struggling into the weekend.
no birds, no animals. not around today.
it is completely quiet today.
there is no problem reading my head. my ideas.
i desire to write some good words, and fear to proceed.
yesterday I read my journals of trips to Mexico, Costa Rica and Italy.
fun to recall, return, live again. should i reprint all, make more work of it?
right now i am taking it easy, getting through rough times.
keep going simply, i am.
no bucket fulls. we're going easy now.
a dab at a time.
always lights have something to do with snow loading days. It Seems snow is on the way. They say. But hey, but we're out of the big fall. measure up.
the coast east will feast on it, the white cold wet.
I look now and it seems sleepy out here.
out there, you know.
hey, it's pretty. and sleepy.
Ohio winter is light, not yet effective.
only Covid 19 is pronounced.
January will begin another world
as trump is on his way away.
sleep packed with dream.
more than sand lining the shore.
my mind wandered in extreme
so much to explore. can you feel it, Christmas. on the way is the holiday, and it is quiet
with people staying at home. mostly alone and thinking. covid is about. at least it is not freezing. there,
something good to enjoy. go eat a cookie.
it could squish between my toes
warm days i walked barefoot
through a puddle
summer outing
The others, joni mitchell, paul simon,
I read and hear about.
many others times, songs are brief.
years in Rome, days to come. Meals.
Other cities, around talking.
Pictures in my memory.
watching poems, impressed, concerned
overcome with, battle along my way,
you go easy, you know you should.
roads are slippery when
it's me in the way.
you wave briskly for me to see you.
it could have been, distraction,
took away concentrationfor a second.
objective in sight.
slow down to be extra careful.
no matter how long it takes i'll wait.
i first saw him many years ago,
for years i've seen him ... on TV.
thin, sturdy, blonde, neat-combed hair.
of apparent Scandinavian descent, i'd say.
he's with a football team, that's why i see him.
once in a while during a game they show him on the sidelines;
always looking attentive ... concerned.
probably a head coach of the NFL team watch.
i know this guy's name for nothing.
i saw him on Monday night Football this week.
for thirty years or more i've seen him occasionally.
so i know him better than he knows me, naturally.
for sure we both get along where we belong ... on the sidelines.
and work it out
hey Debra; Jack and Meridith
from way far away after Sausalito
and Rome, now Oberlin, Ohio
spark a hoppin' hello
back to times with Henry, Joanne and the rest of us.
cause you led us hoppin' true
you did and we stayed in step
you're still in our brain
December got here. so did the snow,
knee deep white, more than i've seen for years.
today is Wednesday, last night snow came down
heavily. today it's 41 degrees, we have no snow tires,
can we get out and back in .
oh yes, she did, all went well.
she made it out and back.
now two weeks later.
it is no snow, warmer
another day is Thursday , sunny.
blue sky with gentle, now wind, wispy clouds.
snow storms are gone,
the temperature is over freezing.
looking out to stillness.
(check the time) 1:44, close the door,
now, this is what a poem is for ...
to give you rhyme, most every time, not always ...
and good sense? hmm, you decide.
and poetry has meter, ... like a parking meter only you never put quarters in.
it won't expire and you won't get a ticket.
and scheme ... what a dream.
today's theme acceptance and encouragement ...
please accept my poem, i encourage you to write your own.
i was asked to write you a poem for today.
what is the poem about? HAH. my poems are so short i 'd divulge too much if i mention it.
here's my poem:
a crowd of poets is a sad thing, there's no denying;
we'll spend time holding hands when we''re not crying.
i'm not lying.
the life of a poet is
difficult, complicated.
making notes sorting words, stacking
cards; we're poets in isolation,
doing it alone ...
the sound of one dog barking
oh, here to the corner ... no parking.
there is hunger in the United States and Covid 19
... this poem distracted you for a moment ...
like rainbow colors, in fluffy clouds
slid the window open after three
dreamed clouds again until five-thirty
when, from long beyond
i heard the whistle say - i am train
calling low in light rain,
sweet voice, milk and thunder
clawing on wings of steel,
lonely is the night, strong, sure
swinging through, blasting,
rolling heavy on quick-wheel feet
powering around, long through, then out of town,
murmur lonely; cutting night stillness, like blades on ice
iron maiden go, into first morning light
familiar friend, shaking windows with your power,
i smiled, low in bed, covered my head
slept another hour.
this is the third time i've published this poem;
i like it and i'm working on it.
sleeping, thinking, rolling dream.
half and half, back again,
not too early, not too late.
i want to hear the tapping rain drops.
nearly see forgotten faces of friends i knew.
longing to see my friends again.
yeah, a cup of coffee and thirty minutes
can do wonders for friendships.
While in Norwhere we drove to the lake several times, sometimes for her to walk the mile or so, loop around, then sometime to gather nuts. A line of chestnut trees were on our way out of the park. It took us a year or two to notice them, then we began timing the season to pick chestnuts when they dropped.
kept the nuts in the freezer. The squirrels like them. We gathered them by the lake; nuts not squirrels. today I finally ate one, three. They are two years old, not fresh. tasty as a nut should be. chestnuts. Now i know them. Open your heart and you can too.
a crowd of poets is a sad thing,
there's no denying;
we'll spend time holding hands
when we're not crying.
sure i miss the bus rides;
i'm not in Rome where i need to figure where to ride,
where to stop, how far to walk.
i tell you, i miss looking out the home window,
seeing the locals pass by,
while thinking it out, planning every bus i'll take.
how far to the next change.
stores i need to stop at along the way.
makes it easier if i have a plan before picking the route.
pick me up again, bring me back.
and how is it i run into friends
in the middle of the city?
you may have missed it,
Peru has had three
presidents in a week;
2020 continues to be a strange year.
now, are you feeling better?
less is better, dear.
don't know who said it.
if he's led out the door.
as we move through the coming year
we'll brighten better than before.
less is better, dear,
if he's led out the door
as we move through the coming year
want to say this Ohio Saturday
went down cool, not terribly. meanwhile,
going through my old poems; took me
back where only time has changed.
right now there is no snow.
still early ... thinking what i'd do.
i'd purchase a monthly bus pass
to see the same old Roma,
have a pizza. take my time.
say hello to familiar faces.
oh, and have a coffee.
i think today i'd wear a mask ...
have another coffee and a cornetto.
a final warm day.
Weather, now leaning into winter.
Shelby has been out of reach for breakfasts.
I want to go back to make corrections on an early post and the new blogger system makes it impossible for me to go back several years. The old system operated quickly. The new method is impossible for me. I will cry here.
in Sandusky, Ohio an ambitious woman began putting
in an art center. Lawrence Ferlinghetti
was invited. he came; picked up a brush,
began painting a modern picture on a wall;
later he asks for the section of the plaster wall he
painted be sent to his City Lights Bookstore
on a downtown corner in San Francisco.
was it shipped? i don't think so.
he was seventy then.
i remember him as old.
i'm 75 now ... still chasing beat poetry.
he's 101 now.
if he had donated his wall painting where
it stood there is a chance it would
still be there today.
well, good for Lawrence and his bookstore
in San Francisco. I saw his corner everyday when i worked in the pyramid. 1981.
may as well quit crying over how it goes
as we try to work life out.
heaven knows
we're about done,
time to to enjoy the sun.
it's what life's about.
the world series is over
and nary a thought is given.
hopefully, next week the election
will be in the same condition.
i hear it while i'm sleeping
and it only awakens me occasionally.
i won't roll around looking to see it,
but when it's coming down
i love the morning rain;
best is when i hear
the tapping drops.
i must wait, see what.
can't have all the votes going my way.
it's unlikely, who'd believe it ?
anyway, it scares me so tension clings to me,
wading deep with each news report.
reading the book in an easy chair, seems
the way to take it, with a page marker
plus time out for a nap and a coffee.
supposed to be warm now.
slow temperature climbing,
the mail man's looking content.
brought nothing special yesterday.
imagine he's happy for a day without steady rain.
by late afternoon sun'll come though;
it'll warm like they said.
can't help wait for the two old men debate.
Trump and Biden.
running beyond October
shall be soon, with rain in the leaves.
where we be going
do not confuse.
stack us up fine,
love around is falling in those crispy colors
crinkling golden. the red is deeper than before.
geese will be honking.
you have to love this time of year
some news stories
are hard to take or evaluate
cautiously medical personal creep ,,,
do they weep? Ohio has record covid cases
third day in a week,
the same America
how many buffalo did we kill?
i like desert gas stations.
quiet out there
can we believe the news
what are we looking for.
have to regain strength
so i'm standing on one foot
then the other, how's that?
i didn't think this up.
i'm sure doctors did, then
a young person gets a job showing
me how to do it.
makes the money wheel spin.
keep america working.
the virus runs again
where you been?
Do it again.
