A Recipe for Disaster
Two people in a boat.
A 30 pack of beer.
Add lake traffic,
and throttle up the gear.
Do not heed the right of way.
Drink more beer.
Forget about a safety vest
because you have no fear.
Two people in a boat.
A 30 pack of beer.
Add lake traffic,
and throttle up the gear.
Do not heed the right of way.
Drink more beer.
Forget about a safety vest
because you have no fear.
I hated that saying.
The one used to console you at funerals.
“God needed another angel.”
What’s always felt like bullshit
has become endearing.
God needed exactly you..
They’re building up heavens army of ankle biters
with the loudest snarl in the neighborhood.
God needs your thick fur summertime shed
to knit blankets from your undercoat.
God needed the chain smoking, shit-talking,
Mountain Dew drinkers for the entertainment.
They need your rambunctious energy and try-it-all attitude.
God coaxed you in with a promise of
all you can view NASCAR races.
God wanted the chaos of this earth with him.
Those of us who find ourselves left behind
are lucky to have loved such free beings.
All I know is wherever you wild things go,
that’s the good place.
The story goes that my sister
was pushing the baby that I was
around the block in a carriage.
She was nine with cat-eye glasses
and intensely protective of her little brother.
A neighbor kid walked up to her as she passed by
took one look in the carriage and said,
Why, that’s the ugliest baby I ever saw.
It’s the only time I know of that she threw a punch,
(her ex-husbands may correct me),
a real corker into the kid’s gut,
left him on his knees, gasping for air.
There at the end, hair gone,
mottled-skinned, fetal on the bed,
she looked more newborn
than the forty-four years she’d lived.
I took her hand, gave it a squeeze,
grief pinned a rose to my lapel.
There was no one there to challenge,
nothing but the air to swing at.
your fingers smell like
your olivetti, linoleum,
a leatherette and red felt
4-drink travel bar,
aluminum, lock and key
are you the only woman
who sits down to a dinner
of your-dad-is-laid-off spaghetti,
wonder bread folded over butter
in a 2-strand turquoise necklace?
just past 7 pm,
watery mint green comb,
your fingerprints are pin curls,
paper patterns, needle & thread,
soft bias tape, cool poplin
in morning, your voice
opens like an egg
on the back of a high heel shoe,
rises like the hem of our skirts
into ourselves with awe
Poets, take note!
Our rich language
is being dismantled,
right now,
one word at a time—
right before our eyes.
It would be risky even to list
examples, though they are
plentiful.
Fewer “acceptable” words
mean less graceful, meaningful,
and clear poems.
We are also being programmed
to think only permitted thoughts,
and many of the programmed
will react–violently–to anything
that even hints at a
different view.
And we are doing this to ourselves,
out of fear for what may happen if
(gasp)
someone is offended by what we say.
How does one go about destroying
freedom, truth, the ability to
communicate understandably,
even–dare I say it–reality itself?
How does a civilzation begin to fall?
(You might not want to forget that every great civilization before modern times fell. Every single one. And every “replacement” eventually fell too. We are simply accelerating the process for our children and those poor souls who follow.)
You can see how–every day–
in the way “news” is delivered,
in the careful way friends and neighbors chose
to speak or, more often, not to speak,
in the way we, the so-called “poets”,
keep our bright red blinking
CAUTION
sign on, 24/7, inside our minds.
People tend to get what they deserve,
and we are assuring a certain kind of
future.
Poetry had always been a way
to connect less directly but more deeply,
more artfully, with layers of meaning to explore,
and much to discover
yet, at its core, good poetry
was also honest and brave,
bringing light into
the dark corners.
But now?
Now, the bullies and their enablers surround us,
just waiting to be “offended”
so they may strike—viciously—
and knock our little light
right out
of
our
hands.
So we keep silent,
and fade into the night.
While I was on my morning walk
I saw a man a-swimming
In the Gulf of Mexico.
My mind went to the Jaws theme song;
I thought about the flick I love
From 50 years ago.
I thought about that poor young girl
Whose swim was interrupted
In the shark’s big opening scene.
You’ll remember that the guy she met
Had failed to swim beside her
Due to drink; he wasn’t mean.
I’m sure if I had picked her up,
I’d join her in the ocean.
(That’s a wholly diff’rent fiction.)
To let her swim alone while drunk
Asea in darkened waters
Seems a duty dereliction.
But then there is the dude I saw
While I was morning strolling:
Did he ever get attacked?
I’ll never know; I just kept walking.
It was broad daylight, you see,
Also, my morning was jam-packed.
Her snore is a tiny tug boat
puttering in a puddle
after morning rain
The sun has risen
on both sides of her ears –
she is the middle of my day
Storm clouds
delay daylight.
Morning sleeps in, grips dreams.
Waking, I swim up, fight against
rip tide.
Honey
swirls into tea—
fragrant warmth brings comfort,
Mom’s voice: “It’s okay, Honey, you’ll
be fine.”
