Pacific Walkers

Poems

Nance Van Winckel

• Publisher: University of Washington Press
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9780295992815
• eBook ISBN: 9780295805689
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: American Poetry
• Index: Literature

Nance Van Winckel's wry, provocative slant on the world and her command of images and ideas enliven these stunning poems. Presented in two parts, Pacific Walkers first gives imagined voice to anonymous dead individuals, entries in the John Doe network of the Spokane County Medical Examiner's Records. The focus then shifts to named but now-forgotten individuals in a discarded early-1900s photo album purchased in a secondhand store. We encounter figures devoid of history but enduring among us as lockered remains, and figures who come with histories--first names and dates, and faces preserved in photographs--but who no longer belong to anyone.

I / Pacific Walkers

That man standing there, who is he?

His path lost in the thicket,

Behind him the bushes

Lash back together,

The grass rises again,

The waste devours him.

— GOETHE, “Harzreise im Winter”

ON

Signing on with The Daily Sun

Nearing a thousand words a minute, I can type

to your health. I can input a print that’s fit

to all. Can get across baby without

a single b. I can keep my prayer mat

under wraps. Ditto the armband. I have the facts,

you have the contracts. Sure, you can change

my name to Lance in the byline.

Like jerking off Band-Aids, I can rip away

calendar pages so fast, no one will even know

we’re over the past. Day in, day out, I can

make them play along with my playing

along, can make them believe decedent,

can disseminate and disguise at the same time

what’s face up, fetid, gnawed at by weasels.

Just. The. Facts. I am like you. Or passing

through you like a taco. Easily rolled up

to swat a pesky moth. Spread wide to accept

your bounty of trout guts. Quick to appear,

pass the verbiage, and disappear.

I can stay anon. I can live anon.

I can keep anon in my heart.

Last Address

What gold flitter has made of your ear

a hive? Clouds tug loose a last dream

and now the rainfall bears down

your secrets. The question’s not

if the river had its way with you,

spit you out as a small inquiry

unfit for the big answer. No,

the question won’t pertain to tattoos

or unmatchable DNA, but to what

world, under what sun, in what situ

we go on finding each you, each you,

the not-missed, the never missing.

***

We stand at the foot of you.

Bees and swallows rustle the grass

around half flesh, half bone, half

here, half gone. Dot of earth: nothing

owed or owned. Once you were a bud

in someone’s belly. A swim, a sleep,

then to crown your way out. Keep

mum. Keep it to yourself, Little Prince

of the Reigning Question,

the would-you-do-it-all-again

there there, now now.

Found on the bank of the Spokane River at approximately 2200 W. Falls Street. Adult Caucasian male. This male was 5 feet 11 inches in height and weighed approximately 161 pounds. His hair was dark brown or possibly black. Clothing worn: a pair of black lace-up boots with a brand name listed as “CORCORAN,” a pair of black socks, a pair of light blue denim pants with a brand name listed as “RUSTLER,” a pair of red slightly meshed undershorts, a dark colored T-Shirt with the size listed as medium and a name brand of “EDDIE BAUER.” Dental identification information obtained, no match found. Fingerprints unobtainable.

—Spokane County Medical Examiner’s Records

Briefing

When the intern asks why

hadn’t the animals eaten this man

the river months ago washed up,

the examiner numbers

his answers.

An order. Of course. Most

to least. The day animals

vs. the night ones. If six,

thorns. If thy right eye

offendeth. I doodle.

My sketch in the place of

reason: a moustache on Mr.

Numbers. If three magpies

flap away. Therefore an

ambiguity of eye color.

Sketch it: how weird,

the moustache needs

a matching beard. Hair

today. Eight trumpet vines.

Twelve solstice winds.

What had he gone by?

My reason. God’s hard.

If one. If the earthly

life. The this life. His

other car was a train.

His Other Car Was a Train

My tapping for him

against the Corona. Ding

at the end of the line.

The trestle bridge,

a light table with a lean

negative him. The fording

of, the fire in the belly of.

Getting the outside air

coming in. Sleet as rain’s

sequel, and anxious

were the trees and good

the green fields pressing forward

and how great the distance.

Boxcars with zero sans serif,

with only space—space

maybe going somewhere.

Somewhere, h...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• I / Pacific Walkers
• II / Rain On
• Acknowledgments
• About the Poet
• A Note on the Type