November 2, 2009
I wept until I could weep no more.
The rainbow did not
appear in the sky.
The ground was still rock hard.
I cried out so loud my vocal cords were raw.
The wind did not
blow or breeze.
The trees did not yield their fruit.
I beat my fists bloody against the wall.
The stars did not
hold the answers.
The earth continued to move.
Where else can I go?
Who else can I turn to?
Let it burn.
Showing posts with label troubles. Show all posts
Showing posts with label troubles. Show all posts
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Do Not Deal Harshly With My Tender Lambs
(Psalm 18:4-24)
October 14, 2009
What happened to your heart
when your baby (insert name here)
got sick and cried all night,
unable to tell you what was wrong?
How did you feel
when your child (__________)
bruised their knee or
scraped their elbow,
and came running to you crying?
Where did your mind go
when that bully,
where-are-his-parents, brat pushed
your boy (__________)
on the playground?
Why did you think
what you thought
when that no good,
holding-my-tongue, boy broke
your daughter’s (__________) heart.
Stir up and recall the feelings you get
when you see the faces on the posters
at WalMart, when you hear an Amber alert.
They all have names.
Arouse and remember the emotions that arise
while watching crime drama or the news on TV
about child abductions and pedophiles and
oh, what you would do if you had five minutes alone with them.
Whose face
do you see
at the mention of
infant mortality,
diseased babies,
beaten and abused children,
child porn,
children used as drug mules,
“adoption” slavery,
my God, how could this be,
this is the twenty-first century?
God knows their names.
You (__________)
are His children.
October 14, 2009
What happened to your heart
when your baby (insert name here)
got sick and cried all night,
unable to tell you what was wrong?
How did you feel
when your child (__________)
bruised their knee or
scraped their elbow,
and came running to you crying?
Where did your mind go
when that bully,
where-are-his-parents, brat pushed
your boy (__________)
on the playground?
Why did you think
what you thought
when that no good,
holding-my-tongue, boy broke
your daughter’s (__________) heart.
Stir up and recall the feelings you get
when you see the faces on the posters
at WalMart, when you hear an Amber alert.
They all have names.
Arouse and remember the emotions that arise
while watching crime drama or the news on TV
about child abductions and pedophiles and
oh, what you would do if you had five minutes alone with them.
Whose face
do you see
at the mention of
infant mortality,
diseased babies,
beaten and abused children,
child porn,
children used as drug mules,
“adoption” slavery,
my God, how could this be,
this is the twenty-first century?
God knows their names.
You (__________)
are His children.
Saturday, May 8, 2010
A Postmodern Psalm
July 1, 2009
I will not dread global warming,
For my God is the Intelligent Designer.
I will not panic over a world pandemic,
For my God is the Great Physician.
I will not feel threatened by atomic attack,
For my God is my Star Wars Defense.
I will not be terrified of nuclear winter,
For my God is my Fallout Shelter.
I will not be held hostage by terrorists,
For my God does not negotiate.
I will not be paralyzed by global recession,
For my God is my Financial Advisor.
I will not be intimidated by any energy crisis,
For my God is my Everlasting Fuel.
I will not dread global warming,
For my God is the Intelligent Designer.
I will not panic over a world pandemic,
For my God is the Great Physician.
I will not feel threatened by atomic attack,
For my God is my Star Wars Defense.
I will not be terrified of nuclear winter,
For my God is my Fallout Shelter.
I will not be held hostage by terrorists,
For my God does not negotiate.
I will not be paralyzed by global recession,
For my God is my Financial Advisor.
I will not be intimidated by any energy crisis,
For my God is my Everlasting Fuel.
Saturday, May 16, 2009
The Leaning Tree
January 200?
I wrote this one night while cooking at the Waffle House. I wanted to have something to enter in the Post & Courier and South Carolina Arts Commission sponsored South Carolina Fiction Project and the deadline was only 2 days away. I wasn't able to work on it again until the day of the deadline. I spent all day editing and re-writing, managing to get it posted 5 minutes before the post office closed. I didn't win.
The Leaning Tree
He rode out on Purpose, the gray-white mare he’d left on the farm three years ago when he went away to school. The sun had already been up for an hour, hidden by a ceiling of slate gray clouds. Probably going to snow. His breath hung in the still air like a ghost. The only sound, the muffled crunch of snow under the horse’s hooves. Everyone in the house was still asleep. Spent. Unprepared for the effort of the past few days; stress they thought they had prepared for.
The horse sauntered through the farmyard; past the rusting F150; past the bare clothesline, tiny icicles dripping off the sagging lines; past the dog pens, now empty; through the already open gate to the woods on the other side of the field.
The sweet scent of pine caressed his nostrils like a friendly cat. Purpose gingerly picked her way along the deeply rutted two-track cut by Dad's Ford, the John Deere, and mother nature. The road wound and forked through the forty acres of forest that surrounded the main house and farmyard. He and his three older brothers, all of them moved away from home and starting their own families, had hunted deer and ‘coon and rabbit with their dogs out here. Large mounds of snow-covered branches and roots were scattered in clearings on either side of the road. Dad had said something about selling some of the trees to help pay Mom’s hospital bills.
A year and a half ago he had learned about his mother’s cancer. His first year at State had been more intense than he'd expected, but he kept to the books. Being the first to go to college made him push harder. Now with Mom gone it just doesn’t seem to matter anymore. Maybe I should just quit. Save time and money. Come home and help Dad.
The two-track rolled out to an open field. Brown and broken stalks poked up through the snow. The bleached gray slat barn was supposed to protect the aging John Deere from the weather, but little mounds of snow sat on top of the huge tires and seat. He had made some weak promises to his father to fix the roof. Animal tracks criss-crossed the whitened field like impatient doodles. A hawk circled over the far end, the future looking bleak for some rabbit or squirrel.
The cornfield butted against the apple orchard. Harvested fruit (the farm’s main source of income for over two generations) was now applesauce or cider vinegar. Large empty crates, stacked rank and file, stood around the perimeter of the orchard; a makeshift fortress. Smaller crates cluttered the orchard floor; some stacked two and three high near the trunks, others strewn about carelessly under the unprotecting canopy of the leafless trees. As a boy, he had learned hard work picking up drops. And he had watched as Mexican migrant workers worked even harder to pick the red ripe fruit for their few dollars; all seemingly content.
Leaving the fruitless trees, the land slowly sloped up. A small ridge—open, unplowed, and left to its own. Dried up Queen Anne’s Lace stabbed the snow here and there. Clumps of dead grasses not flattened by the snow peeked out at the world. A single maple tree stood at the top of the ridge. Three main trunks rose to form a wide canopy. The trunk to his left had been recently struck by lightning, its deadened limbs bent to the earth.
He slid from the saddle to the ground and let the reins drop.
When I was a kid I used to pack up peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, potato chips, and pop to eat out here.
I smoked my first...and last...cigar by this tree. I thought I was so cool, until I coughed my lungs out and puked my guts up.
My back was against this rough bark when Darlene first kissed me. A few weeks later we discovered more than a kiss under this tree.
My hunting dog, Bones, is buried right over there.
Mostly, I just came out here to watch the clouds slide by and the breeze blow the grass.
Yeah, this is where I made my decision to go to school upstate. Stayed out here until it got dark. Mom was so proud that I was going to college. Any college.
And in the shelter of naked branches, he leaned back and wept. For as long as it took, he wept and sobbed. Puffy snowflakes floated down to frozen earth. Wiping his chapped cheeks, he took the reins of Purpose and walked her home.
I wrote this one night while cooking at the Waffle House. I wanted to have something to enter in the Post & Courier and South Carolina Arts Commission sponsored South Carolina Fiction Project and the deadline was only 2 days away. I wasn't able to work on it again until the day of the deadline. I spent all day editing and re-writing, managing to get it posted 5 minutes before the post office closed. I didn't win.
He rode out on Purpose, the gray-white mare he’d left on the farm three years ago when he went away to school. The sun had already been up for an hour, hidden by a ceiling of slate gray clouds. Probably going to snow. His breath hung in the still air like a ghost. The only sound, the muffled crunch of snow under the horse’s hooves. Everyone in the house was still asleep. Spent. Unprepared for the effort of the past few days; stress they thought they had prepared for.
The horse sauntered through the farmyard; past the rusting F150; past the bare clothesline, tiny icicles dripping off the sagging lines; past the dog pens, now empty; through the already open gate to the woods on the other side of the field.
The sweet scent of pine caressed his nostrils like a friendly cat. Purpose gingerly picked her way along the deeply rutted two-track cut by Dad's Ford, the John Deere, and mother nature. The road wound and forked through the forty acres of forest that surrounded the main house and farmyard. He and his three older brothers, all of them moved away from home and starting their own families, had hunted deer and ‘coon and rabbit with their dogs out here. Large mounds of snow-covered branches and roots were scattered in clearings on either side of the road. Dad had said something about selling some of the trees to help pay Mom’s hospital bills.
A year and a half ago he had learned about his mother’s cancer. His first year at State had been more intense than he'd expected, but he kept to the books. Being the first to go to college made him push harder. Now with Mom gone it just doesn’t seem to matter anymore. Maybe I should just quit. Save time and money. Come home and help Dad.
The two-track rolled out to an open field. Brown and broken stalks poked up through the snow. The bleached gray slat barn was supposed to protect the aging John Deere from the weather, but little mounds of snow sat on top of the huge tires and seat. He had made some weak promises to his father to fix the roof. Animal tracks criss-crossed the whitened field like impatient doodles. A hawk circled over the far end, the future looking bleak for some rabbit or squirrel.
The cornfield butted against the apple orchard. Harvested fruit (the farm’s main source of income for over two generations) was now applesauce or cider vinegar. Large empty crates, stacked rank and file, stood around the perimeter of the orchard; a makeshift fortress. Smaller crates cluttered the orchard floor; some stacked two and three high near the trunks, others strewn about carelessly under the unprotecting canopy of the leafless trees. As a boy, he had learned hard work picking up drops. And he had watched as Mexican migrant workers worked even harder to pick the red ripe fruit for their few dollars; all seemingly content.
Leaving the fruitless trees, the land slowly sloped up. A small ridge—open, unplowed, and left to its own. Dried up Queen Anne’s Lace stabbed the snow here and there. Clumps of dead grasses not flattened by the snow peeked out at the world. A single maple tree stood at the top of the ridge. Three main trunks rose to form a wide canopy. The trunk to his left had been recently struck by lightning, its deadened limbs bent to the earth.
He slid from the saddle to the ground and let the reins drop.
When I was a kid I used to pack up peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, potato chips, and pop to eat out here.
I smoked my first...and last...cigar by this tree. I thought I was so cool, until I coughed my lungs out and puked my guts up.
My back was against this rough bark when Darlene first kissed me. A few weeks later we discovered more than a kiss under this tree.
My hunting dog, Bones, is buried right over there.
Mostly, I just came out here to watch the clouds slide by and the breeze blow the grass.
Yeah, this is where I made my decision to go to school upstate. Stayed out here until it got dark. Mom was so proud that I was going to college. Any college.
And in the shelter of naked branches, he leaned back and wept. For as long as it took, he wept and sobbed. Puffy snowflakes floated down to frozen earth. Wiping his chapped cheeks, he took the reins of Purpose and walked her home.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Turning Night Into Day
March 2009
Trident Technical College, Copyright ©2009
This was written as an assignment for my English Comp I class at Trident Technical College. My instructor suggested that I submit it to the new school student anthology.
The atrocities committed upon the Jewish peoples in the early twentieth century are widely known and well documented. Elie Wiesel is one voice among thousands declaring the inhumanity of those times upon his people and himself. At the impressionable age of 16, he suffered the loss of his father to starvation at the Buchenwald concentration camp, as well as the deaths of his mother and younger sister in the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp. Wiesel vowed to not speak for ten years of the torturous brutalities he and ten thousand other prisoners endured (Hurst and Pavlick). His silence ended when he penned Un di Velt Hot Geshvihn (And the World Was Silent), the original Yiddish version of Night in 1954 (McDonald and Trotter 506). Night asserts that what Elie Wiesel witnessed as a young teenager in the Auschwitz-Birkenau and Buchenwald camps was the numbing effect of constant brutality and the threat of individual annihilation upon social conscience and personal faith. What he also recorded, however, as seen through the refining lens of hindsight, was the glimmer of hope within his people and possible redemption pictured in shadowed Christian symbolism.
In one chapter from Wiesel's account, the prisoners of the death camp are so numbed to the indescribable brutality around them that they are not merely unconcerned bystanders, but have also become willing participants. Wiesel depicts this condition when he tells of a young prisoner from Warsaw who is to be hanged for the crime of stealing. As the verdict is being read and the condemned youth stands defiantly before his executioners, their ability to be affected as a whole is demonstrated in the whispered question of a prisoner named Juliek: “Do you think this ceremony'll be over soon? I'm hungry…” (Wiesel 507). During this grave moment, Juliek's regard is for the prisoners' only meal: soup. Soup is their life. It is their sole concern. Soup is the currency of life. To preserve their own life “Two prisoners helped […] for two plates of soup” (Wiesel 507). The other prisoners do not seem to mind that their fellows assist. It has been said that if you do not resist evil you assist it. This saying speaks of this moment as the prisoners are no longer merely observers but have become actively involved in their own genocide.
Wiesel, on the other hand, though “no longer troubled” by the “thousands who had died […] in the crematory ovens” (Wiesel 507), experiences a re-awakening, if only briefly, of the threat to his life individually. The sheer numbers of the atrocities committed behind the closed doors of the crematory are desensitizing. “But this one […] he overwhelmed me.” (Wiesel 507, emphasis added) Wiesel writes that as he stood watching the Warsaw youth: “I could hear my heart beating” (Wiesel 507, emphasis added). Wiesel's reaction to this single life and his awareness of his own evokes a scenario in which he appears to feel that “This is a person. A vibrant individual. Soon to die. I am an individual. Alive. Death, brutal death, is a very real threat to me.” But the reality did not last. The numbness settled back over him, for when he returns from the execution for the evening meal he “remember[s] that I found the soup excellent that evening…” (Wiesel 508). He is still alive.
Although there are other hangings, it is the shock of executing a young child that produces a spark of humanity within the prisoners; but Wiesel looks upon the scene and loses faith in his God. This hanging is different from the ones before. The crowd spurns participation. There are no prisoners helping this time. As the chairs of the condemned are tipped over, Wiesel states that there is “Total silence throughout the camp” (Wiesel 509). There is no discussion of soup. This dying boy, dying an agonizing death, is more than the group conscience can bear. They openly weep. The “forgotten […] bitter taste of tears” (Wiesel 508) is fresh on their tongues. Unlike the hanging of the defiant Warsaw youth, this hanging touches their hearts. Wiesel, conversely, sees in the horror of this slow, tormenting death of “the sad-eyed angel” (Wiesel 508) the death of his God. As the other other prisoners question where God is during this atrocity, Wiesel responds internally. “Where is He? […] He is hanging here on this gallows…” (Wiesel 509). He sees no other explanation for how this could be happening than that it is God himself being executed. And at the end of the day, even his life giving soup now “tasted of corpses” (Wiesel 509).
God hanging on a gallows. Wiesel himself may not have intended to use Christian symbolism to show the possibility of hope for the prisoners, but a powerful picture of redemption can be seen in the second execution. Author Dorothy Sayers once wrote:
God in the form of Christ hanging upon a cross is the central image of sacrificial redemption for the Christian faith. Wiesel describes this child as “the little servant, the sad-eyed angel” (Wiesel 508). Likewise, Christ is often referred to as the Servant King. In another parallel, this “child with a refined and beautiful face […] would not speak” (Wiesel 508) before his torturers just as Jesus remained silent before his accusers. Additionally, this young innocent “struggl[ed] between life and death” (Wiesel 509) while hanging between two adult prisoners. Three gallows—three crosses. The hearts of the prisoners were rent in two even as the veil of the temple was rent when Christ died (Matthew 27:51). In Christianity, the cross, the sacrifice of Christ, is the symbol of redemption, the payment for and setting free from sin and guilt. Likewise, through the loss of this one, this innocent, many are given an opportunity to free themselves, their hearts and their humanity from the bondage of this insidious holocaust.
Loss. All who faced the threat of these unrelenting atrocities lost. The defiant youth and others—many others—lost their lives. Ten thousand captive bodies lost their sense of humanity, of compassion, of life beyond a bowl of soup. Wiesel lost his faith. Yet the loss of one life, though senseless and tragic, broke through to the hearts of these prisoners— prisoners of body, mind, and soul—offering an opportunity to be human again, redeeming them from the sin of complacency and freeing them to feel again.
Trident Technical College, Copyright ©2009
Works Cited
Hurst, John and James Pavlick. “Elie Wiesel Biography.”
Academy of Achievement ed. Hugh Esten. March 2, 2009.
American Academy of Achievement. March 6, 2009.
www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/wie0bio-1
McDonald, Ann, and Jack Trotter, eds. World Views: Classic
and Contemporary Readings. 5th ed. Boston: Pearson, 2008.
Sayers, Dorothy. Introductory Papers on Dante. New York:
Harper & Brothers, 1954.
Wiesel, Elie. Night. Trans. Stella Rodway. McDonald and Trotter 506-09.
Trident Technical College, Copyright ©2009
This was written as an assignment for my English Comp I class at Trident Technical College. My instructor suggested that I submit it to the new school student anthology.
The atrocities committed upon the Jewish peoples in the early twentieth century are widely known and well documented. Elie Wiesel is one voice among thousands declaring the inhumanity of those times upon his people and himself. At the impressionable age of 16, he suffered the loss of his father to starvation at the Buchenwald concentration camp, as well as the deaths of his mother and younger sister in the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp. Wiesel vowed to not speak for ten years of the torturous brutalities he and ten thousand other prisoners endured (Hurst and Pavlick). His silence ended when he penned Un di Velt Hot Geshvihn (And the World Was Silent), the original Yiddish version of Night in 1954 (McDonald and Trotter 506). Night asserts that what Elie Wiesel witnessed as a young teenager in the Auschwitz-Birkenau and Buchenwald camps was the numbing effect of constant brutality and the threat of individual annihilation upon social conscience and personal faith. What he also recorded, however, as seen through the refining lens of hindsight, was the glimmer of hope within his people and possible redemption pictured in shadowed Christian symbolism.
In one chapter from Wiesel's account, the prisoners of the death camp are so numbed to the indescribable brutality around them that they are not merely unconcerned bystanders, but have also become willing participants. Wiesel depicts this condition when he tells of a young prisoner from Warsaw who is to be hanged for the crime of stealing. As the verdict is being read and the condemned youth stands defiantly before his executioners, their ability to be affected as a whole is demonstrated in the whispered question of a prisoner named Juliek: “Do you think this ceremony'll be over soon? I'm hungry…” (Wiesel 507). During this grave moment, Juliek's regard is for the prisoners' only meal: soup. Soup is their life. It is their sole concern. Soup is the currency of life. To preserve their own life “Two prisoners helped […] for two plates of soup” (Wiesel 507). The other prisoners do not seem to mind that their fellows assist. It has been said that if you do not resist evil you assist it. This saying speaks of this moment as the prisoners are no longer merely observers but have become actively involved in their own genocide.
Wiesel, on the other hand, though “no longer troubled” by the “thousands who had died […] in the crematory ovens” (Wiesel 507), experiences a re-awakening, if only briefly, of the threat to his life individually. The sheer numbers of the atrocities committed behind the closed doors of the crematory are desensitizing. “But this one […] he overwhelmed me.” (Wiesel 507, emphasis added) Wiesel writes that as he stood watching the Warsaw youth: “I could hear my heart beating” (Wiesel 507, emphasis added). Wiesel's reaction to this single life and his awareness of his own evokes a scenario in which he appears to feel that “This is a person. A vibrant individual. Soon to die. I am an individual. Alive. Death, brutal death, is a very real threat to me.” But the reality did not last. The numbness settled back over him, for when he returns from the execution for the evening meal he “remember[s] that I found the soup excellent that evening…” (Wiesel 508). He is still alive.
Although there are other hangings, it is the shock of executing a young child that produces a spark of humanity within the prisoners; but Wiesel looks upon the scene and loses faith in his God. This hanging is different from the ones before. The crowd spurns participation. There are no prisoners helping this time. As the chairs of the condemned are tipped over, Wiesel states that there is “Total silence throughout the camp” (Wiesel 509). There is no discussion of soup. This dying boy, dying an agonizing death, is more than the group conscience can bear. They openly weep. The “forgotten […] bitter taste of tears” (Wiesel 508) is fresh on their tongues. Unlike the hanging of the defiant Warsaw youth, this hanging touches their hearts. Wiesel, conversely, sees in the horror of this slow, tormenting death of “the sad-eyed angel” (Wiesel 508) the death of his God. As the other other prisoners question where God is during this atrocity, Wiesel responds internally. “Where is He? […] He is hanging here on this gallows…” (Wiesel 509). He sees no other explanation for how this could be happening than that it is God himself being executed. And at the end of the day, even his life giving soup now “tasted of corpses” (Wiesel 509).
God hanging on a gallows. Wiesel himself may not have intended to use Christian symbolism to show the possibility of hope for the prisoners, but a powerful picture of redemption can be seen in the second execution. Author Dorothy Sayers once wrote:
If an image displays the universal pattern, it will display it at all levels and in all circumstances, whether the poet was or could have been conscious of these possible applications or not.(19)
God in the form of Christ hanging upon a cross is the central image of sacrificial redemption for the Christian faith. Wiesel describes this child as “the little servant, the sad-eyed angel” (Wiesel 508). Likewise, Christ is often referred to as the Servant King. In another parallel, this “child with a refined and beautiful face […] would not speak” (Wiesel 508) before his torturers just as Jesus remained silent before his accusers. Additionally, this young innocent “struggl[ed] between life and death” (Wiesel 509) while hanging between two adult prisoners. Three gallows—three crosses. The hearts of the prisoners were rent in two even as the veil of the temple was rent when Christ died (Matthew 27:51). In Christianity, the cross, the sacrifice of Christ, is the symbol of redemption, the payment for and setting free from sin and guilt. Likewise, through the loss of this one, this innocent, many are given an opportunity to free themselves, their hearts and their humanity from the bondage of this insidious holocaust.
Loss. All who faced the threat of these unrelenting atrocities lost. The defiant youth and others—many others—lost their lives. Ten thousand captive bodies lost their sense of humanity, of compassion, of life beyond a bowl of soup. Wiesel lost his faith. Yet the loss of one life, though senseless and tragic, broke through to the hearts of these prisoners— prisoners of body, mind, and soul—offering an opportunity to be human again, redeeming them from the sin of complacency and freeing them to feel again.
Trident Technical College, Copyright ©2009
Works Cited
Hurst, John and James Pavlick. “Elie Wiesel Biography.”
Academy of Achievement ed. Hugh Esten. March 2, 2009.
American Academy of Achievement. March 6, 2009.
www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/wie0bio-1
McDonald, Ann, and Jack Trotter, eds. World Views: Classic
and Contemporary Readings. 5th ed. Boston: Pearson, 2008.
Sayers, Dorothy. Introductory Papers on Dante. New York:
Harper & Brothers, 1954.
Wiesel, Elie. Night. Trans. Stella Rodway. McDonald and Trotter 506-09.
Friday, February 6, 2009
Down
(July 14, 2008)
Looking down all he saw
was concrete
merely millimeters
from his glazed eyes.
Cracked and bleeding toenails
scratched the rough surface
trying to regain
lost footing.
Calloused fingertips fumbled
for a hold,
grasping at pebbles,
digging in sand.
And his spittle oozed
over dried
and crusted lips
onto the hot pavement.
No one saw or cared to see
or dared to be
the one who cared
enough to lift.
Looking down all he saw
was concrete
merely millimeters
from his glazed eyes.
Cracked and bleeding toenails
scratched the rough surface
trying to regain
lost footing.
Calloused fingertips fumbled
for a hold,
grasping at pebbles,
digging in sand.
And his spittle oozed
over dried
and crusted lips
onto the hot pavement.
No one saw or cared to see
or dared to be
the one who cared
enough to lift.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Shooting Star (for Douglas)
(November 13, 2007)
Douglas was my nephew. He was barely in his twenties when he was hit by a car while riding his bicycle.
I saw a shooting star
last night
in a foggy sky,
quickly shot through the dark—
too quick.
A glance away
and you would miss it.
I guess that's what makes them
special.
A speck of light falling
to wherever stars go.
And if you happened to glance
it's descent,
you've connected with the heavens.
But the connection is cut short
and regardless of your ties
or knots untied;
no matter the light years
or miles that separate,
we are all still connected
to the shooting star.
Douglas was my nephew. He was barely in his twenties when he was hit by a car while riding his bicycle.
I saw a shooting star
last night
in a foggy sky,
quickly shot through the dark—
too quick.
A glance away
and you would miss it.
I guess that's what makes them
special.
A speck of light falling
to wherever stars go.
And if you happened to glance
it's descent,
you've connected with the heavens.
But the connection is cut short
and regardless of your ties
or knots untied;
no matter the light years
or miles that separate,
we are all still connected
to the shooting star.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Life In A Fishbowl
(July 20, 2006)
This poem was inspired by one of Gary Larson's Far Side cartoons.
Floating endless circles
around pretend castles
and plastic treasures;
past a helmeted figurine
of a man
bubbling air that doesn't pass
through lungs;
looking out
at a magnified world
appearing larger than life,
wetter than aerated H2O;
masticating
in personal defecation
and crud covered pebbles
thinking…
Should the castle burn
and I escape the flame
to flop a slimy stain
upon the tablecloth—
Am I not now more screwed?
This poem was inspired by one of Gary Larson's Far Side cartoons.
Floating endless circles
around pretend castles
and plastic treasures;
past a helmeted figurine
of a man
bubbling air that doesn't pass
through lungs;
looking out
at a magnified world
appearing larger than life,
wetter than aerated H2O;
masticating
in personal defecation
and crud covered pebbles
thinking…
Should the castle burn
and I escape the flame
to flop a slimy stain
upon the tablecloth—
Am I not now more screwed?
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Midnight Daydreams
(May 2004)
Daydreaming at midnight
when REM should be producing
Freudian or Jungian or Lithuanian images.
Daily lethargy induces
drowsiness
and any inclination toward movement
is postponed.
Propping up the pillow of low expectations
keeps the thought of even putting on slippers
unlikely.
The alarm should be set
for an early wake-up call
to dream in the daylight.
Daydreaming at midnight
when REM should be producing
Freudian or Jungian or Lithuanian images.
Daily lethargy induces
drowsiness
and any inclination toward movement
is postponed.
Propping up the pillow of low expectations
keeps the thought of even putting on slippers
unlikely.
The alarm should be set
for an early wake-up call
to dream in the daylight.
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Dog On A Chain
(May 7, 2002)
Wow!
Look at this! Look at that!
What’sthatsmell?
What’sThatsmell?
What’sTHATsmell?
It’s...it’s...it’s...it’s...
Whoa!
A ball!
Get the ball! Get the ball! Get the ball!
Hey, hey, hey, hey
this, this, this
is, is, is
Hmm...?
Where
does
this...
Gotta run, gotta run, gotta run...
Wow!
Look at that!
Wow!
Look at this!
What’sthatsmell?What’sThatsmell?
What’sTHATsmell?
Aaah...
Gotta run, gotta run, gotta
Whoops
Okay.
Anyway.
Okay?
Sigh...
What?
What’s that?
It’s a cat!
It’s a cat!
Get the cat!
Get the cat!
Get the ca
Cat! Cat!
Cat! Cat!
Okay.
Okay.
Anyway.
Anyway.
Need to
drink some
water.
Need to
drink some
water.
Gotta run
(gotta run)
Gotta run
(gotta run)
Gotta run
(gotta
Anyway.
Anyway.
Anyway.
Sigh...
Wow!
Look at this! Look at that!
What’sthatsmell?
What’sThatsmell?
What’sTHATsmell?
It’s...it’s...it’s...it’s...
Whoa!
A ball!
Get the ball! Get the ball! Get the ball!
Hey, hey, hey, hey
this, this, this
is, is, is
Hmm...?
Where
does
this...
Gotta run, gotta run, gotta run...
Wow!
Look at that!
Wow!
Look at this!
What’sthatsmell?What’sThatsmell?
What’sTHATsmell?
Aaah...
Gotta run, gotta run, gotta
Whoops
Okay.
Anyway.
Okay?
Sigh...
What?
What’s that?
It’s a cat!
It’s a cat!
Get the cat!
Get the cat!
Get the ca
Cat! Cat!
Cat! Cat!
Okay.
Okay.
Anyway.
Anyway.
Need to
drink some
water.
Need to
drink some
water.
Gotta run
(gotta run)
Gotta run
(gotta run)
Gotta run
(gotta
Anyway.
Anyway.
Anyway.
Sigh...
Thursday, January 15, 2009
lonely sailor shipwrecked upon an immovable Rock
(November 10, 1993)
Wicked winds and raging waves
stirred beneath the clouds,
beat and batter, no care no matter for
this wretched, broke wayfarer.
Salted sheets of frothing foam
poised above its prey,
pounce and pierce with stinging fierceness
the opened flesh lay bare.
Nerves numbed in the needled dark.
sight dimmed in the cold.
Strength bruised in the cursed din.
(clinging, clawing, slipping, falling—
Lord, just let me die!
fighting, fleeing, cursing, pleading—
Lord, just tell me why!)
Tempestuous days make old.
Balmy breeze and calming seas
stir beneath the clouds.
Wicked winds and raging waves
stirred beneath the clouds,
beat and batter, no care no matter for
this wretched, broke wayfarer.
Salted sheets of frothing foam
poised above its prey,
pounce and pierce with stinging fierceness
the opened flesh lay bare.
Nerves numbed in the needled dark.
sight dimmed in the cold.
Strength bruised in the cursed din.
(clinging, clawing, slipping, falling—
Lord, just let me die!
fighting, fleeing, cursing, pleading—
Lord, just tell me why!)
Tempestuous days make old.
Balmy breeze and calming seas
stir beneath the clouds.
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