Malcolm Miller Poems

Malcolm Miller was a Salem poet. His main entry is Miller, Malcolm H.

Thanks to Rod Kessler, English professor Emeritus from Salem State we have some of his

Salem-Centric poems listed below.

Malcolm Miller’s Salem Poems –an incomplete compilation [13 February 2016]

Standing on the Salem-Beverly bridge gazing seawards at four in the morning March 1990

to the right the final

part of Salem shines

with spaced lights curving

towards the end

of our power

to the left Beverly

like a finger lit

by many gold

rings points

towards some union

out beyond

our marriages

out where only dark

bigger than all our lights

seem to call

I am going

I am going

will I see

will I see

you there?

[INTO THE HIGHER AIR, 1992, 72 pages, p.8]

Witch Trials Salem Mass. 1692

the trees were stark

to begin with

and the choppy sea

often grey and cold

Indians had strange

ways and eyes

their arrows could travel

a long way and accurately

far off the English king

could not be relied on

rumors spoke of changes

not to their advantage

order is always maintained

by a form of no

the haunches of women even young

shake fire in the thatched-roof cabins

fire is a dangerous element

and a moral god insufficient

there are always reasons to kill

many wished for more than twenty

[INTO THE HIGHER AIR, 1992, 72 pages, p.33]

A clean Well Lighted Place In Winter

it’s 3 in the morning

the fatal lapsed hour

I am the sole

customer here

in this Dunkin Donut on

the coast of Massachusetts

the coffee is all right

the donut not bad

the music being offered

only fair

and behind the counter

the young woman

who quit high school

out of boredom

is yawning

a mute kind

of weary-eyed goddess

but a goddess none the less

in this god

blessedly open place

or don’t you know

don’t you know yet

about closed up towns

in cold dark times

                                         [FURTHER AND FURTHER   POEMS (1992), 72 pages, p.65] 

ZONE 3

I used to buy a ticket

from Boston that said

to Salem Mass

now it says

to Zone 3

I used to have moments

of joy now I have

no problems

I used to be free and easy

now I am acceptable

and do the right

thing for

the situation

I used to be loyal

to something I could not

define now I am

a good citizen

      [FURTHER AND FURTHER   POEMS (1992), 72 pages, p.16] 

State College Canteen

on his last day of work the guy

by some quirk of inspiration

profit or satire

loaded the huge soft

drink machines with beer

the price was right and the day

spring-like

never have students learned more

about religion

Dionysius was dancing in the halls

and singing in the corridors

never did the philosophy professor

a master of logical positivism

seem more absurd

his much praised sobriety was found

to be a sort

of living death and all the English

instructors by afternoon were being

booed from the building

for not knowing how to teach

young people how to return

to the sun [POEMS THAT NEED YOU (1993) p.41]

there is a sign in a bar in my

home town that is like modern life

do not hesitate to ask for credit

it says

our way of saying no is very polite

       	[Unsatisfactory Fragments of Lukewarm Fire, (Jan. 2004) p. 57]  

College Girl in Massachusetts

in the winter dawn a girl bound

for history class sure

footed and neat with

the grace of morning

her face almost fresh as

recent snow the night’s

full twinkling moon over

Salem harbor

college girl bearing your proud

unchallenged face towards

the necessary war of all

the living I go

with you

I go with you clear-eyed sprite

your earnest brow of morning

even over here I feel

your unique breathing

the privateness of your being

descended from trees and birds

and from darkness kind

to all its stars

I go with you lovely scholar

and may you find on

your way however

buried the gold

of unteachable joy

[The Taste of Inexplicable Nothingness, 1994]