In a Garden Immemorial

In a Garden Immemorial 

Where the yard narrows to a green,
  Bright hedges walling on three sides,
Where a rail fence once opened to the plot,
  Is now gone, passed on in the way of all things,
Where black marble plaques lay all in a line,
  Each carved with the name of whose ashes remain

There I heard every bird singing,
  In a menagerie whose music to Heaven belongs,
Yet looking around, I must have heard them wrong,
  For there were no flocks here, not one seen nor found

Excepting, brash in a burning bush, stood a mockingbird,
  Defiant as the phoenix in his red lapping leaves of flame,
Working to relieve the stand of a few dead branches,
  Pruning the base of a brittle stalk with his beak,
Where he broke a spiked twig, long as he,
  All in his plan, as soon I’d see

With a flash of white under wings he was off to the crabapple,
  Where I saw him work at knitting the twig into a form
Sure to put all basket weavers to shame,
  It was a crown of thorns, his boast, his bower,
Installed to impress his love mocking-dove,
  Coy on a branch behind white apple flowers

Where herein, since time immemorial,
  Have come all creations, beasts and floral,
Though here none long can stay,
  We being mortal in our every moment, and
Unknowing, rhyming, naïve to the moral,
  That an eternal garden such as this
Claims to no pretense of a heaven, nor a hell,
  Is but simply a place where a bird sang well

Ode to a Friendly FaceBook Troll

Ode to a Friendly FaceBook Troll

You vex me, friendly FaceBook troll
  I haven’t many other friends
You think you play free speech’s role
  By trying me, friend FaceBook troll
Through all your retorts, must I scroll
  Is just pissing me off your goal?
Yet, I need you, Mr. FaceBook troll
  I haven’t many other friends

Tuxie

Tuxie

White feet, chin, ticked dear ear tips,
Black gloss from forehead to hips,
Tuxie’s a tuxedo cat,
 Created from a plush toy kit,
  Both real, really, stuffed and knit

Today a new adventure begins,
Starting with a wash tub swim,
Next in the dryer, tumble and spin,
To come out scented fresh and clean
  For a waiting wanting kitten

Our Tuxie is a comfort toy,
A friend to lost and homeless kittens,
He plays with them in their nursing box,
And cuddles with each lone orphan,
  To encourage kitten endorphins

They rub their faces over Tux,
Which makes his scent like one of them,
His last kitten was named Jerome,
Who, now that he is eight weeks grown,
  Has been adopted, found a home

And that’s why Tuxie’s being washed,
Tossed in the tub with soap and sloshed
For soon he’ll greet a new kitten,
Perhaps like him, with white mittens,
  Who’ll love to share his scent with him

The Price of Tea in China

The Price of Tea in China

Kifu received a letter from his feind Fuki,
Kifu was illiterate, so
  He asked his other friend write a letter for him, saying;

“Dear Fuki,
 I have received your letter but could not read it,
 What does it say?
   Kifu”

Kifu received a second letter from Fuki,
  It read;

“Dear Kifu,
 You sent me a letter before I sent my letter to you,
 It said “I cannot read,” but you wrote it,
 I do not understand what your letter means,
  Fuki”

Of course, Kifu could not read Fuki’s letter,
And Kifu’s other friend was away on a pilgramage,
  So Kifu was now very worried about his friend Fuki,
But he did not want to leave the house
  In case another letter came

So what, you ask,
  Has this to do with the price of tea in China?

Confused, worried and anxious,
Kifu drank only Japanese green tea,
  Which only made him more anxious and nervous,
And which is imported from China,
  Which made the price go up,
Until Kifu’s Doctor told him he had to give it up,
  Then it went down

A Fluffy Poem

A Fluffy Poem 

As roasting fish permeates the house
With aromas preferable to kibbles or mouse,
I see her sitting by my chair,
This time last week too, and right there

With a ‘Mew,’ stating “Hey, I am here!”
  for Fish!

She usually has no voice,
Sits un-amused by treats or toys,
But Friday nights she takes her place,
Eager to dispense with saying grace

With a ‘Mew,’ now stating “Where’s my plate?”
  of  Fish!

The skillet has it cooked and browned,
She’s eager, a tail twitch, sitting down,
A forkful in a finger bowl
Of salmon, cod, or sometimes sole

And another ‘Mew,’ implying “That’s my share!”
  of  Fish!

“You’ll have to wait a minute or two,
  It’s still too hot, it could burn you,”
But she could not care ‘bout the heat,
For her it’s time, c’mon - let’s eat!

With a third ‘Mew,’ stating “Give it here!”
  of  Fish!

I set the bowl in front of her,
She’s on it without thanks or purr,
Her tongue and teeth make snacking sounds,
And in a moment it’s all down!

Then, with no ‘Mew,’ to say “I’m done,”
  just her tail held high

  And she’s gone

Three Poems in an Emily D- Idiom

Three Poems in an Emily D- Idiom


It Was a Letter

Were they just stanzas in a book,
  Written by one long ago?
Her loving tones, her simple poems,
  Have wrapped me in her thrall

I wrote some rhymes in her response,
  In the diary I kept,
Then I engaged to turn her books’ page
  And look! She’s answered me!

A teenage crush? Young love’s hot flush?
  What timeless pen-pals we!
And when I write her, next page, there!
  She’s answered me, again!


I’d Not Heard 

I’d not heard from you in so long,
I’ve wrote to ask you what’s gone wrong?
  And you told me, naught did I do,
You asked I place the blame on you

You haven’t a new paramour,
Of reasons, you are not quite sure,
  You say in love, we must endure, 
Then close and lock me from your door

The paths laid by this bitterness,
Have cast me to spare wilderness,
  They will not lead back to your door,
Indifferent love,
  Distance my cure


I’ve Set the Words

I’ve set the words of life,
Each verse in it’s extremes,
  Of common birth, moments of mirth,
Of trials, crimes, and ease

Yet one I cannot write,
And may it be the worst,
  When death arrives by day or night,
End of all words, its curse

What dolt would pretense to pen
On death before it calls?
  No keyboard taps, no scratching pens,
Are heard behind its pall

Howling

Howling

He’s taken to howling,
“Ya-Howel, Mer-Ount”
In the dark, in the day,
  from another room, right here

He’s not in any pain
  although she says
“He sounds so painful,”

“Kitty, whadda you want?
  What’s all this howling?”

“Ya-Howel, Mer-Ount”
And his name tag is clinking
  against his breakfast bowl again,
  sounds of snacking jaws and teeth

We used to have a second cat,
They weren’t like litter mates
  but he licked her ear when
She came home from the vets,
We lost her two years ago,
  she died on my lap

“He needs a new girlfreind,
  someone to play thunderpaws,
  at two am in the dark, he’s lonely,”
She doesn’t want to get a second cat

He’s not in any pain
  although she says
“He sounds so painful”

“I think he wants attention,
 The more we answer his howls,
   the more he howls for answers back”

“Kitty, whadda you want?
  What’s all this howling?”

“Ya-Howel, Mer-Ount”

Penpals

Penpals

I awoke this morning to find
No emails
  from you,
Letters not sent

After two mornings
Of waking to your thoughts
  I was disappointed,
You were not oblidged

There is a cardinal too,
  It is spring,
He sings to greet the sunshine
  As it warms,
Saying to his drab green friend
  “Let’s nest here …,” and
  “These juniper berries are ripe …“

No, I really don’t know what he says,
  Nor what you’d write either

  But I miss it

April Snows Again

April Snows Again
  (after reading too much Edne St.Vincent-Millay)

No Lord can be looking down on me
As clouds are falling peacefully
My pink skin reddened by the cold
Has not the heart to walk out bold
From this bus stop shelter by the road
Here waiting for a bus snow slowed
Where I can shiver nothing more
Mid April’s snow storms I abhor

Upon my shoulders most appalling
There’s wet and biting dandruff falling
A no doubt ominous omen
That dead I’ll soon be a snowman
Who never ever will get home
In your sunless world gone monochrome

How like a fin-de-siecle suffragette gone mad
Do I foment - God you’re a cad!
For we on earth are not mere wives
We’re men who pledge to you our lives 

Yet I who swore I loved thee once
Now find harsh absence your affront

Eleven Haiku Late on an April Night

Eleven Haiku Late on an April Night

I ask the scarecrow,
“Have you anything to say?”
“Caw, without a rhyme”

The Cat sits with me,
One of us is mistaken,
I think it is me

Haiku before love,
It begs the expectation -
Will he read all night?

My carrot is peach,
Shorter than a cucumber,
Long enough for you

Let’s take a shower,
Pleasure in the warm water,
No where to lie down

Rain and wind tonight,
I hold you under covers,
Your bush gets so wet

The scent of rain drops,
Evaporated bone dust,
Will our seeds spring soon?

It made me angry,
“How can you be more than I?”
(The Hydrangea bloom)

We climb mount Fuji,
The common snail does not,
Our gardens can’t wait

Something about “it,”
Now I am the great master,
All haiku, the same

The sound of one hand
Clapping, but for whom, or what?
I wrote that, it’s me!