Click the superimpose graphic to link up with other excellent wordsmith 56 wonders.
Contemplative Satisfaction
My memories are superimposed,
each one over the others,
repeating forgotten things
like reflections in a window
to my past.
The sights, sounds, and sensed emotions
I can no longer feel, hopes and desires
of mine in a younger man’s clothes
when I danced and played
not knowing about the treasures
that are my memories today.
Look both ways and overlay the tastes and aromas of each memory.
Mind the gaps of confusion as you look through lost time for meanings as we live into the answers to past questions.
This poem was rendered to meet today’s dVerse challenge offered by Paeansunplugged from Delhi. We are to write about the good and evil in mere mortals, the good in evil and/or the evil in good. For me, at no time is that enigma more profound than in times of war and battle.
Conundrum War
One story I’ve never told,
a confession…
if evil were evil enough,
if good were good enough,
I would simply tap a secret reservoir of courage…
but courage, too, has finite quantities,
yet it offers hope and grace to the repetitive coward.
I can’t fix my mistakes.
Once people are dead, I can’t make them undead…
killing and dying are not my special province.
Am I too good for this war?
Too smart, too compassionate, too everything?
I’m above it. It’s a mistake, maybe.
Look both ways at good and evil or take Hamlet’s advice and think it so.
Mind the gaps between and within our perceptions of what is better and what is truth.
Everything
I say and do,
makes me,
according to some
(hope not you),
sexist, racist, communist,
capitalist, atheist, and/or —
something else bad-ist,
or worse,
and so on.
The epithet “snowflake” implies
a melting softness, unlike icicle, and is both
insulting and a grounded gauntlet challenge.
I’m being verbally shoehorned in
by short-sighted, narrow thinking
like an ugly foot that doesn’t fit.
I could well
go off with my own difficult ways,
and face my personal world
for the rest of my days,
and forget to fit
their stereotypical clichés,
which some seem hardened
to claim that I always am.
That would be
such a great blow
to the cause
of human equality.
Since then,
all will see
and we will all be:
collective assholes,
magnificent they and
malevolent me.
Look both ways if you intend to make anything better.
Mind the gaps, saps, and crap chaps and be who you are—the real you.
For the last full day of global top-half summer, our waving but unwavering maven of history’s mysteries, Rochelle, has boxed-up a deal with Alicia Jamtaas. That duet has flat-out challenged our fictioneer muses to contrive artful `songs or stories of fewer than 101 words. I don’t think titles or postscripts count, lest she DQ’s me.
Click any box, bike, or item in Alicia’s photo and UPS will pick you up and creatively deliver you to Rochelle’s post of purple passions to open the what-ifs and where-how’s of joining the fray.
at the park, the
San Gabriel River slow flows as
trees, grass, and gardens grow,
ducks and squirrels search
while dogs wander;
people—few kiddos play,
adults do nothing—just relax while
idle athletic fields recover, empty
picnic tables under shade; and
boulders and benches go unused,
feel the summer zephyr, nice,
some souls are alone, but
I’m with you.
It’s Wednesday. Recover.
Relax. Everything else
can wait.
Look both ways — up and down stream;
mind the gaps for crossings over to another side.
Sometimes just go and be — hear, feel, and wait and see.
It happens
like this
it all comes together
too seldom,
so brief
but when
it comes,
we feel it
forever.
It’s more
than love,
family,
sisterhood;
life has enough
pain and suffering
and sadness.
Forget that—
remember this—
time always was
always will be
just because when
it’s like this
it’s cosmic.
No
everyday thing.
That wouldn’t work.
The right people,
the right time and place
discovering high levels
of special happiness.
We need to do that
more often—
again soon.
One bottle passed through
snifters near dripping candles
lighting empty chairs
reflections
light and dark
happy and sad
yin and yang
simultaneous synergy
of family energy.
Look both ways to find soul in family.
Mind the gaps. Set the stage. Live the love.
At the car wash
busy with trucks and SUVs
but few cars.
I spy a young HR lady
as she
explains personnel things
to a few male employees
who look confidently confused.
They pay “up to” twelve dollars per hour
there—
so says the help wanted sign.
It’s a hundred degrees Fahrenheit
again today, outside, at the car wash
for not enough dinero to live on.
A customer—tall skinny guy wearing
starched, ironed Wranglers with
a big wide belt holding up a bigger
shiny rodeo belt buckle, in
black cowboy boots
boasting bright diamond earrings,
under a big black felt
unairconditioned cowboy hat with
a long wallet jutting up from
his tight right back pocket
and chained to his belt,
and his big-ass cell phone in the other,
all in his stiff, creased, ironed
cowboy blue jeans while
Mansplaining to his nicely wigged
lady friend—he even told me when
my car was ready (it wasn’t)—she nodded and smiled—
people waiting for their clean and polished rides—
one rest (wash) room for all. With
a mercifully short waiting line,
I see no ‘young’ customers, but
one old man wore his ballooning
starched & ironed loud pink, long-sleeved shirt with
pearl buttons in this noisy, busy business
somewhere in the middle of Texas
where dressing to subculture
ignores realities like sun and heat
except for the guys making top
dollar, one every five minutes,
at the car wash. Plus, a tip from me
in my worn Phish tee and shorts, ball cap
and old gym shoes. My subculture.
At the car wash.
Look both ways at the car wash.
Take notes on the sights and write ‘em up: prose or poetry to get you through the day.
Mind the gaps unless you pay the upcharge for a greater job, done by hand, details.
If you’re unfamiliar with the mid-seventies song and movie, here is a youtube trailer version.
Click this graphic to link to Sammi’s blog page and links to more 86-word works of jamboree.
Tanta Belleza
En la ciudad Mexicana de San Antonio, Texas,
Fiesta: eleven April days and nights of wild jamboree
fiestas where diversity is celebrated with parades galore,
like the Battle of the Flowers with royalty;
titled Queen of the Alamo, the Charro Queen,
King Antonio, or King El Rey Feo in his royal ugliness of medieval rivalry,
there’s a Queen of Soul, and La Reina de la Feria de las Flores,
everywhere you’ll find dancing and music, muchos happy people,
if large crowds are your taza de tequila.
Look at crowds both ways for the fun within the melee.
Mind the gaps for the light-fingered chaps.
A fun time. Take the bus. It is always packed. Click the pic if you want to know more.
Sometimes I don’t understand, or
(and it’s not the same thing)
I misunderstand, hoping
somehow to be brought
to correction and truth,
by way of clarification,
minus animosity.
Like one day
writing to prompts.
A young lady made clear
her (pre-pandemic) intention
to complete
the several months long hike
of the Appalachian Trail,
Georgia to Maine.
Starting in February,
finishing in May (unlikely),
by hiking
twenty-seven miles
every day for months.
She had done eighteen miles in one day,
no more; none
during March or July
on a rocky or muddy ascending trail.
I wanted to say, that’s a marathon a day,
every day, for at least three months (more like five to seven) bearing a pack, food, and water.
But I didn’t. Is it for me to say?
Lest I dash her dream with reality.
Is it for each person to discover
our dreams? To defeat challenging demons?
Not with wisdom but with grit.
Each of us must, on life’s long wander,
one day, one step at a time, take the risk.
Look both ways on every trail.
Watch where you step and mind the gaps lest you find a limp.
Follow your dreams.
Wisely.
Click on the photo of my favorite trail bench for more info on the Appalachian Trail.
Our Literary Journey 