FORTY-SEVEN AUTUMNS

ago our old Volvo trekked
toward the North Woods
for our honeymoon.

I lost the car keys,
delayed our passion,
left the salami and cheese gift
from your parents
at that gas station,
forgot the take-out ribs
at that fancy restaurant.

Holding hands still,
working through
the differences no marriage
can foresee.

Thanks for your forbearance
as we made it through
the ruts of our years
just as that Volvo
bounced through the ruts
in the road to the rustic cabin,
where you, dear wife,
slid cold feet out of bed
that first morning
to light the pot-bellied stove.

Originally published on Rat's Ass Review

MORE! MORE!

Once was a girl who slid on the ice
as if the ice were frozen wind.
Pink-cheeked and laughing
her plaid scarf wildly flapping,
whenever her shoes reached
sidewalk end, she would cry:
“More! More!”
as if the ice were Life.

Originally published on Rat's Ass Review

DECISION

Oh, the heroic pilgrims!,
who chose the Mayflower
when the Speedwell floundered,
off to a new world despite the danger.

Half the saints died that first winter,
but no one chose to return to England.
Instead they set shod feet on Plymouth,
believed God stormed them North,
believed God bequeathed the new land,
to have dominion over and flourish.

But other humans tilled the land,
hunted the pristine forests,
fished the teeming waters.

Given a choice to cooperate in peace,
our ancestors chose
the railroads over the buffalo,
the natives getting in the way.

Sent passenger cars to the herds,
shooting helpless creatures
from open windows,
leaving bodies to rot,
using nothing of value
as the natives preserved all.

Rail-crossed the nation.

Now we dignify our first people
by damning racist mascots,
keep natives the poorest among us.

Our cars cross those tracks—
dirt and iron—
on the way to prosperity.

Originally published in Poesis Magazine

BIRDSONG

I woke up this morning
when the birds sang.
The tweet and the trill,
the peep peep, the usual chirps.
God’s alarm clock.

But this one morning,
grating songs,
raucous sounds,
needling sharp notes,
obnoxious squacks
like never before.

Ran to the window,
squinted down the sun,
alert for the danger,
the disturbance
that would turn melody
into ear-covering noise,
an atonal avian symphony.

But there was no danger.
The birds had abandoned
their sweet songs—
annoying, threatening, cacophonous—
Keats’ nightmare, not nightingale.
The noise would have driven
the couple stark out of Eden.

The wren’s warble, a red-breasted song.
A caw is melodious,
even the bluejay’s screech
can be beautiful.

Oh, never take for granted
delightful bird song.

Originally published in Poesis Magazine

DEATH SPEAKS TO YOU

Sorry to intrude into your young world.
You may ignore me.
I am not sure why I am telling you this,
but Death does begin to speak to you
at a certain age,
probably different for everyone.
I am near 80, she, he, it—
Death has no persona
except what we invent—
mine a scythe wielding crone
with a hideous grin—
just starts to remind,
whispers in my ear
not all the time,
just at a dark corner,
at a crosswalk, 
at the top of the stairs,
any time of day or night
in dreams, daymares,
before the morning pills,
before I snap on
the electric blanket.

Death says
a bone pain here,
an ache there, 
what you did,
what you didn’t do,
a slight fever,
a newspaper article,
Facebook stab,
TV bray,
a small limp,
a sudden fall,
whispers, whispers,
perhaps nags. 
I suspect Death
will not stop
or go away
until we do.

Originally published in Stick Figure Magazine

LOVE FROM BOTH SIDES

She said: You don’t dream about someone
who died you don’t care about.

My daughter called me crying
from her apartment in LA,
sobbing because she dreamed
I had died at 80
that being a possibility,
but I feel quite healthy
and don’t see that bucket
swinging before me yet.

She said we laughed a lot.
We went to Dairy Queen
where I ordered a hamburger
but, walking down a hill,
I dropped it and it rolled
until we were rolling
on the ground with laughter.

Her brothers wouldn’t
talk about it in the dream.
That made her mad
and woke her up.
So she called me
and was laugh/sobbing
to hear my voice
and see my reassuring smile.
Glad I was alive.

So was I.
Glad to have this much love
as we were actually
talking on that other side
and I jabbered a lot,
which made it seem more real
because I do spout off
and that made me feel good
about this love from both sides.

Originally published in Rhodora Magazine

COMING AND GOING

On the day our son and daughter
depart from a visit,
return to their far away homes,
we could not fathom
any of our children
who slipped into this vast world
from their Mother home
would go away when they could.

One stayed, two left.
You feel exactly what I mean.
We swam through their youth
like sharks—guided, protected,
expected a lifetime close
like the farm families of yore.

But we were city,
where the sirens most live
who called them away.
Love abounds
even in the comings and goings
always returning, always leaving
until their home is only where they live.

Originally published in Rhodora Magazine

THE CHILDREN MOST

They crawl inside my mind
those little children shot
by the most recent madman.

They multiply in my thoughts,
try to escape,
horror on their faces,
fall asleep when I don’t think of them
as I move through my day.

They wake me from my daymare
as the pantry door opens,
at the turning on the stairs,
as I wash my face
see their eyes blink back
from the glass darkly.

They stare back, live there
until the next ones
dislodge, hutch in.

Rabbit scream.

Originally published in Rhodora Magazine

FAIRY TALE DAUGHTER

You know how princes become frogs?
Our daughter became a dog.
In bed, this morning, side by side,
The huge black puppy in our life.
Petting her hunger for affection,
Licking our bedclothes like confection.
I think of our daughter far away
Spreading her wings to win her day.
Leaving behind her family to sing.
Leaving the dog to fetch and bring.
A dog can become a daughter,
And we can become her parents.
Though it cannot hug the same,
Nor have her eyes and smile,
Or make our birthdays shine.
But a dog can be sublime.
Barking her way into our hearts,
Barking away the pain of parting.

Originally published in Sanctuary Magazine

DAMN YOU, CHUBBY CHECKER

Silky ballroom dancers, my folks also loved the jitterbug.
I took to that jive and won contests, gyrated my way through my teens
into girls’ hearts and arms, straight through American Bandstand,
college, and a job teaching my art to all-girls PE classes.

Also taught the heavyweight wrestling champion from our school
who bear-hugged me in gratitude because he was able to dance
with his sweetie at Homecoming, well worth the twenty-five cents an hour
I charged him to practice at the mirror with his dorm room doorknob.

I was a star, the Cab Calloway of my small Midwestern college,
until along came Chubby and my life got suddenly Twisted,
forced to practice with a towel and swing my butt back and forth—
the magic of the jitterbug gone, a wallflower dance master now.

No one touched each other anymore.
No hand holding, no cool twirls or Ricky Nelson slides.
You could twist with yourself. You could twist with a group.
No one needed to teach you if towel swivels convinced the mirror.
Dull anonymity. Damn you, Checker!

Originally published in Down In The Dirt Magazine

BLIND RAY

Ray was totally blind,
wheelchair-bound, eager to please,
happy for companionship.
I thought I was just a grad volunteer,
there to read, do my bit for humanity,
but Ray shared his poems and prose with me,
proud smile, craved approval for his work.

The misspellings overwhelmed,
grammar—bad on bad.
Plotless rambles. Unfree verse.
Ray talked incessantly.
He often had a cold,
snot hung from his nose,
sickened my stomach.
I could not praise.
I could not look at him.
Mumbled: 'Interesting.'

Given my literary standards,
his chronic congestion,
I just disappeared.
Ignored his calls,
cries on the machine:
Where are you?

Youth can be a bonfire
of good intentions.
Guilt decades later
embered a cold heart.

What if Ray instead had been
Renee, a red-headed beauty
who wrote stirring poems,
smile gentle as a dove?
So I fell in love,
married her, had three children
who grew up to help the world,
allowed us to see the beauty of life.

But he was Ray
and I left.

Originally published in Down In The Dirt Magazine

HOLY KARL MARX

did you know that Jewish boy
raised by Hebrew Christians
in Germany over a century ago
saw Jesus as a socialist
wrote that little book
cried for all the workers
to break their chains and unite
throw the fat cats
Mary called out in the Magnificat
under the table
so that the wretched of the Earth
sit at a table
as long as the world
sup and sup

but when a pandemic
crushes the world
we see the fat cats
still at the table
the workers cleave beef loins shovel dirt
spoon-feed patients punch cash registers
crawl in attics wheel gurneys
die under the table
as Marx turns over in his grave
wonders if we are going to get it
before that Communist Jesus
comes down takes
His own to the Place
where the cats can’t roam

Originally published in Sledgehammer Magazine

COLONOSCOPY

This poem is irrelevant for young people
until the doctor says:
“At your age you need one of these
for a lifetime regimen,
every few years until…”

Snow White’s Step-Mother
must have invented
that first evil prep potion
you had to drink for hours,
which almost killed me
and made me swear off
lemonade for six months.

I was so sick I told the doctor
I would gamble against colon cancer
rather than drink that stuff again.

But they changed it to something
drinkable only by comparison,
the rest of the process not the stuff of poems.

I went in for mine this morning,
greeted by the same smiling face of the man
I see once every five years
as we go through this together,
he for the thousandth time,
me, starting at fifty, only for the sixth,
hoping for only polyps,
which are benign–hooray–once again.

When he pulls me out of sleep
to share the good news,
I mumble how many years until the next;
he smiles: Five.

But that will make me 82!
Is there a statute of limitations,
an age where old age and death
wait grinning heartily: “Why bother?”

And each time I say:
”I’m sure glad this is over.
Don’t ever want to do it again!”

But at 77, 82 in five years, I do.
I really do.

Originally published in Spilling Cocoa

HEART’S CRY

Where does a heart go
when it cries out?
Does the heart hunt
for what makes it weep,
cry so hard it leaves home?

Search for a lost
spouse, child, pet,
roam the empty world
try to find what
will never be again.
Is finding nothing
the only solace
that can stop the tears
and bring us home?

At home, the rooms
look the same
but a stark absence
sits in every corner,
immovable until time
makes it disappear.

Originally published in Mad Swirl

REFLECTIONS ON A DOT

Whenever I see we are
one
of millions of galaxies,
I feel like a dot of a dot of a dot.

No feelings or memories in galaxies.

No galaxy married the most beautiful other dot in the world,
birthed three other dots with that dot,
stood looking out at its own raging, blue ocean,
sad that one dot spoke terrible things about another dot,
voted for one dot over another,
wondered why one dot only ate vegetables, another meat.

Or was horrified when a dot crashed his car into another dot,
gazed at the big white dots in the black sky,
amazed as dots created music, paintings,
poems, novels, sculptures,
scorned a dot of a different color,
warmed to a dot rescuing a dog,
felt the distant dot of a red, pulsing sun.

Or marveled as a dot explored an unknown sunset-soaked vista,
spied one dot stealing from another,
shot a basketball through a dot on a pole,
cheered when a dot carried a picket sign,
exclaimed when a dot danced with lotto winnings from dots on a ticket,
cried as one dot adulterized a dot’s dot.

Or scaled the dot of a mountain,
lauded a dot for the sonnet she wrote,
screamed as a drunken dot jumped off a bridge,
contemplated dots supplicating, genuflecting, meditating,
surveyed a placid, green lake with an egret dot,
loved a dot petting a swan, another petting a bull.

Or dropped bombs on other dots.

Or looked up, realized
had one of those dots
left her other dots far too early
we would look up at those other galaxies
and know that dot
was somewhere out there.

Originally published in The Corvus Review

GRANDMA CRIED

Grandma lost her second husband,
the saint from a sudden heart attack,
not the scalawag, who walked out the door
when Mom was two.
The first one broke Grandma's heart leaving,
the second one broke her heart dying.

Grandma did not shed a tear,
but when the funeral was over,
when TAPS and the gun salute faded,
she jumped in the grave,
hugged and hugged the casket
until they dragged her away,
her face as hard
as the Brass around her.

Home they went,
no tears, Grandma a Sphinx
who sat in the house,
zombied through her days,
mechanically cleaned.
Frail as a bird,
Mom couldn’t flap a wing,
wheedled and pleaded
for Grandma to cry.

One day, the statue stood stark still.
Mom said she did not know
what moved her to strike.
But she slugged Grandma,
smacked her right in the jaw.
Her mother looked at her stunned,
scrunched up her face
and wailed for days.

Mom and Grandma,
the best shoulders
for each other
the rest of their lives.

Originally published in Spindrift Magazine

POLLUTION MANIA

Will we run out of things to pollute?
Still have that rampant, burning, gulping
desire to consume and destroy?
Not think about the sight of smoke rising,
filling the sky, killing once clean air.
Snatch a convenient plastic bag from Target.
Straws suck down that delicious milkshake.
Burn gas on a country drive for time to think.

Just eat all the blue from the sky.
Use the Big Dipper to scoop
it down our wide-open maw.
Scorch a sun pie and scarf it up.
Turn the moon into green cheese,
none for the mice.
Snort up the oceans.
Process voles for food.
Create tsunamis in purple majesty.
Seems that’s what we're after.

We do know how.

Originally published in Spindrift Magazine

AM I INTELLIGENT?

An article appeared on Yahoo,
unusual attributes of high intelligence.
Ah, I can test myself against the world.
How will I fare?

To start, I am the oldest child,
a leg up, but no choice of mine
and I did take piano lessons,
but failed miserably.

I have owned cats, don’t now,
but had a lot of cats
so I must be super curious,
even though it has not killed me.

Alas, I am not left-handed.
There must be far less
intelligent people than I thought.
And I am not tall.
Wasn’t Napoleon short?
Do I begin to question this list?
Roll on.

I read at a young age,
was read to and memorized books
to delight the adults.
And I have always been
very anxious, taking pills for years.

Yes, a sense of humor,
even laugh at my own jokes.
And I am quite disorganized.
Can’t even find my lists!

Eschew luck, one of my
cats was witch black and
I fear no ladders or mirrors.
Don’t know if my Mother
breast-fed me. Too old
to remember, but must have
since this list is going my way.

Definitely a night owl,
reading lamp on till late.
Viewed as lazy as a child.
Only read comic books for years
and watched the Cubs,
avoided every odious chore.
But very focused,
perhaps OCD for a middle name.

Admit when I am wrong,
though not frequently.
Am not at all the strong silent type,
more a gadfly with a mouth.
Does that disqualify me?

But I seem to be lining up quite well?
What do you think?
I love challenges
and of course I multitask,
see life as a big stove
where I manage many burners,
but I am not a good cook—
not on the list though.

Surround myself with smart people
who have me around for the same reason
and married a smart woman
though she goes to bed early
and hates cats.

Egads! Intelligent people
shun electronics.
Can you fail at one category
and be eliminated?
Are there levels of intelligence?
Perhaps I am just smart, not highly?

But I am empathetic,
love facts, am a perfectionist,
keep a top the news,
carefully examine my ideas
over and over with my
Rubik’s cube mind
and, in truth,
don’t think I am smart
even though this wonderful test
says otherwise.
What do you think?

Originally published in Odd Ball Magazine

TO THE FATHERS OF ALL AND EVERY

To the fathers of books and papers and pens, to the fathers of hammers and nails and boards,

to the fathers of either, to the fathers of both, we celebrate this day.

To the fathers of song and voice and lilt, to the fathers of trade and coin and hire,

to the fathers of brush and easel and paint, to the fathers of seed and soil and wind,

to the fathers of words and teach and gesture, to the fathers of stove and boil and sear,

to the fathers of music and string and chord, to the fathers of gear and cog and whirr,

to the fathers of hugs and smiles and laps, to the fathers of silence and strength and arms,

to the fathers of ship and storm and curse, to the fathers of prayer and Spirit and sacred,

to the fathers of daughters and the fathers of sons, to the fathers of mothers and fathers of fathers and the fathers of Grand.

To the fathers of either, to the fathers of both, to the fathers of all and every, we celebrate this day.

We celebrate this day.

Originally published in Spillwords Magazine

THE RIGHT TO COMPLAIN

I won’t compare and contrast
the pain in my life to others
like a dutiful rhetoric student
composing an obligatory essay
assigned by an older teacher
nursing his retirement years.

I want the pain to be mine.
I want to own the hurt.
I want to feel my daughter's divorce,
my son's vandalized car,
my dog's surgery.
I won’t compare my life events
to the ravages of a hurricane
blowing an island paradise into the sea
or the latest mass shooting
composing a cemetery from a concert
or the death of my best friend's daughter
cancer slicing her life in half.

But why can't I complain
when people ask me how I am?
Why can't I bray my petty pipings
in the grieving face of real tragedy?

My maiden aunt often said:
"You are only in your own skin."

Does that comfort me?

Originally published in Blue Pepper Magazine