24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
Two Cafe con Leche’s she requested,
In the thickest Dominican accent.
Her skin the same hue when the liquids collide
patting down her breast, then sides
Her brown wild eyes connected with mine panicking
“dos dólares” the worker replied
I slide the five-dollar bill
still connected with her eyes
Keep the change,
I have all I need in front of me.
Levitating painted gold a wonder to behold,
Street performer yet metaphors
Supports inside confuse
Beneath the blanket below
Inside the clothes
Supports tangible yet unseen,
How we do indeed hold up.
Clear night
Gold light splashes
Spills on my window sill
In old buildint where I reside
Morning is glorious
Notorious
New day
(Eintou format)
Running so fast that you feel
shoes slipping off
Look down to see
no ground beneath you
Close eyes tight and hear
wind tunnel as you trip on the void
Taking gravity’s orders
and tumble through the tree tops
only knocking loose enough fruit for the village
As your theme music plays
And the crowd of dandelions goes wild
I see that democracy is still awake
Puttering about
Coffee in hand
Eyes full of crust
The neighbors are suspicious
Watching it shuffle out the door
Grabbing a paper
It will never read
It used to make appearances
Glamorous and titillating
Now the kids are gone
And the make-up is off
And no one can remember
What it plans to do
As retirement age
Approaches
Maybe it will head
To a far off land
Take up residence
And paint
A future no one can see
Through the haze
And combustion
Of today’s whims
How fast does the minutes, seconds and hours pass
From your first breath to your last
The years fly by before you know
And you left wondering where they go
How you go from not being able to stand or walk
To learning how to read and talk
Not having any responsibilities and stress
Because all you know is fun and nothing less
Then comes your teenage years
Where most experience heartbreak and tears
This is where you start to see things in a new light
And make your own decisions based on what’s wrong and right
When you reach adulthood you are more mature
With different hardships and difficulties to endure
Maybe you have a family and a home
Or maybe you’ve decided to be on your own
And finally you become old and it’s back to stage one
It becomes hard to move, stand, run
It’s where you know you have numbered days
Before your life fades away
Life is strange.
Árainn mhór
Wind-swept, still we board the ferry
In the port tidal sway is not too bad
Venturing out to the open sea stretch
Portholes dip drastically below water levels.
Céad Míle Fáitle – A hundred thousand welcomes
Residents so relaxed, Also, the most friendliest too.
The Pipe Band my reason for visiting this beautiful island
To teach my role however time disappears here, it’s a delight
A golden beach, Lighthouse, lakes and rugged cliff edges
I’ve seen them all, picturesque scenes like no other.
The bars open late, when they close, the disco starts.
Ceol agus craic to be had by one and all.
Arranmore, yes the island of the West Coast of Donegal
Not the Aran islands of Galway or the Scottish Isle of Arran.
If you have not travelled here, I recommend it at some stage,
I’ve not been to the later two but there’s only one Arranmore
The dog I was understudying to learn the art
of a calm sea obeying the Messiah’s voice
loses its teeth in a bone fight.
Patience was it that rot the flesh
off the bone into the night of a greedy dog.
I tell you truly, faith is what keeps me watching
the scene of this world changing
into obscene scenes,
not as I remoted but as it was written.
Once, I spat on my palm, spoke in tongue
like a man learning to defraud God
but the spittle didn’t display the world I crave for.
God knows it is not a sin to change
a channel from a violent scene into a school
of children singing nursery rhymes.
I was a leper in Jesus’ parable pleading
to resurrect in this poem.
And here I am loosing my fingers again,
flipping the scriptures for the portrait
of the Nirvana the prophecy spoke of.
Have you ever watched Aurora’s morning ritual?
How she flings herself across the sky to bring us the sun?
My morning ritual consists of flinging
My index finger through social media.
One app after the other.
I wonder how this brings me light.
Aurora is mother of the winds,
Conceived with father of the stars.
Each little blib of contact
Blows me in circles.
Everybody here looks so happy.
Their smiles mock me.
Why are they having fun without me?
Why don’t they like me anymore?
Will I ever be this happy without them?
Aurora is selfless in her task
Of showering this world with rays of gold.
I wonder how she can be so kind.
I like to call myself kind,
But I know I truly just want connection.
I want people to love me.
Tell me, if I were to spread my skin so thin
You could see the light through it,
Would I be someone worth spending time with?
Just before he died, my daughter asked him, “What is your favorite color?”
And he said it was yellow.
“Send me a sign when you’re gone,” she said.
He nodded weakly, though he appeared to dismiss her.
“I saw a yellow bird. Here’s a picture,” she texted.
And then the yellow butterflies flitted by.
She never doubted Grandpa’s sending a sign.
Who watched your wife die for 15 years, the last five
under my roof, as we both gasped at her final inhale?
Who changed your i.v. every 8 hours when they almost killed you?
Wasn’t it I who wet your lips when they were dry, set your game up
when the sickness took away every last pleasure you relied on
to help you forget, tuck her under your pillow at night when you dreamed
her young, dreamed her beside you, spooned in sleep of the living?
Didn’t I watch boxing and Gold Rush and the Angels games
with you, despite my mad thirst to work, work, work to forget, to pacify?
Where was my sign?
I cried at the stop light, the traffic a crawl.
Did I kiss him enough, tell him I loved him?
And I saw it then, the cloud break, the golden rays at dusk,
last shudders of daylight, like yellow hands upon my heaving shoulders.
I see you.