where do i park it

in my head I still have
my 52 Chevy pickup truck
that i sold fourteen years ago

was the same make and model
as Phil’s who had the gas station
across the street when i was a kid

where we used to play
while he worked on cars
and i rode in the back when he took
his son and i out to the family farm

i found an old truck like it, loved it
got it back like old and new
it ticked, ticked, ticked

so now where do i park it
in my mind?

leaping leapers - good fortune

i fell, what the hell
washing the car
didn’t fall far
and i rolled

like Batman Senior. jumping out of an airplane
my feet didn’t tangle in the parachute
wasn’t about to break anything on the landing
not with a bucket in the way, not this time

lying on my back wet in driveway water
staying put, looking at the sky, like i oughter
knew i learned my lesson the last time
and that was the - way last time

i figured a clean front fender
wasn’t worth a month in a cast, not again
man, i was computin’ fast
tuck and roll, tuck and roll

now i have to call my friends
tell all the good fortune i’ve captured
or maybe just take a nap instead,
either way, i’m smiling, unfractured

direct, indirect

being a direct descendant
of one hundred fifty ten thousand years
off the Polish isles near the bleak Russian tundra
i hugged a widdle blankie over my shoulder

my french/scotch/irish/cherokee bride
on the other hand, spurned all covers
as one born in the boileroom of the boiler making plant
generates her own heat and some for the city of Minneapolis
and for Pittsburgh

special on the board

on the board two, scrambled with cheese
get the signal, shake off a menu
heavy hitter Nicky takes my order
try to see the newspaper
down the pipe, over the shoulder of
the guy at the table in front of me
on the board it's three for, two opposed,
the ayes have it, no rain today

on deck, waiting my order, making notes
off the board it’s two flips and a tuck
did a flip back and curl into reality
tasted good, grease is good
I like bacon, sipped coffee,
left a buck ride on the table
am I fit to drive?

winky and blinky

winky and blinky out at night
by light of a cheddar moon
laughed til they cried and hung on tight
as they pranced to every tune

hop a diddle they could
crisp and doodle might
doing what they really should
and thusly passed the night

see the hours fly on by
wrapped to the skin in fest
spinning, swimming eye to eye
of course you know the rest

planted on a quiet hill
on the road to the hereafter
some say sometimes when nights are still
you can hear bits of their laughter

poetry masters

oh yes, we’ve poetry masters
like America’s Walt Whitman
who thump covered a lot of bases
green waving fields, lightening flashes
blood red and dead gray fallen soldiers

bubbles of crystal clear rippling streams
by farmer’s long faces and torches
on the global sphere mystery and chants
for ten thousand of thousands of years
forward and back leaping

know how times have changed
for all of us
for in all of his words
of roots, songs, joys, and power,
of fury, nomads, nations, legions, submission,

banners, fires burning, pageants
and frost-mellowed berries
in those cherished times of olde
some lonely dim shadowed snowy eve
with walking staff and collar up

Walt never mentioned
stopping on his way home
to pick up a lotto ticket,
pizza with his favorite topping
or a movie

if here now, today
maybe stop for a pizza and a beer
i don't know, don't think he'd own a TV
and, stewards of the earth,
where'd the clear water go

ain't got money

even though we ain’t got money
i’m so in love with you honey
Kenny loggins wrote that near forty years ago
today i heard the anne murray recording
over the speakers at the festival
where the clock seems wound back years
in the heights
a small Ohio town
that managed to stay that way

this morning to the fire station for pancakes
this afternoon a short block walk
from the single village stop light
to a barbeque downtown

like it was
so it remains
small talk
happy voices
familiar faces
a peaceful village
god bless the little towns

where'd de go?

no mosquitoes okay
but where’s the lightning bugs
or fireflies, as some say,
but that’s in other parts

not here in humid hot hell
take a breath and sweat
stick to the chair summer
winged beetleful ohio

where’d de go?
gimmie da glow
i wanna know
those delightful iridescent call 'em yellow lightning bugs

da filthy rich

yeah, buddy? you say
you got a million bucks
well that’s just fine
now take a step back in line there, son

we gots us some real money folk comin in
you noticed the world making money
and stealin’ what they have to
well, only out’a necessity, that’s all

i’m telling you, kid
they don’t mean nuthin’ by it
what chew called there?
yeah, you. . . .

oh, that’s fine, now like i say
the rich gets richer
while the rest of you Head Count
is not needed for much of nuthin’

unless is for being
good foot soldiers
we need those, you see
they pick up things on the parade grounds

and i don’t mean jes communicable diseases
hah, hah, pieces of paper and shit like that
an' they can walk in a straight line
an' everything

an' look fine for when
the real important people,
the important people, make their speeches
ya hear me? - don’t chew see?

now step a little closer,
crowd in here,
that’s it
so’s i donze haz ta yell

nightmare

i know you were renting,
well, your home is our house now
you see, we are going to buy it
would you move out please

wait, what i said last week
forget about it
yeah, cancel the movers
we changed our mind

see if you can get
your deposit back on the new place
oh, and here, this stuff
was in your mailbox

i guess it’s yours again,
most of it’s junk mail anyway
hope you don’t mind,
i clipped out all the coupons

when i'm flying

often we pass a certain high tension pole
supporting large power lines
that run for miles over the rolling country side
in mornings, large birds called turkey vultures or buzzards
set on the metal branches with wings partially spread
to dry them from nightly dew

one of the most skilled aviary flyers in the Americas,
these giants have been seen to soar
as long as six hours
without flapping their wings

today on the pinnacle of the tall vertical metal tower
a bird perched, wings fully extended
in it’s full six foot span
gallant as an eagle on an American emblem

seeing that bird atop all, in golden morning light
my wife put words in that wild creature’s beak
when she said,
“this is what i look like when i’m flying.”

at the same time
he whispered to me
“i can soar higher, longer, faster
than you can ever dream.”

tend your still

words on a note
i know i wrote
cause it was on a piece of paper
in my pocket

couldn’t figure why
i asked her and yes, she said it
that’s why i wrote it down
tend your still

nice words together
i asked what it means
she said it’s what you do
in West Virginia

three steps

needed house front steps,
didn’t want wood,
in our town it’s normal to call a cement contractor
that’s a guy who has a truck and pours cement

not a problem, i’d call a guy, then another and another
the job to pour three steps was too small to be bothered with
they had big jobs, long driveways to keep them from tiny steps
so i thought and thought - and thought of stone

at the stone quarry they said they could do it,
cut Indiana Blue Sandstone i selected, and deliver it,
set the stone down one , two, three
all i had to do was provide the dimensions for three blocks

three weeks i planned. the first time i measured i thought i had it
a few days later i checked my figures and they were wrong,
so i did it again, three blocks, one, two, three on top of each other
it was many days to get it right.

i had to prepare the ground, no one else would do it,
so I raked, then measured the first block, the second had to fit
back under the wood of the door, and the third
had to be even with the inside floor. one, two, three

on and on i figured stone dimensions, and finally had it right.
the bottom block was largest,
the second and third were equally smaller.
it all would fit, everything tight.

the day they delivered the stone in a large truck with a crane,
they had one block cut wrong by two inches on one side.
I recalculated and told them put them down. one, two, three
in a half hour i had them down and perfect,

you can’t tell they made a cutting error.
now we have our three stone steps
the bottom, the second recessed under the Georgian doorway
the third level with the inside wood floor

come back in two hundred years, you’ll see
the house may be gone,
but the steps will be there
one, two, three

dry my tears

dry my tears
in my dreams
i'm in my world
you are you

i may yell
but don’t cry often
hug my fears
then they soften

truth over fiction

a fast horse pays
the loser begs
truth is fiction
with better legs

M. is going shopping

M. is going shopping at trader joe’s
it’s an hour away
she’s taking me along
and will drop me off at a friend’s
who wants to show me his new bookcase - wow

that’ll take about a minute
so she told me to start now
to write down as many questions
about bookcases
that I can think of

4:09 a.m.

when I wake
in the middle of the night
as I often do,
should I listen with headphones
to radio reports on the BBC
or listen instead to the silence
and think my own thoughts?

what I was thinking in my world was dreaming not thinking
i can tell cause i woke up

what i was
thinking in
my world was
dreaming not
thinking i can
tell cause
i woke up

check out time

quite a morning breeze
that knocked down
her favorite dark red hollyhocks
while she was looking
out the kitchen window

then she saw it leap
through the flowers
in blowing rain and heavy winds
that came for hours and hours
one more frog followed the exit sign
one more for the road

leaving only a pair
out there
a boy frog
and his girlfrog friend
loving right down
to the very end

as luck would have it

as luck would have it
an expression that grew because others
recognized it, picked it up and rolled with it,
it became a part of the vernacular

so, as luck did have it, seven old friends
happened together for an afternoon
to laugh and compare
review and declare

five friends stopped by our home
fifty years ago five of us were in that summer,
that particular time of our young lives,
before our first year of high school began

if we could have fed our friends
and wrapped them in blankets
they would have stayed all night
however, on improvisation we did okay

mark it as a day well done
in light drink, snacks, long talk and laughter
pile this onto our stack of pleasant memories
of life worth living - good fortune for us