This sentence structure reminds me of the way non-native English speakers ask for a definition. Of course, the meaning is nothing like this, actually – but it calls to mind for me, the many time I’ve heard: “How call you the thing for the rain?”
“What you say to stop someone?”
“How say you the word for wonder?”
“Can you splain me this?”
“What this say?”
“Mean what this?”

Beneath this cloak is a small tender thing.
It is soft and uncertain, precious
Like someone’s first born baby. It grows in swaddled darkness.
It’s not a secret so much as a vulnerability,
A tenderness that might shrink in the light.
If you knew it was there, you might lift the cloak,
Unwrap the blankets, you might reveal it before its time.
I’m waiting for it to open its eyes so it can greet the world
When it’s ready. When it’s grown.

Celia says this, too, but she keeps going to make it
Most wonderful and yet again wonderful.
It must have, at one time, been a sincere exclamation.
Now, we see “O, wonderful” and assume it’s sarcastic
Particularly in the mouths of teenagers. “O, great”
Could go this way too, if we’re not careful.
But then, if I punctuate it: O! Wonderful!
I somehow get the wonder back.
Wondering being something so full, so basic, it feels
Like a gift to remember what it’s like to wonder.
There are few things that spark true wonder
After a certain age. One of the great gifts of children
Is the tremendous surprise that everything in the world is –
A field, a truck, a horse, a constellation, a bone,
A library, a train, a sticker, an eggbeater.

Marcellus as a bird – a nighthawk or an owl.
He flies to the parapets at night
Settling by the arrow slits in the walls
Keenly watching the coming and goings
His eyes following in smooth lines, not missing
The slightest variation in the patterns of the night.
He flies to Hamlet. He flies away.
Then after bringing Hamlet and ghost together
He flies away for good.


Interesting. Interesting.
He’s added an H from the former call and changed
“My lord” to “Boy.”
Is it like when people call a dog?
Like, “Come Boy come. Come on – Give me the bone. Good boy.”

I’ve never heard a bird called Boy
But I sort of would like to.
“Come on Boy, chirp. Peck that seed, Boy. You can do it.
Come on Boy, hop on that perch, Boy. Flap those wings, Boy.”

What is Hamlet doing between “I have sworn’t” and now?
Has he been performing some swearing ritual?
So be it sounds like the conclusion of a prayer
Or an oath
Or proclamation.
Has he been on his knees these last three lines,
Drawing diagrams in the dirt
Spitting into his palms, rubbing them with dirt
To stick his oath together with earth?
Maybe, though, he’s just standing there collecting himself
Gearing himself up for his first human contact post ghost.

Before everyone had contracts and lawyers
Before letters of agreement and parties of the first part
Before everyone had a file in every government and banker’s office drawers
Before paper was readily available for everyone –
One’s word must have held more weight
Swearing – a binding agreement.
Oaths and promises secured heir legitimacy
From the testimonials of the elements.
To add credence to one’s swearing –
Invoke the stars or the moon
The sun, the heavens. You can also get support from the supernatural –
Swear by the gods or their sons or even
The wounds of their sons (depending on the religion, of course.)
Now, however, swearing won’t get you as far as your name
Scrawled across the bottom of a piece of paper –
One you very likely haven’t read the fine print of.

Last words. These are the ghost’s last words,
Hamlet’s father’s last words. He died suddenly
So he did not get any real last words in.
Presumably he said something to Gertrude like
“Have a nice walk. I’m just gonna grab a couple winks here.”
Or “This is some nice soft grass. I’ll have to remember
To compliment the royal gardener.” Or
“Hmmph. Remind me to skip the beans next time the cook makes tacos.”
But as a ghost –
He gets to leave his son with something.
He leaves him with a French goodbye
He leaves him with a request to live in his memory.
Hamlet, in production, often seems to quote the ghost here
Or use this line as an oath. Which makes sense
Because he says, after it, that he has sworn it.
But I wonder what would happen if there were
Some sense of poignancy here
Some savoring of what they both imagine will
Be their last exchange. It’s no “Either that wallpaper goes or I do.”
It’s not pithy or wise but there is a longing, a loss, a permanence.

Everyday I have this meeting
Pen to paper
On the way to my word, to my words.
Sometimes in talking with people, I cannot find
The right ones. I will slip and say
The wrong cliché. “Hey, what’s up?” will get a “Fine. You?”
I will wrestle with the pause
Decide if I want to speak at all.
So sometimes, this place where I write
Is a castle for words.
The words hang out there, milling around,
Having cocktails until I show up and put them to use.
I go to my word like a lover.
Eager, full, not uncomplicated, but with great anticipation.
Now to my word.

There, smiling.
There, in Denmark.
There, a villain.
There in my crosshairs.
There, guilty.
There, waiting to be discovered.
There, sketched in my book with a target over your face.
There, walking along the battlements, literally.
There, already on the way to hell.
There, in my tables, set down as a smiling villain.
A line like this offers choice bits of business – a demand for a clear “There”
An invitation for something specific.