloused they cut

you when you shake them. 

Some of them cup

the sunlight.

Imagine the hands 

that held the thieves down, the hand that raised 

the machete, the hands 

that fell. Hand shadows, hand puppets,

hands of time, hands of God. A clock

without hands. Why 

couldn’t that plastic bag 

have had a six pack of beer in it instead? 

Natalia has beautiful hands. What would I not take

from this world to give to her? 

Nothing? The truth is 

hard. She’s dying and I’m afraid

to go inside to touch her, to try to steal

a kiss, or coax a rare smile. 

I keep thinking about that 

plastic bag full of severed hands

and what I’m going to do without her

and my mind stumbles   

and grasps at the air.

THE PODCAST POET

The worst thing about this slick-as-snot poet on the podcast

with his good looks and slim physique and 80-dollar hairdo

is not that his poetry is bland and self-content 

with as much soul as a Disneyland seal 

or that his life is easy or that he is satisfied and perfectly adjusted

or that he is lauded and rewarded 

for not being offensive or bleak

or that he rides so gracefully the tides of the current norms

and still calls himself “a daring explorer”

or that he speaks of Mahler and Hayden

and of being “encouraging.”

The worst thing is thinking that if my wife met him 

she would fall in love with him

with his rich voice and no circles under his eyes

he who has made poetry pay

who seems wise  

has admirers and invitations and loads of likes

dines at restaurants

does not drink much

has an apartment in New York 

and a lucrative blog

wears name-brand shirts 

talks about suffering 

as one talks about the evening news. 

He looks like a movie star

agreeable as a morning warbler

this man who holds the world in his hands

with a heart that isn’t black and weary

a man who feels pride instead 

of having had his pride obliterated 

a man who knows how to answer questions

who speaks of lavender and horses unironically 

instead of lonely chairs and worms and dust and dirt

a man who has not grown old before his time

a man she hoped I’d be

before she got to know me.

THE BEAUTIFUL ROAD 

I abandon my job,

take my kitten in my arms and walk

into the deformity of morning.

There is nature,

strong and solid beneath her flowing robe.

My kitten and I see a grown cat playing in the grass.

I say, 

That looks like it could be your mother,

she has the same colors.

My kitten jumps from my arms and goes to her.

Then a van pulls up. 

The door opens and a woman asks if I am lost.

I climb in.

Inside are 2 men and 2 other women.

They are all drinking liquor.

They have little apples for pupils.

We drive for a while

And then the van stops and I hop out 

at the foot of a hill.

I hear music floating down

like a carnival of deities.  

One woman says, 

You are a new witness

and you are welcome anywhere 

and anytime.

The door closes and the van drives up the hill

on a beautiful road 

that ends somewhere I can’t see.

Mather Schneider divides his time between Tucson, Arizona and northern Mexico. He has several books available including his first novel, The Bacanora Notebooks (Anxiety Press) and the recently released book of stories, Port Awful (Anxiety Press). He works as an exterminator.