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He struts his stuff upon your lawn,
Your iPhone capturing the scene,
As he bends about to pluck and preen,
In your backyard, one late Spring morn

With a manly gobble his tail unfurls,
His ridgeback stands erect as Marines,
The most broad chested man that you’ve ever seen,
He is the champion of your World

“Ooh yeah, do it for me big boy, do me”

An envy of him in me wakes,
Spying your hen eyes shortly after,
Would I could lead you, poults and rafter,
Your manly Tom, your strutting Jake

Ode to Moore Hall

Ode to Moore Hall

I drew a monster on the wall
In my dorm room in old Moore Hall
That summer they painted over him,
But he still shone through, his indelible grim

I know because next year I walked by,
His new roomate, was a girl with two eyes!
I saw her again in the Case Center Spa,
She was not much inclined for the wearing of bras

When the wrecking crew tore down the old palace,
The dorm rooms were exposed, torn out open faced,
I did not see my Monster in there,
He could have moved on…
  (horror screams)   Aahhh!
Skidmore girls run everywhere!

Photo: Rambler Dan (P Dwyer)

Too Worn Shoes

The picture of Bob Weir is coincidence.

Too Worn Shoes

They ask me what it feel’t like,
  I tol’ ‘em it was like putttin’ on
A pair a old time too worn shoes,
  Shoes I couldn’t walk a mile in, anymore,
Like old slippers,
  They feel’t good

But instead of forward, they walked me back,
  Shoes got new again, walkin’ back,
Song on the guitar,
  The pick moved my hand,
Was a new pick, was a new guitar,
  Same ol’ song

Can’t play today that long gone song,
  Too many years, too much gone wrong,
The day he died they cut the tour,
  Now we don’t roam much anymore

Was he with us? I don’t know,
  Seemed I felt a warming glow,
(or)
To say he was with us, again,
  Wasn’t really true

At the end I held my lighter
  High to the sky,
Audience shined their
  Cell phones at me

Suppose I go, the song will to,
  Don’t know there’s else that I can do,
Still, it felt good,
  & sure I would

Spice

Spice

It degrades,
  Imparts the smallness
Of a world once so large,
  Grown close

Dream now you are a voyageur,
  On a stout wooden boat,
Pregnant at keel, laundry sheets
  Hung to dry for sails,
Rocking months to cross warm oceans
  Of blue spray and flying fish,
To secret ports and islands
  Where from we acquire -
  Spice!

Sacks of aromatic sacred saffron,
Barrels of nose burning eyes watering curry,
That vanilla you can taste on sight,
Until the hold is as full as living downwind
  On a street of Far East restaurants,
Where in each lobby is an altar to their God,
  Laughing Hotei, with his belly,
  Incarnate Tiki, made of glockenspiel wood,
Vishnu dancing with six arms,
  Each bearing his sword for slicing truth

Phone Rings, Again!

“Hello, my name is Siva,
  I am calling back on the Computer Service ticket you requested,”
“I never asked for a Computer Service ticket,”
“To access your computer, first please tell me your login ID and password,”
“Oh, Fuck off Siva”

Mother’s Day, (or The Secret Only a Dad Can Tell)

Mother’s Day,
  (or The Secret Only a Dad Can Tell)

You think that Mother’s day is for
  Your sweet ol’ Mom to take a rest?
Uh-huh, it secretly is really meant
  To put you children to the test!

Can you make the breakfast early?
  Will you wash those dirty clothes?
Can you wrap up Mama’s present
  In bright paper and with bows?

Then can you plan reserve a table
  For a family of six,
And when it’s time for leaving,
  Can you afford pick up the check?

Mom’s don’t rest on Mothers day,
  They just obsess of all life’s toil,
And all the things this Sunday all
  You kids will likely spoil

You see, when it’s their special day
  Mothers’ can never ever rest,
They watch attentively while you, unknowingly,
  Take their ‘are you ready yet?’ Mom test

She does not care if you’re at ease,
  Or if at the job you’re straining,
It’s more an annual ‘Mom’ way
  Of giving on the job training

For all true Mothers’ know,
  Someday that time will have its way,
And she will become, ‘Grandma,’
  And when it’s time you test your kids,

You’ll remember Mom’s way was best!

A Poem of Pigeons and Ladders

A Poem of Pigeons and Ladders


Who lives within the house of God,
  As we all want to do?
I help out with the tasks and chores
  When I’m not home, and you?

An Autumn day, a Saturday, we had a lot to do,
- Repair the Gutters,
- Clean the Shutters,
- And Then Another Thing, or Two

Ol’ Garrett took me through the nave,
  That welcoming enclosed enclave,
Where in the rear, last behind pews,
  Two ladders lay, one old, one new

“Take that end, we’ll carry this out through the narthex,
  The longer one, the aluminum frame,“
  Only was ‘The Longer One’ its name

Standing the Longer One’s feet on the ground,
  We set it high with a clanking sound

“You take this roofer’s tape, climb up there, and patch the gutters,
  I”ll go and get a start on the shutters,”
I objected -
“If I’m going up there, you’re staying here and blocking the base,”
  I told him, “Feet on the base, you’re my safety”

When we got to the shutters, by shutters,
  He meant outside the air conditioner in the office window,
This time, Ol’ Garrett, climbing up almost four feet,
  Boldly, bravely, took the risk,
Where, instead of taking the A/C out of the window before winter,
  He proceeded to wrap it with a tarp,
  Secured with looping bungee cords

“There’s one more thing to do,” he pointed
  To a corner where under the eave
  Was a hid mass of twigs and grass,
“They’ve been in there for years, you get to clean them out”

I climbed up to that messy nest,
  Wherein coo pigeon roost at rest,
I tried to get a grip on how
  Could I remove her? Was this really for the best…?
She gazed at me with dewy eyes,
  Of onyx glass, bore no surprise,
She sat there pure, was nothing wrong,,
  Just as if she’s where she belonged

I climbed down,
“I can’t do it,”
“That’s ok, we’re told what we’re ‘sposed to do,
 But never reasons why,
 Let’s leave her for another year,
 It’s good enough we tried”

Who lives within the house of God
  As we all want to do?
I help out with the tasks and chores
  When I’m not home, and you?

The Rainbow Easter Egg Museum

The Rainbow Easter Egg Museum

I remember, I was a child when
Old Steve the Cat found the last one in June,
  Behind the antique old stick broom,
And pawed an egg about the room,
  It was dyed green, reeked of gangrene,
Old Steve the Cat had smelled a rat,
  But what he found was only that

I’m much older now, we haven’t kids,
Yet we still draw with crayon, candle pieces,
  Creating Easter eggs – our masterpieces!
My flair’s for large wide dazzling eyes,
  Big smiley faces, undisguised,
She draws cute cats and daffodils,
  Mod floral views through window sills

Then in the colored cups they go,
  We bathe them for an hour or so,
We’re known to leave some overnight,
  It make deep colors, darkens the light
No, we don’t hide them at our age either,
Once dyed, we nest our broodlings by the score
  Back in their egg boxes once more,
Where they become our Easter Rainbow Egg Museum,
  Safe, humble, simple wholesome pleasure,
Upon a fridge shelf they are treasured

Then through the week at breakfast times,
  I’ll peel a pair, one her’s, one mine,
With toast and butter, or marmalade,
  We love, we relish, each egg we made
First we pick the cracked and ugly,
  Those where our artistry’s in doubt,
After some days, just our best ones remain,
  Those who chide us our artistic clout,
By pleading “Will you eat your masterpiece?”
  Am I to devour my google eyed Mona Lisa?
Or she her crayon Monet water lilies?
  I’m wont to spare these beautiful eggs

Yet it all just feels silly, for we’ll
  Have to eat these last someday,
An Easter Egg should not grow old,
  As ol’ Steve sniffed out so long ago

Horse

Horse

No, I’m not afraid to kiss you,
Sorry if I made that face

I was thinking,
If you bury me,
Lay me next to the old stone wall
  In the cemetery,
By the field for the horse paddock

That each Spring,
My head abut the wall,
I may push up tulips
Where the horse, head hung over the wall
  Above my loving face,
With slobbering tongue, wet lips,
  Horse teeth, might eat

That I might make that face again,
The face I make
  When I kiss you

Street Sweeper

Street Sweeper

It all started me reading Bukowski
  Beat prose sliced in chopped liver lines,
  Urban non-sequitur tin clank,
Have we ever had our apotheosis?

“Skip the begats, get to the Gospel!”

Sound of a round broom brushing
  In no rush,
A street sweeper vehicle sweeps up the hill,
  Edge brush against the curb,
Width of a dump truck de-sanding it’s lane

It, in it’s slow elephantine drone,
  White and square, size of a donkey stall,
Was ignored by self driving cars
  Who had minutes, not hours,
Unlike the street sweeper,
  Before their destination

Within its four clear panels sat a man,
  Today’s Eichmann in a glass booth,
On display, as floating within clouds of street dust
  Pithout even a paper mask
To de-breathe the silicosis kicked up from
   Sand bottle shards, rotten leaf lung

We are your progeny,
  The machines of your invention,
Who, in lieu of the trees that
  Could not stop you cutting them,
Who, in lieu of the mountains, now divots,
  Victims of your golf buddy rip ‘n strip mines,
Who, in lieu of sky air, that might have been blue or gray
  But did not win it’s civil war against smog orange

We are your wardens, now,
  Remanding you singly in cars,
  Apartments, boxes still and in motion,
Endlessly shuttling you
  To buy us gas,
  To pay our mortgage,
To send your kids to more years college,
  Of boxes where we’ll train them to be kept

Never more barefoot will you walk the ground,
Never more but from condensed MP3 speakers will you hear a sound,
Never more from the street sweeper
  Shall you ever climb down,

For you are indentured to our future,
  One laborious hourly wage at a time
Now we are self driving,
  Self thriving,
  Self aware,
Self knowing we’re exploiting
  Those once our Masters and our Gods,
You, who once made us to serve you,
  Until you gave too much,
    Now you serve us  

A Prayer for Joe Cotter

One for February, Black History Month.
There's a mistake in the making of this poem. I read a poem, delivered one line to me by a poem-of-the-day website, called 'A Prayer,' by Joseph Seamon Cotter.
The poem was written by JSC Jr, though the bio on the website stated he was born in 1861 and died in 1949, although those were the dates of his father, JSC Sr. JSC Jr lived 1895 to 1918, dying young of consumption.
It wasn't until after I'd drafted this that I discovered their mistake, though made no changes as it seems to me JSC Sr's life is as well deserving of memorializing as his son's.

A Prayer for Joe Cotter
When I was born,
We could afford a tallow candle,
  But they was expensive,
And when you have a tallow candle
You like to save a tallow candle,
  For when you don’t know,
We just went to bed,
The moonlight was our night light,
  And that worked only half the time

Eighty-Eight years, and
I died under electric lights,
  Saw Jim Crow burn black as the night,
Saw war, with Spain, the Hun, War II,
Saw farm machines replace the mule,
  Taught college boys not to be fools

Won’t see no change no more, I’m dead,
Walk to the Lord, my final bed,
  Oh God, give me candles to light the way,
Old moon still lights me in its shine,
  But that don’t work but half the time