5.31
blue lamp special light
windows of rain tonight
fall around rainbows
until skies let loose.
dark clouds, basic feuds
sun to wind to shearing
falls, hot cold frontings
spawn our swirl death dooms.
twister, roarer, heightened
restorer, when do we
know that we’ve pushed
too far.
—————————
5.30
rain clatter on the tin chimney
tells a welcome story
water, life, pours down around
us, and we are safe.
gift of life, gift of pleasure,
gift of growing green
thank you.
——————————
5.29
The plain paper package rests
on the kitchen table, eighteen inches
high by six across. Cylindrical,
Inviting. shoosh, shoosh, shoosh,
My neighbor having sat down to
coffee and a chat, notes the odd
sound from within as I lift and
move it. shoosh, shoosh, shoosh.
What do you think it is, he asks
fondling it on the way by.
I think it’s Mrs. Robbins, I reply.
shoosh, shoosh, shoosh.
5.28
A big S curve marks the road
swooping through fields on
either side, green lines flowing,
crops just showing, between
different farmers fields.
At some time they were friends
then the need for transport felled
their mutual repose. Neither would
give a step, so between and
around them it had to go.
Still it is a warm set of curves
that forces us to slow and smile
as we pass through. Even adversaries
can produce things of beauty
between them.
————————
5.27
The beloved face at the door
will I see it again. So I stop and
wave her back for an extra kiss
before beginning my walk around
the block.
Morbid I know. Memorial Day
notices bring out the “it’s-all-
of-us” in me. Donny, on your
thirtieth birthday. Except that
Donny isn’t here.
So Tobey and I check out the
blueness of the sky, and the
sniffs of grass pilings, the
flood of new waters over the
dam.
And somewhere in that round
mortality goes away. We complete
the walk, open the door, and the
beloved one is still here. Thank
you.
——-
5.26
family gathering, brothers, sisters
hangers on. I slip my hand under
the tinfoil just to see, and
oops, a bit of frosting seems to
have stuck to me.
I must lick that off, otherwise
I might mess someone else
with my messy fingertips.
Really. It’s not an excuse.
How could you accuse me of
being so duplicitous…..
Hmmm. Maybe I should
just peek under there again.
——————
5.25 [on the eve of an 18th birthday]
The flow trudging over the falls
has turned brown muddy gold. Days
of heavy rain in remission have
ribbed up the bottom places.
My son will turn a corner in
the morning, and bottom places
have risen within me as well.
I didn’t know it would go this fast,
I cried, seeing my classmates
start retirements. It feels the same
as this last one moves out.
The hard flow suddenly ebbs, water
through the sluices shuts down to
a channelled, domesticated straight.
canal. Water over the dam indeed.
————————
5.24
Good Master. Why do you call me good?
only One is good. Jesus said that.
Way back when.
I said, I will try to be a good man,
back when
I asked her to marry me.
Years now, and we hold hands
smile, talk, love, wrestle, care.
Good, not perfect.
Good you can go for. Perfect
attacks: yourself, the love
and your lover.
Since none of us is really as good
as we think we are,
or sell ourselves to be
I couldn’t go wrong
trying to be a good man.
There was always room
to go there.
—————
5.23
From the far room Clam
looks like Irish Cream
and Irish Cream looks white.
The color is the same
but light dances, changes
alters in the eye, which is the
brain seeing, knowing, through
the fractal of the lens.
Color dances across the palate
fluid, unstable, surprising in its
changes and chances, like a
girlfriend you thought you knew
‘till she opened up unsuspected
doors inside you, and the plan
changed.
Seeing is not believing then, believing
is believing. And being open to
what actually shows up on the
doorstep, when you look at it.
No matter what the words say
on the label.
———————
5.22
oil change day. will they tell me
that I need more than oil
or will they surprise me this time.
cynicism and upselling, naming rights
for sale, dollars and consumers
our most important product.
God being inconvenient, spirituality
now only a way to shave a stroke off
our game, or a pound off our waists.
oil change day.
———————
PoemsPerDay 