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Space Putter

 

Draw the curtains

The dog and pony show is over

Gold filigree of youth sold

Copper plumbing of health stolen

 

Lighten the load

Ready for casita blast off

Wall clock ticking countdown

A consolidation consolation

To timeless constellations

The yawning maw of forever

 

A desultory dance among stars

Blown like leaves across pavement

Like vehicles flooding highways

To endless horizons

 

No punch in, punch out

No calendar bondage

Of birthdays and appointments

The new amorphous voyage

Ties to nothing

 

Live the mantra

Hasta manana

Mucho de nada

No hay problema

 

Man, oh mana

Where have you gone?

Sleep like peanut shells and popcorn

Swept under the stands

When the tent comes down

Death Witch

 

She blew in like a dust devil

Tumult of emotion, tears lashing out

Lightning bolt youth

Short raven hair, crimsoned cheeks

Tenderness not yet numbed by time

 

Told me her woes on the tarmac

Break ups, lies by ones she trusted

Seat belts fastened, a long flight ahead

I was her dry weatherman

No longer in the field

 

We spoke of endings and beginnings

Tethered to earth, flights of fancy

She confided her witchery

Near death experience, saw the light

Thereafter an ambassador to hereafter

 

I sprinkled wisdom

Like one who salts beef

Enhancing the flavor of loss,

Ardent entities of love and life

Feed off the carcass of what has passed

 

She felt better, smiled

Put on a shawl, played a game on her phone

I went back to a book I read before

The story the same

But I enjoy nonetheless

Bitter Sweet

 

For days

I felt my dog and pony show was over

Going through motions without emotion

The world in shambles

My world seemed a farce

Until the boy on the caster trike saved me

 

At the softball field before the game

The boy wheeled around passing time

He looked like Pugsley from the Addams Family

His father came to play, the boy was in tow

I was in a miserable mood, only thinking of myself

Not caring for myself, not caring

 

Until I noticed the boy all by himself

It was past sundown but still hot

I thought all that wheeling would make him thirsty

I offered him the Gatorades in my cooler

He said thank you and spun away

 

The other team didn’t show

So we had batting practice and goofed around

I was reminded how my skills have degenerated

Bitter sweet, all life is bitter sweet

 

Wrapping up practice the boy swung up to me

Said he had a Gatorade, I asked what flavor

He said pink then added he also had orange

It made me smile and I told him purple is good too

 

He was a window to another time, another place

Another place I sorely missed

He whirled away as the field lights blinked off

Bitter sweet, I thought, bitter sweet

But I felt a little better

Port and Voyage

 

The well with crumbled plywood lid

The webs thick underneath

Spiders scatter to creviced walls

Unseen bottom

Dropped stones splash

Dark ripples echo to daylight

 

Dear lilac

Centerpiece of home

Pedaling back from the lakes

Descending from the mountains

Calves knotted, lungs full

Purple and white blossoms

Flag us in windward calls

Your ambrosia welcome

Sailed our souls safely to sea

 

I woke to remembrance

Days my hands picked wild berries

Days barn swallows strafed the black cat

Fox in the field, minnows in a bucket

Plump grapes drooped the vine

 

When parents were solid and not dream

Moving about, creaking floorboards

Their weight entering and leaving rooms

Warm Gods, a well-lit harbor

Their presence large as a freighter

Heavy with cargo

Steaming across oceans

Too deep to fathom  

Off the Rainbow

 

I drink your voice

Effervescent words refresh

Like a wellspring

I found as a child

In winter breaking woods

 

Brown musk leaves

From last year’s fall

Frame your mouth

Cling to slick stones

Chilled by receding snow

 

You have lived as I

Through decades of groundswell

Undulations of random seismic shifts

That whittled living joy

Undertowed lost loves

 

How I love your voice

Reminds me of youth’s wellspring

Before the push off the rainbow

The pot of gold merely vapor

All spectrums seep in dirt

 

Our dear psychedelic friends

Now earth toned with collared shirts

Seek colors from a million pills

In somber hues of Medicare

 

Your mountain runoff wisdom

Chimes a merry tune

Crystal sparkle laughter, sunlit eyes

Youth was not lost to you

 

Your voice

Redemptive like coins under a pillow

Compensation from parents

Disguised as fairies

Long, long gone

Who couldn’t stand their children

To lose a single tooth

Mountain Village

 

Razor edge rock face perch

Bright colored homes on stilts

Like sedentary circus clowns

Shops of art and whimsy

Haunted saloons, gift shop brothels

At its peak the first state hospital

Now a converted motel

 

West facing windows glow

Charred yellow from the sinking sun

As if orbs of history shine within

Cumulative miners, whores, artisans

Hollow trod in creaking rooms

 

Each historic day pried

Like a babies’ tooth

By the tongue conspirator

Time wiggles away

Wisdom rises, incisors tear

The red meat of dawn

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