Unending Story

Oh, tell me an unending story
A tale that never ends
With characters fantastic
And plot lines that ever wends.

Charm me with chapters
Of episodic brilliance
And villains evil
With tentacles of dalliance.

Keep me involved
In this forever story
That bathes my mind
In unending glory.

Open the book to me
That speaks to me ever
Of people I love
That die to me never.

We will, in this tale
Keep forever our noses
In this wonderful book
That never, never closes!

Shooting the Moon

Last night
I pointed my rifle
At the moon
And pulled the trigger.

Somewhere
Between here and there
The full metal jacket
Fell to earth, I figure.

I peered
Through the scope
And couldn’t find
A new crater.

I may try again
Tonight and see
If I can do it then
Or maybe later.

I’m not a man
To lightly surrender
To circumstance
Or situation.

So I’ll fire again
Just to see
If I can make
A new lunar formation.

Talking to the Wind

There hasn’t been a day
I've not thought about you.
Not an hour passes
Not even a few.

You’re on my mind
You’re in my heart.
When things never end
Things never start.

I long and I ache
To hear from you again.
You were more than a lover.
You were my dearest friend.

But I suspect it’s pointless.
I’m talking to the wind.
Because when time runs out
All things must end.

The Bitter Cup

I’m not leaving you
He said.
We’re in this thing together.

I didn’t say anything
Back.
We both knew he lied.

The eastern sky
Lightened.
It looked like traveling weather.

Pushing his pant legs into his
Boots
He made sure the laces were well tied.

I’m just going to take
A look-see.
I’ll be back in a minute or so.

You stay quiet and sit tight right
Here
I’ll be back in a little bit.

I watched him pull on
His gloves
As he made ready to go.

The winter sun rose on
My face
And I knew that this was it.

At the top of the rise he began
To run
And he didn’t even look back.

I loosened the tourniquet and felt
The blood
Flow from the wound.

It spread on the ground in a
Warm pool
As I lay my head on my pack.

He disappeared over the
Horizon.
He wasn’t coming back anytime soon.

Never thought it would end
This way
Not in a million years.

As my blood flowed out, the sleep
Rolled in.
I knew I wouldn't wake up.

I would never leave him
Like this.
I’m not a man that surrenders to fears.

So I laid back and let it
All go
Sipping death from the bitter cup.

The Dead

It’s kinda weird
When I stop to consider
The dead always know
Where I am.

Ain’t no use to hide
‘Cuz the dead got eyes
Can see everywhere
So it don’t much matter a damn.

I’m fixin’ to stand
Up tall and brave
And not pay the dead
No never mind.

It ain’t as if the dead
Got legs
Though I don’t mean
To treat them unkind.

Please give the dead
My best regards.
I don’t mean them
No harm.

Got a rabbit’s foot
In my pocket
And a garlic pouch
For a charm.

Leavin’ Today

I’m leavin’ this town today
To some place I don’t know.
Can’t say why exactly
Just need someplace to go.

One city’s as good as another.
They all start looking the same.
Don’t much matter the reasons.
I don’t put much stock in blame.

Got a clean shirt in my backpack
And a couple dozen warm socks.
Got a good pair of boots
That can kick a few thousand rocks.

I’ve memorized a hundred or more songs
I can sing to pass away time.
But there’s nothin’ much in my pockets
Save for a nickel, few pennies and a dime.

This trek is just what I need.
I’m gonna take a bead on the sun.
I don’t rightly know where I’m headin’
But I do know this journey’s begun.

Let the Mountains Fall*

Mr. Collins
My unworthy eyes
Just read your new volume
The way a plebe
Reads a textbook
Or an apostle
The Holy Writ.

Mr. Collins
You shame me
With your pure
And simple words
Your mild verse
And easy symmetry
Of line.

Mr. Collins
So seamless
So naturally
Your thoughts
Gather to flow--
The ink
As blood
In your veins.

Mr. Collins
Your poetry
Compels me to
Secret away my own
Or offer them up
To heaven
As burnt sacrifice.

Mr. Collins
Should you ever find
These poor
Sniffling lines
Please hurry onto
Some other pursuit
More worthy
A master of language
And let
The mountains fall on me.


*My reaction upon reading Billy Collins 2013 collection of poems, titled Aimless Love. Buy it. Read it. Then never read me again.

Contradiction

There is warmth in my soul
But ice in my mouth.
There is love in my heart
But hate in my brain.
These things contradict
Yet the obvious
Remains.

How is it that opposites
Are the building blocks
Of the experience
Of life?
Such uncomfortable truth
Is a palm on the blade
Of the knife.

It’s of no use to grasp
Upon reason
Or wrestle with truth
And try to comprehend.
All of life is reduced
To contradiction
At the end.

Going Alone

I guess
I’m going alone
Although that is not what
I intended.

It appears
Time is deaf
And cannot hear
My call.

I shouted
Then I screamed
Trying hard
To gain attention.

But time
Has no ears
And must not
Care.

So I will
Go alone
Into the proverbial
Dark and stormy night.

The Hanging of Haman

Delusion
Is a rain that falls
Spilling rivers from their banks
Sweeping before the tide
All manner of intelligence
Wisdom
And propriety.

False tales
Silly fables
And outrageous rumors
Violate geography
Rolling upward
Swelling mountains
And subverting truth.

The mouth
Of the liar
And the itching ear
Of the hearer
Are altogether wicked.
They will have
A certain end
But not before great violence
Is done
To gentle truth
And those who dwell
Circumspectly
In a land that was once at peace.

Woe to those
Who trade in delusion
Who lift their necks
To scaffolds
Of their own construction.

Haman always hangs
From his own gallows
While Mordecai is exalted.

The Greatest Question

I don’t know how
This whole thing works.
I just know
That it does.
I don’t know why
All this matters
But I suspect
It’s just because.

The puzzle of life
All comes together
And makes sense
At the end.
I’ll understand
Little more
Than that now
But it’ll all make sense by then.

Stop asking questions
That have no answers.
Just settle down
For now.
To my mind
The greatest question
I need answered
Is not “why?” but “how?”

Fortress

She thundered in
Five hundred feet
Above the deck
A bright white star
Blazing on her port wing
Right out of 1944.

I stood on the edge
Of a field of wheat
Feet planted in the earth
But my soul was executing
A shallow right wheel
Under a wide powder blue sky.

My chest vibrated
With the palpitations
Of four Pratt and Whitney engines
Pulsing all the way
To my loins
And I stood transfixed
By seventy years
Of passion and history.

Come again, hero.
Fly again, warrior.

As she receded into the distance
I became aware
I had been standing tall
My right arm
In a stiff salute
To an old Fortress
Pristine in form
Mighty in honor
And disappearing forever
From skies
That now feel empty.

There Were Men Once*

There are few men remaining
That know the sound
Of summer rain
Pelting a tin roof.

Fewer are left
That have the musk of earth
In their nostrils.

Not many have
The scent of rivers
In their brains.

Not many remain
Whose fingers were cut
By the knife of cotton bolls.

Not many are left
Who savor black powder
Like French perfume.

There were men once
That pissed a furrow
Then planted beans.

There were men once
That bought continents
With their life’s blood.

Once upon a time
There were men
That didn’t need to understand
A woman
Before he could love her.

There were men
That drove old trucks
With the dignity of Cadillacs.

Once upon a time
Men saw no contradiction
Between poetry
And manhood.

There were men once
That never apologized
And never explained.

There were men once.


*Yeah, I'll probably catch hell for this post. And sure, I stepped over the line here and there. But I ain't gonna apologize and I ain't gonna explain.

Some Feelings

There are no words
Sometimes.
Some feelings
Can’t be explained.
Some feelings
Are hard as iron.
Some feelings
Pour like rain.

Sometimes it’s best
To say nothing.
Sometimes
Silence is best.
Some feelings
Flow like lava.
Some feelings
Have no rest.

There are no words
Sometimes.
Some emotions
Get lost.
Some feelings
Burn quietly
Some glow eerily
Hovering like a ghost.

Some feelings
Are raw meat.
Some feelings
Are intoxicating drink.
Some feelings
Weigh heavily upon me.
Some feelings
Take me to the brink.

To be ransomed
From some feelings
Is to be delivered
From a fate.
To be imprisoned
In some feelings
Is to wait
And wait…and wait.

Fixed Behind the Fifty

The kindling and the sticks
He scattered with his boot
Strands of smoke
Quickly diffusing
By overhead branches
And chill morning air.

Coffee grounds swam
In boiled coffee
A grit between
The soldier’s teeth
The way memories
Irritated
His heart and mind.

Tired every morning
Weary all night long
Anxious every hour
And thinking of going home.

Damn these burned out villages
And damn these empty fields.

Damn these brooding clouds
And damn these cartridges and shells.

Today is yesterday
And yesterday today
Tomorrow never comes
In the middle
Of a freezing hell.

Her body was so tender
Her kisses were so sweet
But memories are toxic
When you’re fixed
Behind your fifty.

Memories are toxic
When you're fixed
Behind the fifty.

Ambling Dog

I am a discarded deuce
A cigarette butt in the gutter
Water through a sluice.

Sometimes I feel alone
Powerless to act
Like a chance come and gone.

I am a child of lost stars
Alone in a night of winters
Wandering between the wars.

If I gave my heart away
This road would miss my feet
And I would live in yesterday.

Look for me no longer.
I am just an ambling dog
Hoping to grow stronger.

Of Earth and Sky

Fifteen feet overhead
The kite briefly flared
Catching the wind
Pulling skyward
Forsaking its early
Unsteadiness.

The long knotted tail
Kept the bright orange fabric
Properly related to the horizon.

It climbed beyond roof-lines
Higher than chimneys
Superior to darting sparrows
Into the realms of hawks.

The spool of twine
In my hand
Tugged toward an early
Blue-blushed moon
The kite settling
Into its sky home.

Beside the distant diamond
My mind soared
A disembodied aviator
An exclamation
Of earth and sky.

Tell Me

Tell Me

Tell me where you are
And I will come.
Give me an indication
You want me
And I will be there.

Distance is simple mathematics.

Mile markers tick by.
Horizons broaden.
Highways widen
Then narrow.

Small towns and big cities
Homogenize.
Billboards chatter
Silently.
The geography of travel
Is predictable.

The only thing that truly changes
Is you.

You cannot be who you once were.
What you will be
Cannot be
What you now are.
I fear that once found
You will transition again
And the points on my compass
Will shift once more.
I once more become disoriented.

Tell me where you are
And I will come.

Come to the Summit With Me*

Come to the summit with me.
We will stand where few have.

Before us
The land undulates
From gentle swells
To dramatic peaks
Thrust skyward
By unfathomable Tectonic plates
Glistening
In burnished sunlight
Dappled
By ancient forests
Of evergreen and pine
Oak and birch
Swathed in mists
The color of squirrel pelts
Casting to chambray skies
The aromas of autumn mornings.

We will ford cold mountain streams
Laughing across table rocks
We will scale troubled crags
Seeking finger holds
Few have grasped
Rising upward
In defiance of civilized convention
And domestic routine.

Come to the summit with me.
We will settle into the earth tonight
Faces heavenward
To drink draughts
Of the fiery cosmos.
Gazing into eternity’s starry eyes
We will slumber
Guarded by the shimmering Dog Star.

Before dawn
Jupiter will lay on the horizon
Mars burns red above the peaks
And high
Behind the starry sickle
Venus will shine.
Saturn yawns
Beneath an autumnal crescent moon.

Come to the summit with me.
We will rest upon volcanic upheavals
Dance with granite shafts
Ascending slate and shale
Reaching for September skies.

Forsake
For a season
Urban distraction
And assorted neon avenues.

Come to the summit with me.


*Remembrances of Lilly and a long-ago Appalachian adventure.

Empty

The death of his dog
Diminishes any man.

Mickey died hard.
I foolishly thought
He would recover.
He always had.
But time ran out.

Mickey slept fitfully
His last hours
Legs kicking
As though
In his dreams
He was young again
Loping easily across wide fields.

I gave him pain meds
And that helped
But at six in the evening
Mickey died.

I wrapped the Sheltie
In a blanket
Carried him into the yard
And placed him
At the foot
Of a blueberry bush.

For thirteen years
Mickey was a joyful companion
With a spirited connection
To tossed balls
Frisbees
And water streaming from a garden hose.
With all of nature.

Dogs are amazing creatures.
I would rather have a good dog
Than nearly any other concession
God might offer.

The place Mickey slept
Suddenly feels much smaller
And infinitely more empty.

I Remember*

I remember
Snow so white
Pure
And cold
That numbness
Came as a mercy
After the first moments
Of icy agony.

Once or twice an hour
I sat in the cab of my truck
Hands under the heater
Tears streaming my cheeks
With the pain of exposure
Psyching myself to go out again
To carry on to completion.

Small flakes struck my windshield
Fine as talcum powder
Only to instantly resolve
To droplets
At the warmth of my defroster.

I remember
Tiny flakes fluttered to earth
Like millions of parachutes
Covering urban streets
With a crystalline blanket
Covering city grit
In a holy shroud
Muting busses
Taxis and trains
Exacting a price of pain
To exposed flesh.

I remember
Marveling
That each tiny flake was unique
Not another like it
Among the millions
Piled
Against garbage cans
Against locked doorways
Against derelict cars
Against naked winter shrubs
Against high line poles
Against winos asleep in cardboard boxes
Dying one second at a time
Numb with cold.

I remember
Chicago ice
Glazing rungs of the ladder
I would climb
Making treacherous the ledges I would walk
Frosting the high voltage lines I would negotiate
Deadening the fingers I would use
My gloves too clumsy to be of benefit.

I remember
The hushed moments
In my truck at day’s end
Sitting in the silence of gathering gloom
My breath rising as vapor in the frigid cab
Grateful I had completed my job
Praying I would successfully
Do it all over again
The next day
And the next.

I remember it all.
And I still shiver.



* It seems my recent thoughts are weather-related...however the seasons of earth are deeply attached to the seasons of life. I am at the place where that kind of reflection is increasingly common. Can I get a witness?

Night Fall

Clouds, rain-laden
Dark as bruises
Suspend from
Early-autumn skies.

I sit by the window
Television droning
Unwatched.
Mindless chatter.

Soon the firmament will darken
Black as Lucifer’s heart
Empty as a winter barn
Cold as river ice.

Moments like these reckon
Those that follow
Resisting hollowness
Or yielding to loneliness.

Somewhere in western skies
A pumpkin sun sets, but not here.
Here darkness beckons
Within night's priestly robes.

Time

My words resonated.
They were hard targeted
Finding their mark.

Time.

My mind was prepared
My fingers the instruments
Of a ready writer.

Time.

My shoulders were strong
Abel to carry the burden
To muscle-through obstructions.

Time.

My feet were well-shod
Anxious to travel
Any path necessary.

Time.

My heart was tuned
To the frequency of wisdom
Prepared for the chase of life.

Time.

My body sighs
Like boughs
Of autumn leaves
Weary and wanting rest.

Where have you strayed
Oh, soul
And why are you disquieted
Within me?

When the best of life’s journey
Is spent
And thrill resigned to memory
Yearning yet remains
Within the treasures of
Time.

Perfection

She is beautiful
But not classically so.
She is not a “Model.”

Models do nothing for me.

Look up “Model”
In the dictionary.
It will describe
A “Model”
As a small approximation
Of the real thing.

She is the real thing.

Her inner being
Rushes from her eyes
Sparkles from her mouth
And breathes through her lungs.

It is not the package
That most charms me.
It is that which is thinly veiled
Behind her flesh.
Were she unwrapped
An exquisite woman would still gleam
As noon rays on white sand.

Of this I am certain.

That is not to say
Her flesh
Is of no consequence.
But I never was a man distracted
By wrapping paper and bows
(Though I do admire the unveiling).

I am trying to say
That the whole of her…
Package
Paper
Bow
And spirit
Are absolute perfection.

She naps in the afternoon light
Streaming through the pane.
Her breath comes easy
Unguarded and peaceful.

She will not sleep long, though.
Every day with her
Feels like Christmas morning
And I know
Precisely
How her ribbon ties.

Solar Fruit Salad

The sun
I know
Wears a variety of gowns
Among the many spheres
In which she sets.

She glows white hot
In orbits closer to her
Massive
And oppressive.

On the War Planet
Of Mars
Her setting hue
Is powder blue.

From perspectives distant
She seems a tiny
Gleaming nuclear furnace.

But here
In the “Goldilocks Zone”
She is a lemon in the morning
An apricot at noon
And tangerine when she sets.

I’ve no desire to see her fury
Nor her ambivalence.
Give her to me
In her Northern nurture
Her Midwestern charm
Her Western thrill
Her Eastern sleepiness
And her Southern sweat.

Last evening she slipped into
Illinois cornfields
The color of sliced cantaloupe
Full-bodied and late-summer ripe.

She does not beg worship
But calm appreciation.

Soon her warmth will sleep
And we will rest in hope
She will awaken to us soon
Playfully urging us outdoors
To offer her our shoulders
Our arms and legs
In celebration
Of her gleaming joy
And our perfect place
In the universe.