On his way out the door Bonny kisses Clyde goodbye
and says in her quiet voice, y’know, that voice, “Hey Honey,
pick up some cash at the bank on your way home, will ya?”
humor/ light verse/
They come dancing from the darkness. / They fly twirling out of view.
Dandelions
Dandelions left her cryin’
What’s a man to figure
Tried it twice— She turned to ice
So what’s a man to figure
Told her that my love for her—
who knows—might last forever
Asked her if she’d be my gal
Last words I hear’d was “NEVER”
Last words I hear’d was “NEVER”
I have no idea how this got in my head. I admit to laughing.
Ball Card Heroes
With bat and ball and gloves in hand and on our way we’d pass
by Old Man Finch where when he’d sit and watch the world
one of us would wave. Most times he’d look, he’d say,
Ever tell you boys about the game?
He stole our breath away, sure, a hundred times.
We were fielders for him, basemen, catchers and every ball
split seconds from extra innings in mid-flight-
from-outfield-to-second-base-and-home-plate night games.
Peanuts, beer, hotdog vendors shouting,
with every other voice, shouting!
Out! You buncha losers! C’mon cmon cmon! Safe!
Allow the call or fault it, either way.
We were ball card heroes, just the same,
with bat and ball and gloves in hand and on our way.
This poem tells a story. Life, imagination, games, spirit of play, youth, heroes and age. Baseball! When I was a boy we collected baseball cards. Topps I think. We carried them in our pockets, traded them, flicked them across the schoolyard in games of accuracy, attached them with clothes pegs to our bikes so that they hit against the spokes when we rode and made motorcycle sounds (we imagined). Cards were toys. I don’t collect cards now but if I did I’d collect the most played-with cards I could find.
Published in: “3201 e’s” 2018
Zombies Dancing
I see zombies in my headlights
Just one or two—and now a few.
They come dancing from the darkness.
They fly twirling out of view.
Published in: “Letter to the White Imbongi” 2013: “3201 e’s” 2018: Spillwords Press Oct. 2020
Them Birds That Cat
Yellow blue green white black—
they sit upon their perch
above the cat.
Cool cat—
she curls her tail and counts
and curls her tail,
she counts—
them birds.
That cat.
Published in: “3201 e’s” 2018
answer
I think a thought
(I sometimes do)
I think a thought
from start to through.
And when I’m done,
if it was fun,
I think me up
another one.
Happy Birthday! A day in the life of a child, a bird and a snail.
I was walking down the road
Just as happy as can be
And all the leaves upon the trees
Were waving back at me
I saw a curly snail
As he stretched to greet his day
Then headed down the road with me
Then stopped to stretch again
I saw a pretty sparrow
She was perched upon a wire
She sang a song—I sang along
We made a lovely choir
The snail conducted from a twig—
Just so, our song began
“Happy Birthday to You!”
Did you hear us as we sang?
We had a happy party
As we danced around—We three!
And we wished you Happy Birthday!
Just as HAPPY as can be!
Published in “Between Music and Dance” 2013 as version “Happy Birthday, Marianne!”
BEDBUG SLAM
The only good bedbug is a dead bedbug.
The only bedbug worse than a live bedbug
is a fed bedbug, notwithstanding the
fedded, bedded & newlywedded bedbugs
which tend to copulate & propagate across
rolling great reclining plains, trailing baby
bug bedbugs to carry on their game and with
no attention to the names we call them either.
Pannin’ fer Rhymes (an old miner’s tale)
Well, now– It was in the spring of ‘49 just ‘round Memorial Day in the Land O’ Freedom… or so they call it. Anyway, I was sittin’ up behind them hills… Y’know, nexta where God ‘n’ Hell musta had some sorta fuss or ‘nother. Sorta desert. Sorta not. And I was pannin’ fer rhymes– I kept comin’ up dry– when alluvasudden straight outta the ground there’s this tinklin’, twinklin’ musical sound. So I grabbed me a panful and gave it a twitch. Some verbs and an adjective peppered the dish. Good stuff, I s’pose. Fer a yarn they’d bin fine but not fer perfessional-lookers-fer-rhymes. I swished ‘em a little and shook ‘em again to see if that tinklin’ mightn’t be kin to the one that I found in the gully that night. It’d had to be good or it wouldn’t fit right. Them poets won’t shell-out fer less than a pair cuz one by itself leaves ‘em pullin’ their hair. So ya gotta find more than a couple that fit or poets ‘ll fake it and some ‘ll just quit and some ‘ll just hope no one says that it’s….. Y’ know….. Call ‘emselves “nou-veau” and claim it’s legit. ‘Nuffa that, I s’pose.
I looks fer them twinklin’ musical words that rhymes like the first time they’s ever been heard. I sure ain’t the first one that’s panned in them hills. My pappy before me turned up a few thrills and somewhere or ‘nother done found a whole line. But me, I ain’t happy unless it’ll rhyme. They’re there, I can hear them– they tickle the breeze! I’ll stick it out long as there’s poets to please. If y’ expected a yarn or to hear miners cuss– I’s pannin’ fer rhymes and not prose in the dust!
Hmm… What’s that ya got there?
Published in: “souls arriving” 2006: “Between Music and Dance” 2013: “3201 e’s” 2018
Homage to Ogden Nash
I love to eat with just a spoon—soups, puddings too, if there is room. I love to eat with forks and knives while dining in with friends and wives. I love to eat with little sticks, especially the tricky bits. But most of all with hands and fingers or any things where flavors lingers.
Published Aug. 2020, SpillWords Press.
Hello from a room
Hello for the earth
Hello for the moon
Hello from the sky
Hello from a room
Hello my new friend
Hello little brown bird
Hello trees
Hello clouds
Hello thoughts
Hello words
Hello joy
Hello breeze
Hello life
Hello me
Hello all that I see
Hello you
Sacrificio
O sing unto the grape her glory!
Impatient, she awaits undress—
Sun warmed, sun ripened, Rubenesque!
They who decry her worth, her alchemies,
Flatworms shall feed upon them.
A hymn in praise of the grape and a curse upon oenophobes (haters of wine). Sacrificio is from “Sacrifice” and here refers to the first wines of the season which are reserved for Bacchus, Greek god of wine.