Blasting Out of Town

 

The familiar carseat that was first to hold

Our daughter from the hospital, the rocking chair

Where a thousand bedtime stories have been told--

I threw them away as though I didn’t care.

And countless other treasures of our life

Brimming with memories, enriched with love,

Artifacts of my children and my wife

I’ve had to fling or toss or shove

Into a reeking dumpster, sad debris

From our explosive exit out of town,

And though we try to slow our exit down

Some hidden engine, roaring, blasts us free

And we must hold on tight and hope we find

A landing worth what we have left behind.

The Flickering Screen

 

Each day plays out

on a flickering screen

the same images

cycling 

the same characters and scenes

cycling 

and you can never change the channel.

Each day plays out

on a flickering screen

some of the scenes I want to fast-forward

some I want to pause

but there is no remote control

cycling

Each day plays out

on a flickering screen

the plot is negligible

and it’s obvious

the actors aren’t completely convinced by the script

cycling

and who the hell is the director anyway?

Each day plays out

on a flickering screen

some of the faces I tolerate

some of the faces

cycling

I am drawn to

but of course they get the least screen time.

Each day plays out

on a flickering screen 

and who’s to blame for this mess?

The actors?

cycling

The director?

Or the editor?

After all, what was left on the cutting room floor?

Too much? Not enough? Anything at all?

Each day plays out

on a flickering screen

and what if I’m to blame

for watching it?

cycling

Smash the screen

unplug it

throw the damn thing out the window

and come with me

yours is the only face I want to see

and we will go just you and I

When the sun is painting a purple sky,

Where waves are rolling on the shore,

With words to say and wine to pour,

And live like that forever more.

Why not?

why not?

you’re probably right

Each day plays out

on a flickering screen

cycling.

To grasp her Who What When Where How and Why

 

To grasp her Who What When Where How and Why

observe minutely with intensive care:

the What her green false-bottomed eye,

her granite smoothness or the musky oils

of shoulders and the scrum of hair

erratic on the nape of her neck;

her Why imposed, appropriately loyal

[inside some wild elusive throbbing check

on such restrictions]; Who I only know

most fully if I spark some laugh or gasp

-ing breath; her How a lithesome sloping flow

of rigid strength; and always here and now

I need her When and Where so I might grasp

her Who What When Where Why and How.

Dara in Hades

 

I can near imagine being one

Of those sad souls in Hades long constrained,

Forgetting everything but that I’m chained

And seeing there, where light has never run,

The gleam approaching of a living one,

And stirring with the other spirits, pained

By half-remembered hope where death has reigned,

We see your step and soft skin like the sun

And long for just a glance from your green eyes,

To find upon your face some recognition,

Some pity for our withered, dark condition

Or horror at our forms, or sick despise.

But witnessing such souls in misery dressed,

You turn and leave us, shrugging, unimpressed.

My lover strides through worlds of life and zones

My lover strides through worlds of life and zones

of chaos on pillared legs in flitting

raiment of color and flesh soft-fitting

her saint’s unvenerated bones

as squealing despotic-subjects unknowing swarm

her ivory ankles and carpeted domain

spreading chaos and she giving form

while spinning holiness from the profane.

But hear her tell it, and she just muddles,

smudging her way through gray-scale gradients

of failure, head down, avoiding puddles

peering forward to the sweet release

of sometimes never fleeting radiance

and a house with nothing to pick up, and peace.

Date Night

I've written many sonnets just for you,

Your looks, your character, I've made a fuss

of every nook and cranny, every hue

your body holds, but here's a poem for us.

And all we are together, to the sum

Exceeding all its parts, to every factor

That multiplies to what we have become

And to those traits that serve as a detractor,

For how could we appreciate our pleasure

Without perspective of a little pain?

How else to celebrate and measure 

Our growth if there were not some growth to make?

So here’s a toast to us and date night. Drain

Your pint and let’s enjoy this needed break.

Do the Dishes