Before my guardian angel
came crashing to the ground
in a heap of bloody early summer cottonwood fluff,
he clipped the top of his left wing
on an abstract steel sculpture
recently implanted in a park in what used to be
his typical oceanside flight plan from
up there
wherever
to the balcony of my apartment
where he would normally perch,
occasionally to torment the odd pigeon or seagull
that’s not quite tuned into
the abstract, ethereal vibes
that constantly inhabit my balcony,
whether angel-boy is there or not.

And before the crash to the ground,
perhaps it was yesterday
or last month
[who knows, what with Pacific Angel Time and all]
he hit a patch of vertigo
while hovering in the cliffside updrafts
in the Grand Canyon.
When he panicked and plummeted
he was fortunate that the mildest gust
tossed him enough
so he could land on the cliff edge
rather than down down down.

I used to be somewhat self-conscious
about having a sub-standard guardian angel.
I mean
is my karmic balance so out of whack that I don’t rate
a qualified guide?
Did I piss off some early muse
as a cocky teenage poet
full of self-defined genius and
overwhelming erotic allure
and hyper-critical insight
into the stupidity of the previous poetic generation that I
—and only I—
had the power to erase them from the canon?

But as I got older
from being such a teenage cock,
I started meeting others who,
when properly motivated by what I learned to cultivate—
a safe trustworthy ear,
would admit to having suspicions
of cosmic incompetence
“guiding” them into co-dependent, dysfunctional
ultimately imploding, self-destructive
relationships with uber-egotists.
So maybe I wasn’t alone.
Maybe we’re all in this trap,
thinking there are reliable wings to catch us,
when really they’re not necessarily
any more reliable than our own common sense.

And then I began asking who sets the standards
for quality, or even competent,
guardian angels.
What committee was empowered
and by who
and what about the applicants—
was there a sufficient pool to draw from
or do dead 1970’s glam-rock drummers
get to apply?

And once I’d cultivated enough doubt and suspicion
of my supposed guardian angel,
I came to see him more as a companion,
a mostly unobtrusive friend
who thankfully lacked the capacity
to annoy me like some inconsiderate roommate who never cleans his pasta pots.
And wouldn’t you know,
I began to see him more
as my sense of awe lifted.
He’d sit on my balcony rail,
ten stories up,
often lost in his nearly-patented daze
staring at meandering
lava lamp cloud formations—
as if he had some major life decision dilemma looming over him.
Maybe he did.

There were even days
when he looked so down
and I was amidst an optimistic, inspired streak,
that I felt it was actually my presence around him
that made all the difference,
that kept him from sliding off the rail
to kiss the pool deck below
at terminal velocity.
Those were the days
that if it weren’t for the groove I was in,
I’d be cynical enough to think that the Great Chain of Being
was actually one of those chains
attached to a rubber plug in the bathroom sink,
that every time it slipped out of your hand
the chain would seek the plumbing depths
by diving, jingling, down the drain,
desperate to drag the plug with it,
only to be ultimately frustrated when
the plug
merely
did its job.

So when I heard the crash
and saw the bloody cottonwood fluff,
I knew I was on my own.
And the air,
it doesn’t taste all that different
after all.
But I still miss you, angel-boy.


Copyright 2002, Stephen Buckley
2002.10.16, 915-945pm