Climb
We climb the narrow path
above tree tops
houses fade to invisible
and distant shore
changes to pewter
sun reflecting hours as
a lady bug in her red dress
hops to the other side of
my palm and my eyes
fix on her glamor
grand presence in
minute scale
an immense love
springs from my river
quenching the thirst of
every tree every need
Poetry the Noble Grave
Poetry offers a fine funeral to its beloved dead
with official tunes and mythic splendor
it buries them deep, salutes with music
dedicates wreaths, a cold grave slab
the endless procession behind the verse
all the sepulchral History above them.
The palms of angel seal their silence
until their Second Coming when
the dead will shake the gravestone
and move the moist body
to harvest our ripened life leaving
behind the borderless homeland.
Our dead hope to be resurrected and wrap
their arms around our necks
with their great strength and rigor.
Avengers, tyrant killers will choke us.
excerpt
…made and she could not take a chance on hurting them by refusing
their generous offer. It was kind of them to even think of an engagement
gift, but she wished they had decided on something less ostentatious.
Oh well, maybe if it was a small, inexpensive car she wouldn’t
feel so bad about accepting it.
She had not told her parents. She did not want them to feel they had
to give the newly engaged couple a gift. Such a thing had never entered
her mind, and she hoped Cam did not expect it either. And anyway,
her parents certainly could not afford anything as lavish as a car.
Maybe I’m out of my league, Tyne thought. We’re just simple
country people. I shouldn’t be marrying someone like Cam.
This new revelation made her uneasy, taking the edge off the excitement
she felt about returning to the city. She turned to look out
the window onto the bleak winter landscape, but a little girl in the
seat beside her suddenly caught her attention and offered a welcome
diversion for her thoughts. The blond-haired child held up a story
book and asked her a word.
“That says hospital,” Tyne replied, smiling into the innocent face.
Noting the pictures in the book, she asked, “Is your story about a nurse?”
The child beamed. “Yeth. When I grow up, I’m going to be a nurth.”
“Are you? That’s lovely. I’m a nurse, and I work in a hospital like
that one in your picture book.”
The little face turned up, the blue eyes wide and incredulous. “Oh
… oh, you’re a nurth … oh.”
Tyne laughed softly, and could not resist the urge to put her arm
around the little one and hug her. Looking up, she saw the warm
smile of a young woman sitting across from them.
“You’ve made her day, thank you,” the woman said, smiling.
“Are you her mother? Oh then, I’ll trade places with you so that
you can sit with her.”
“No, no,” the mother waved her hand. “She wouldn’t thank me for
that.”
Tyne laughed and turned back to the admiring child. Someday,
would she and Cam have a little girl like this dear one? A girl who
wanted, more than anything, to be a nurth?
Ah, I’d like to kiss the hands of your father, the knees
of your mother who gave birth to you for me.
I’d like to kiss all the chairs you touched with your dress
as you walked by
to hide in my heart, like a charm, a piece of the bed sheet
you slept in.
I could even smile
to the man who saw you naked before me
to even smile at him, who was graced with such
happiness.
Because I, my beloved, I owe you something more
than love
I owe you the song and the hope, the tears
and again hope.
In the tiniest moment with you, I lived all my life.
https://draft2digital.com/book/3562930
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763831
excerpt
…lavishing her body, erotic and desirous, promising and promiscuous;
Mona, the nurse who came to replace his gauzes. Mona, a woman,
came to the help of a man desiring nothing more than what nature has
allotted to him: lust, even with his half-severed penis, a man desires to
ride on top of a woman’s body, this woman’s, Mona’s. In this war zone,
man never stopped longing for that exquisite moment of coupling,
nature’s first and most powerful expression: a man, an injured man,
coupling an eloquent, musical, poetic, female body.
His eyes still closed, he saw himself on a bed where he was battling
his last, three days and three nights, with his stressed breath in
irregular spasms of a living-dead man, skinny, leftover of stamina
recluse in his austere village bed. Shadow of a man left to perish as
nature commanded, yet, his last breath was delayed as for three long
days and three long nights, he kept on gasping for air unable to release
his soul to his creator while from time to time he would whisper in
his so ever weak voice one word, “pussy” to the amazement of his relatives,
especially to his two sons who didn’t know how to play out their
father’s last wish. And the night arrived again for the fourth time, and
the owls sang their lonely songs in the nearby barn while the moon
kept on playing hide and seek behind the clouds, while the unrested
soul of the old man repeated the same double syllable word, “pussy”.
Indeed, it was tragic and comical for the three relatives who stayed for
the vigil: one of his sons, the old man’s niece, and the servant girl who
attended to the wishes of the almost-dead man. Not any special wishes
did the moribund man have other than perhaps stir him from time to
time to check whether he was still on the upper stratum, although his
occasional whisper, “pussy” was witness to the fact.
At the desperate moment of ambivalence when no one of the three
knew what to do to help the old man relax and let his soul be released
to the elements, Mona, the twenty-four year old maid with her flaming
eyes and promiscuously half-open lips and her voluptuous breasts, an
angel of mercy nonetheless, neared the bed of the old man, raised her
skirt, took his fragile hand and placed it behind her light undergarment
and between her legs upon which time and upon feeling the touch of his…
Il Pagliaccio
With his pink face, his tardy pants, his
perennially smiling lips, the pagliaccio
runs to the stage drawing an imaginary
circle in front of kids who laugh
especially when he pulls a kerchief out
of his pocket, a green kerchief with no
end and after he pulls three meters of
endless fabric and focusing on the faces
of the children the pagliaccio gets ready
for his next act: he takes off his hat and
turning it upside down he puts his hand
in it and after three abracadabra he raises
a snow-white rabbit in the air to the yelling
and laughing kids as the pagliaccio,
as happy as ever with his performance,
disappears behind the big red curtain
not forgetting his duty to the man, he
once was, one who could reach the stars,
who could transcend the flesh and touch
the eternal, which, alas, he never did.
Difficulty
I was lucky
in my life
to meet many
good and always
correct people
perhaps they were more austere than normal
perhaps, how can I say it,
even a little tough
but isn’t this the right
of those who know
and know how to judge
everything?
The difficulty arises when no one
of the just people accept
the other just
what am I saying
they never appreciated each other
excerpt
‘Yes, Nora. Yes, I honestly do.’
‘I wish I could share your optimism.’
‘You’re becoming cynical in your old age, Nora. You need cheering up.’
Nora looked behind her towards the door. ‘I don’t know what’s keeping Janet.’
‘I wouldn’t even like to hazard a guess,’ Clifford said with a smile. ‘Would you like me to order drinks for you now? What were you and Janet … ? Ah, here she comes.’ He stood up as Janet rushed in.
‘Sorry I was so long, Nora,’ Janet said, ‘but I kept meeting people. Robert Purdy’s here with his fiancée. And the whole Morgan family from Clondarragh.’
‘Janet, you know Dr Hamilton, don’t you?’
‘But of course I do. How are you, Dr Hamilton? We haven’t seen you down in our part of the world for ages.’
‘I’m fine, thank you, Janet. It’s a pleasure to see you again. I hope your mother and father are well.’
‘Hale and hearty, Dr Hamilton. I’ll tell them you were asking after them.’
‘Yes, please do,’ said Clifford. ‘I actually came to invite you and Nora to join us at our table. My wife, my son, his girlfriend, and some friends of ours are there.’
‘That would be very nice,’ said Janet. ‘We usually have more company with us, but they all had other things to do this evening.’
Clifford led the way to his own table and made the necessary introductions. Nora and Janet sat down on two extra chairs that John had already added to the group.
Nora sat between John and Ian, Janet between Ian and Clifford.
‘Now, what is everyone drinking?’ Clifford asked.
Fiona and Susan had had enough, they said. Janet and Catriona asked for lemonade. Julian a Macallan single-malt Scotch—‘If they have any.’ Nora ordered gin and orange.
‘Mother’s ruin, Nora,’ said John. ‘Make mine a John Powers, Clifford.’
‘Julian’s choice of Scotch for me too,’ said Ian.
‘Do you ever drink anything else, Ian?’
‘Only Drambuie, but not now.’
Clifford smiled. ‘You’ll have Coca Cola in your whiskey, I suppose.’
‘Get away with you, man,’ Ian scolded. ‘Even though I know you’re joking, you should still be horse-whipped for a crack like that. In Scotland we don’t joke about our Scotch.’
Supper Prayer
Oh God, covered in goodness
you deigned to dress him
with dignity that he’ll
again today share
a table with You
https://draft2digital.com/book/3562939
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763408
excerpt
“No, strangely enough, Sarah, she’s quite a good woman in her
way. Oh, she has her faults, and she thinks she’s a cut above the
ordinary Joe as we used to say in the Old Country. But then, lass,
which of us doesn’t have any faults?”
Mrs. Thompson expertly positioned a round slab of pastry onto
the sliced apples in the shell and began to press down the edges with
a fork. Without waiting for Sarah to answer her rhetorical question,
she said, “It’s Will I feel sorry for. He’s never been the same since it
happened. Used to be such a jolly man, always ready with a joke.
The girl was a lot like him in that way. Although in looks she was
fair like her mother. They hadn’t been here long when … when it
happened. Maybe a couple of years because I know the girl finished
up her high school in Nimkus.”
“What did happen, Mrs. Thompson?”
“I can’t really say, lass.” Mrs. Thompson suddenly looked embarrassed
and flustered. “And, my goodness, I’ve talked enough. The
time’s going on, and Ben’ll be in for his supper.” She gathered the
unbaked pies onto a tin tray and hurried into the kitchen.
Sarah stared after her. She wanted to ask more questions, but she
knew that no more information would be forthcoming from Mrs.
Thompson. Obviously, the English lady had already disclosed more
than she had intended.
But Sarah knew that something disturbing had happened in
Nimkus, and she was sure now that Ben had been a part of it.
