Belated Words

Write On!

Author: Leo

  • scars

    Daylight, unforgiving and true,

    caught my hands at ease, flat,

    unflatteringly flat, upon my knees.

    Loosely applied over blue-veined

    rivers and tendon ridges, a pliant

    skin reveals a history of scars:

    puckered, punctured stars, sliced

    crescents, rude tears and gouges

    all ungulate in a lighter hue over

    blue-veined rivers and tendon ridges.

    A skinscape of a crazed topographer;

    a delineation of years of labor,

    of incidences with sharp edges,

    of inabilities, and worst, inattention,

    of flailing arms and careless hands;

    hands with slender fingers

    better spread across opened pages

    gently tapping, counting, calling out the joy.

  • Stones

    Those we left by the road still stagger among us;

    we lean on their diminished bodies as we move.

    Talc-tasting air, smelling of urine and hot stone,

    burns our skin, shriveling our memories of them.

    The whisper has passed; this road is closed to us.

    This ditch of stubble will be our home for an hour,

    a day, forever, until this throng moves us,

    forces us up to walk, again, this endless road.

    Ahead, those green hills rejected our pleas.

    The distant canopies’ chattering fell silent,

    fell to fear, as we gazed, as one, with one breath held,

    and another stone was thrown to bruise the heart.

    This child on the sharp rack of my hip

    stares with eyes passive as stones.

    My child of bone in his gray flesh bag,

    stares passed wanting, never cries, only

    clenches the one ragged wall of his home.

    This was originally titled Refugees and was reproduced here with a few changes from a copy dated October, 2003

  • first poem

    first poem…a guttural moan of awe;

    an appreciation of phenomenon:

    of shimmers on febrile plains,

    of fallen cloud underbellies ripped,

    spilling mist to chattering canopies,

    of a sensuous line jerked from chaos,

    of beast in flight or majestic pose,

    of scents of the mull or heated stone,

    of the body in heat or love or both,

    of colors, so startling, only sky,

    in absolute stillness, could hold them.

  • Next Door

    Frosty 004 

     

    Across our mutual fence, salutations

    were swapped twice in three long years.

    one time, surplus tomatoes were offered

    and accepted but with visible unease;

    he looked as if I had presented bad fruit.

    His meek response, a nodding weak smile.

    In May, during a storm, a limb crashed

    across our fence; searching our canopies

    of oak, the origin was undetermined, so I

    claimed the splintered bough to chop & burn.

    No mention of the damaged fence. “O.K.

    and thanks.” he said, walking away, for good.

    In grass uncut six months or more, Frosty, 

    almost hidden from view by weeds long dead,

    sorely desires to melt away with all hope

    of retrieval loss.  Santa reclines on matted,

    desiccated grass, face turned from passerby;

    sun bleached now, but with a flush of shame 

    adding blush to fat cheeks of plastic mold.

     The wading pool, deflated, soldered tight

    to the ground by heat and grim, once rang

    with peals of childish glee, making me grin,

    from the kid I saw with Mom, herself,

    a large, redheaded girl, white as Frosty.

     Beneath two windows still sits the swings

    predictably askew.  Limp chains, devoid

    of seats, hang purely plumb, Heaven to Hell,

    perfect parallelograms aligning Here and There,

    Want and Need; impervious to debate or fault. 

  • Dying Pine

    The beetle-ridden column of pine, still

    coppery-brown—-stark against a flood

    of deciduous cousins’ May green,

    looms, surrounded by shedded, layered

    bark chunks and brittle limbs detached

    and dropped to litter his meager yard;

    precursors of the fall, numbered in

    days or months, unknowable, to come.

    Still, in wind, his stilted sway of youth,

    but now with creaks and groans of doors

    closing….opening, still offering his body

    to nuthatch, squirrel and the jay and still,

    though fading, his green crescent of a

    smile at his tip-top, unencumbered by

    regrets or daunting musings of mortality.

  • TC

    tc

    She’s gone for good this time…..I think.

    I’ve not seem her for seven days.

    Wet food collects slugs in her bowl; three days

    of rain evicting them from danky hidey-holes.

    That is the only sign. We rarely spoke

    ……or acknowledged the other.

    I did stoop to offer my hand, a back-arching lintel,

    ……….but not too often; no spoiling.

    She was a true hunter; eating her kill

    with no gloating, no display for display’s sake.

    She preferred the wild-wide-world, at least,

    that’s what I tell myself……as balm,

    but I really can’t know cat thought,

    or human thought for that matter.

    Others I’ve left to wander? Too aloof,

    too free with freedom, or has it

    just been easier to let them roam

    so blame can only know their names?

  • It Seems to me:

     

    Years ago, around forty actually, I had an American history professor who was memorable for two traits: he chain smoked in class and he used the phrase, “It seems to me…”, constantly.  His voice, whether from the smoking or a genetic occurrence, was deep and resonate and he used it to good effect.  His students were allowed to smoke in the small classroom with the only stipulation being that you disposed of your ash properly.  I used a coke can.  There was no mention of or consideration for non-smokers.  His use of the phrase, “It seems to me,” to preface almost everything he said seems to me to have been a sly ploy; one that worked.  The phrase implied, at least to me, “This is only my humble opinion and I only offer it for consideration.  I’m sure you have equally considered and viable ideas about…”.   I, for one, as a college freshman during the late sixties had few considered and viable ideas about anything excepting perhaps the Vietnam War, which I do not remember discussing in his class.  Its seems to me, by adopting that almost humble presentation, his ideas and points of view were much more palatable and acceptable.  No one likes to be preached to—-well, some people do and I never understood that.  Although I do not remember his name I can still–almost–see his leathery, creased face.  He was the only person that had any influence on me that first year of college; the only instructor I remember.  I’m sure he died years ago from lung cancer or emphysema.  Rest in peace.

     To make my point: it seems to me, there is an over abundance of discourse today that is manic-didactic and spoken with clinched jaws; the speakers might as well be wagging their fingers in our faces.  Some actually do!  Everything anyone says is open to dispute and usually is; jumped on and shredded before the last syllable dies in the air and I’m not just referring to political rhetoric.  I have wanted to do that, shred someones argument, but usually I just shake my head and mumble, “What a dumbass!” Since this is usually directed at an image on TV, no harm is done, no confrontation ensues.  If an actual person, friend or relative, utters something that raises my ire I attempt to smile quizzically and say nothing.  If you let them talk long enough without argument they usually smother themselves in contradictions and embarrassment. We must put our ideas and opinions out there whether they be about politics or chocolate-chip cookies but we have to realize we aren’t going to change many minds.

    My purpose for this blog is completely personal, completely selfish.  I don’t intend or really want to change anyone’s mind about anything; I want to clarify, for myself, my own ideas and opinions.  It seems to me, that is what I need at this point in my life.  Therefore, if I have the urge to express my “considered and viable ideas” in any form other than a short story or poem I will preface it with “It seems to me” and file it accordingly.

    Let us be considerate and thoughtful out there.

  • Sunbathing

    Tomorrow, a flirting innocent, slips a string
    around a toe— tugging, enticing, implying
    realization is just past that task.  Just there!
    Yesterday, an old neuter, ask questions,
    prods for justification, cast doubts.

    But occasionally, the prods, the tugs relent;
    my heart races with the pleasure of strange time,
    Now ,when  the sweet smells of oil and radiant heat,
    even that of chlorinated water, delight and paint
    a lazy smile.