Still Hungry after All these Posts
9
Category Archives: Poetry
Where Carryings-on could Lead to Carrion
Saturday Night Study Group
Lo, the lazy morning passes,
Finds the weary lads and lasses
Still abed, or on their asses,
Half awake and half a-snore,
‘Mid detritus of the pizza,
Hot wings, chips and other treats a
Sober student seldom eats, a-
Strewn in heaps upon the floor–
Partied late; what was it for?
Shattering the blissful quiet
Suddenly, a loud impiety
Is screamed and starts a riot
Right among the corpse-like corps:
All a-scramble, grabbing trousers,
Shirts and shoes, these late carousers
Start remembering the wowsers
Of the night they’d passed before,
Though recall was rather poor–
Finally, wakening more fully,
One of them, if somewhat dully,
Crawled across, his brain still woolly,
To fling wide the knocked-on door
And reveal the dawning horror
Come to waken every snorer,
Standing, looking faintly, more or
Less, like someone seen before–
Somehow shook him to the core–
Ay! It’s Mother stands there staring,
Arms akimbo, nostrils flaring,
Challenging his story, daring
Him amain: Explain this war!
What’s this wreckage, who these bodies
Strewn among the butts and toddies,
Some dressed only in their naughties,
Covered all in festive gore?
He stood gawping, nothing more.
In the cursèd silence stretching,
From a distance came a retching
Sound and instantly, all fetching
Up as though a manticore
Chased them out of their reclining,
They responded to this shining
Call and left the poor repining
Lad, with Mother, at the door,
Beast and trembling matador.
Dust now settling, son and mother
Gazed intently on each other,
Understood this bit of bother
Must be rectified, the score
Evened out: this was the chore.
Mother, calm now and quite cool,
Explains to him that, while in school,
Her son shall still observe the rule
Of sober thought. The lad’s encore:
Will I party? Nevermore!
(And means well, just as before.)
Sources of Brilliance, Such as We Are
Tropical Splash
A-chatter in the curling fronds, the wet-leafed canopy, the ponds,
Among the tangled twining root of every vine-choked tree’s broad foot,
Wild birds spread out their neon wings in this green palace of such kings,
Shout to a sun that’s seldom seen, deep in this hot palace of green,
But bring a blaze that’s all their own, as bright as such a place has known.
Take flight! Take wing! Aim for the sun–race with them upward, every one,
Above the canopy, to see whether a sun can really be;
And if it’s not, let no bleak night deter a second from our flight:
Upward and forward, light or none, we always ought to seek the sun–
And if not found, our calling is that we must light these palaces.
Uninformed, or Old and Infirm?
Or just uniformly old?
Does it matter? Not much; never mind. As it happens, I was a little hazy to begin with, so there’s not much worry about the old marbles disappearing. Who really needs marbles anyway, except for a game-playing champ or, say, Michelangelo. For me, the touch of lunacy just adds a little color and a lively element of surprise to my everyday existence.
Scaredy Coot
My fears are principally these:
Of sharks, the dark; of killer bees;
Of speeding cars and drunken louts
That race them through the roundabouts;
Bloodsucking leeches; of the kind
Of beasts that populate my mind
In doctors’ offices; of tests
That only earn me second-bests;
And most of all, I fall in tears
Lest someone should unmask my fears!
Happy Birthday, My Sweet
Between us, my husband and I have nine outstanding nephews, all of whom we adore. We have one niece. She was born 22 years ago today. Any questions? 
Goddesses Beware
My dearest darling, grand, almighty,
So surpasses Aphrodite
In each nuance womanhood
Considers lovely, fine and good—
And never mind what men prefer,
All being ten times more in her—
What panegyric can I make,
What genuflections, what grand hymns
Of obloquy, as evening dims,
Shall I sing for my niece’s sake?
Is there a form of worship deep
Enough to compass the extent
Of family greatness, heaven-sent,
We mortals are so blessed to keep?
What I See is What I Get
My Hero, My Self
The guide to my path,
The lamp to my feet,
My counselor, guru,
Informer, my sweet
Intelligent tutor,
My rescue, my hope—
Too bad you are Me,
You poor pitiful dope.
All the Colors
When we speak of something having ‘all the colors of the rainbow’ I am certain we don’t quite understand the enormity of such a thing. My sisters and I used to criticize badly designed or tasteless clothing, interiors and the like as being so artificial and clumsy because they were of a ‘color not found in nature’–but then, too, our thinking was far too constrained. For nature, that queen of design, has more colors than can be perceived, let alone understood, by mere human eyes and minds.
She’s a trickster and a lavishly opulent over-doer, is Nature. We are much too small to comprehend the fulness of her range and beauty. What seems like one rather simple thing at first often morphs, as we look and imagine further, into something far different and most likely far more subtle and complex.
I was reminded of this last night when I sat down with a new set of children’s marking pens–the cheap permeable-tip markers that last for about five drawings but cost a tenth of what the ‘professional’ pens do–and began to sketch something leafy. As soon as I began I knew that one kind of green would not make a leaf; no, I knew that all four kinds of green supplied by the manufacturer of this little bag-of-pens couldn’t begin to be sufficient to convey the character of the simplest, plainest sort of leaf-like thing, let alone give a hint of the way light might play across it in different climes, at different times of day. Or how much its appearance must be affected by my own vision, my mood, my expectations.
Our abilities to envision, physical and metaphorical both, are fluid but can never quite keep up with the mysteries around us. And that, my friends, is a fine excuse for forging ahead into the puzzling and problematic and pearlescent thing that is the future . . . .
How It Works
In Haiku,
Reality takes
Sudden swerves
The Insomniac
R.E.M.
Under a slab
Of cement I sleep,
Wilderness heavy,
Sorrow deep;
Sorrow deep,
Archaeology old,
Running through
Corridors untold—
Racing the hallways
Of my dreams,
Ankles shackled,
With muffled screams;
With throttled throat,
I strive to wake,
Covered in cobwebs
I cannot shake;
Cobweb-bound,
Imprisoned in doom,
Under concrete,
In the dreamer’s tomb.
Just a Couple of Odd Fellows
Unendurable
Ulf was our unctuous uncle
who was uglier than a carbuncle
so we tried to disguise
him from unwary eyes;
but he also stank worse than a skunk’ll.
Expedition Down the Tube
A fellow, exceedingly thin,
Got his auto prepared for a spin;
When he checked the exhaust,
He was sucked in and lost,
Since when nobody knows
Where he’s been.
Pardon My Love Letters
Adjusting the Balance of Powers
I make no pretense of refinement,
Charm-school graces, savoir-faire—
I’m no more mannered than a monkey
Picking cooties from its hair—
In fact, I’d never boast of
Attributes I’d likely waste,
Having little use or need for
Proving further I’ve great taste
Than I did when I selected
You as partner, lover, mate;
All alone, that one maneuver
Proved my social skills are great,
Even if the sorry outcome
On your side is to undo
Any special social standing
That once appertained to you!
Art-Colored Glasses 