“The Striking Clock”

Measures,

Kept hourly,

Reminders of time,

Signals of elapsed moments,

Harbingers for gain and loss,

Markers of the count and court,

Moments divided into equal parts then combined,

Cauldrons bubbling over with expiring breaths of present,

Stanzas of life uninterrupted by the consciousness of living,

Fiery flickers of inception parading in soldier files of regularity,

Objective insights parsed by regal tones amid both fury and passion-

Oh wonder of memory! Robbed of clock and mantle, my imbedded shrine.

“Stripes and Wading”

Bogue and I went fishing again last night.

Down Conasaugie ways out past Fairview.

We didn’t need no license, anymore than two

Indians catching supper should be expected.

Bogue ran his trot line again.

I used to think that was both funny and lazy.

Now I realize that he enjoyed wading out

Across the yawning stream more than fishing.

Mom and Mrs. Hooper seemed content

To just hear the sounds of the water,

Almost as if a voiceless hymn was being sung.

Glad to be away from telephones and kitchens.

We had Zebra sandwiches,

(What Bogue called PB&J)

The wonders of the universe opened

Like the giant Bible in Eleazar on Sunday!

Maybe a little kid will wade there

Forever, trampling the muddy banks of time.

Listening to the sound of eternity and watching

Bogue smile and give praise to the Stripes.

“The Manipulation of Surfaces”

Ocean sleep waves goodbye,

Fractured by golden shards.

Carpet scrunches like mini shrubs

‘Neath the feet of giant bards.

The daily fete of plastic touches

Blooms anew each yellow invasion.

Formica, glass, stainless steel,

Shifted in line for current occasion.

Sounds never forested pronounce

Excuses to feel justified for living.

Enter the ether neighborhood, aware

Gimp stares, alohas for the giving.

Plug into the labor module,

Predetermined time-lapsed boredom.

Taste the taste tested by the taste test.

Consider living in the mall, like Mom.

Home again, home again,

Jiggity, jig.

Escalator staircase ride eclipses a

Need for strides, in this cemetery dig.

“Corduroy a Go-Go”

Most people like denim-

“It’s a way of life, Tim!”

But discerning cool cat Joes

Wear corduroy a go-go.

Away from the fray,

(Neighboring O Tay)

Indigo crowd’s “Hoo-ray!”

Ne’er corduroy a go-go way.

Feel those corded ridges,

Go-go over the bridges,

So when the time-bell rings,

No reminiscing stings!

While a saxophone fairy

Round the mirror ball tarries-

The corduroy a go-go spins

Velvet planet waves o’er skin.

Don’t fade away-go loudly,

Go-go corduroy life proudly.

First-prize is a happy face,

Second-prize is borrowed Grace.

“The Monsters Are Us!”

The mice run crying across the field,

Among the marigold and lavender,

“The Cat, the Cat, run for your life!

He has left the corn rows and now

Scatters death in meadow square.”

Henry Opossum crossed the road.

One of the loud metal beasts lay

Overturned in the ditch, burning.

“I would feel bad, but I am just a

Soulless opossum,” grinned Henry.

Bambi ducks underneath The Thinker,

Hearing the unnatural mechanical pop

Pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop.

“Here Bambi, hide in the plant room,”

Mrs.Thumper urged from the new warren.

-No Planet X or Mayan Hex, just an

Oily mechanical sound in 4/4 time-

Some future archaeologist will quip-

“They seriously believed a threat from

Without would be their end my friend!”

“Ode to the Rabbits of Watership Down”

…Hazel, dozing in his burrow one "chilly, blustery morning in March" some years later, is visited by El-ahrairah, the rabbit-folk hero who invites Hazel to join his own Owsla. Leaving his friends and no-longer-needed body behind, Hazel departs Watership Down with the spirit-guide, "running easily down through the wood, where the first primroses were beginning to bloom." From Watership Down by Richard Adams.

When I see rabbits feeding at dusk,

I think back to Hazel, Fiver,

Bigwig, Blackberry,

Dandelion and Pipkin.

I wonder if their

Descendants fair well

Against their 1000 enemies-

If they remember those that went before.

I cry to think some might

Live now in a place like Efrafa…

Marked and destined to serve a place

Whose center cannot hold.

Better to be free,

Fending for themselves-

Than oppressed and protected

By overseers willing to sacrifice for the status quo.

There is stillness in the night

That speaks to those that will listen,

It is the quiet cool of foreboding-

Lessons we may not learn in time.

Ask many times,

Answer but once.

What constitutes a soul?

To live? To reason? To sacrifice?

Or merely to love your friends and enjoy fresh clover?

There is no spoon.