Rowan Ricardo Phillips

We’d cut school like knives through butter, the three

Of us – Peter, Stephen and I – to play

Just about all the music we knew,

Which meant that from nine in the morning till

Steve’s parents, the ever-patient Murtaughs,

Would get home from work, I played guitar,

Peter played bass, and Steve (who’d end

Up becoming a guitarist by trade

When we went separate ways, to separate

Schools, in separate states), Steve at this point

Played the drums. We dreamed of power trios

And powered our way through song after song,

Including ones Steve and I wrote – like

“Hey, Regina” and the lamentably

Titled “String Her Up.” Sometimes we tried out

Some Yes, a long “Hey Joe,” the stereo phaser

Was my signature sound, and I’d bend in

And out of notes, imply arpeggios

Only to solo over them, tapped, frowned

Through anything in a major key, felt

My way home on Steve’s map of snares, Pete’s rope.

We’d play an entire Zeppelin album,

Usually the first or second, then stray

By chance into the longer, later songs

Like bees that float down and drown in a pool.

We’d break for lunch and then get back at it,

As though we had a gig to get ready for,

Or a demo to cut, the cassette deck

Rolling its eyes as it whirred round and round.

Peter, as is the nature of bassists,

Held the tunes together and kept things light.

Years later, I assumed he was dead.

My Telecaster glares at me at night now

From inside the hard case by my bed –

And the calluses on my fingertips

Have long since softened. The six-minute solos

At some point became poems it took two months

Minimum to make seem seamless. Steve

In the meantime thrived in the Triangle,

Became Stevie, married Emily; Pete

I knew less about. He posts on Facebook

Cheerfully about the Light, the Great Light

That glows in all of us, sends the occasional

White dove in the occasional shared shot,

A sun resting on a cloud like a pearl

In its mooted gray shell. Nostalgia courts

Me. I’m nearing forty, we were boys –

And I should let us be. But nostalgia

Spreads quickly through the ashes of our youth,

Making ferned fires out of blue beliefs.

When the dark would come, we’d show each other

Our blisters, the painful white whorls peeling,

Our red palms upwards, outstretched and unread.

We’d cut school like knives through butter, the three
Of us—Peter, Stephen and I—to play
Just about all the music we knew,
Which meant that from nine in the morning till
Steve’s parents, the ever-patient Murtaughs,
Would get home from work, I played guitar,
Peter played bass, and Steve (who’d end
Up becoming a guitarist by trade
When we went separate ways, to separate
Schools, in separate states) Steve at this point
Played the drums. We dreamed of power trios
And powered our way through song after song,
Including ones Steve and I wrote—like
“Hey, Regina” and the lamentably-
Titled “String Her Up.” Sometimes we tried out
Some Yes, a long “Hey Joe,” the stereo phaser
Was my signature sound, and I’d bend in
And out of notes, imply arpeggios
Only to solo over them, tapped, frowned
Through anything in a major key, felt
My way home on Steve’s map of snares, Pete’s rope.
We’d play an entire Zeppelin album,
Usually the first or second, then stray
By chance into the longer, later songs
Like bees that float down and drown in a pool.
We’d break for lunch and then get back at it
As though we had a gig to get ready for
Or a demo to cut, the cassette deck
Rolling its eyes as it whirred round and round.
Peter, as is the nature of bassists,
Held the tunes together and kept things light.
Years later, I assumed he was dead.
My telecaster glares at me at night now
From inside the hard case by my bed—
And the calluses on my fingertips
Have long since softened. The six-minute solos
At some point became poems it took two months
Minimum to make seem seamless. Steve
In the meantime thrived in the Triangle,
Became Stevie, married Emily; Pete
I know less about. He posts on Facebook
Cheerfully about the Light, the Great Light
That glows in all of us, sends the occasional
White dove in the occasional shared shot,
A sun resting on a cloud like a pearl
In its mooted grey shell. Nostalgia courts
Me. I’m nearing forty, we were boys—
And I should let us be. But nostalgia
Spreads quickly through the ashes of our youth,
Making ferned fires out of blue beliefs.
When the dark would come, we’d show each other
Our blisters, the painful white whorls peeling,
Our red palms upwards, outstretched and unread.

Not knowing the difference between Heaven

And Paradise, he called them both Heaven.

So when he shrugged at the thought of a god

Blanched in the lights of implausible heights,

Thumbing the armrests of a throne, that was

Heaven. And when he stared out at the sea,

Feeling familiar to himself at last,

He called that Heaven, too. And nothing changed

About either Paradise or Heaven

For it: Paradise retained its earthen

Glamour; and Heaven, because it can’t stand

For anything on its own, like the color

Of rice or a bomb, was happy to play

Along, was happy just to be happy

For once, and not an excuse for mayhem.

This night sky won’t always have a meaning,

Won’t always mean something it’s meant before,

For if it did it would always be but

Merest meaning, and how then would I know

Myself from any other self, my self

Beached at the sea of my soul, as it turns

To sing back to this star-seized evening that’s

Unreeling and unreals like Paradise?