On Day Four Hundred, I had lunch inside
a restaurant I walked to from my home.
The outing left me feeling satisfied,
at liberty to dine with friend and wine,
my mouth unmasked, my taste buds gratified.
I told my friend I’m fain to take the train,
to board a bus, to pay my fare and ride.
And so I’m telling all who read this poem –
for now the tide is starting to subside.
(Magic 9)
My son asked, did I hear the latest news
about the region’s elementary schools?
“They’re dumping analog – they plan to use
all digital for classroom time.” “The fools,”
I said. He uttered “Kids can’t read the clock.”
And I responded “Why can’t they be taught?”
(My aim is not to censure or to mock,
but doesn’t school mean teaching? So I thought.)
It’s more than just a style choice at stake.
A clock face can be understood from far.
Aimed well in daylight, analog will make
a compass pointing sure as guiding star.
We don’t need more school theories to despise,
so let’s not render dead the term “clockwise.”
I hope it’s like a muscle memory –
the ease with which I ride a bus or train.
I’m sure the skills will soon come back to me,
although it’s been four hundred seven days
since I had public transit liberty.
My kids were Covid-cautious, and they pled
for my restraint. Now shot immunity
is likely, and the traffic’s grown a pain.
I found my card. I’ll load it hopefully.
(Magic 9)
So now the students share the bins with me.
They even pull them, early, to the curb.
I wrote – they sent sincere apology,
and I thought (prematurely) they could learn
(in spite of their hysteria at bees
they misidentified as hornet hordes).
But when I checked the bins’ capacity,
I found unflattened cartons to perturb,
in stubborn 3-dimensionality.
(Magic 9)
The train was subterranean right there.
We lived beside a curving length of track.
Of course we had no windows, and the scare
was always in traversing out and back.
For sure the tracks, of shining silver black,
were laid between the walkway and our door.
It took a dash of brave to dash, and more.
I recollect the artificial light,
dull yellow on the seamless curving wall,
and momentary hesitating fright,
regaining home and family. It’s small –
one dream of three that I can still recall:
a dwelling near a train beneath the earth,
connoting neither sex nor my own birth.
(Rhyme Royal)
It’s ominously beautiful outside.
The gardens teem with blooms, the air is clear,
the sky’s a bowl of azure high and wide.
The birdsong peals like morning bells, and here
are daily hummingbirds, identified
in thrumming flits. The atmosphere
is mild, but I see the soil’s dried.
I clear and turn the sprinklers on with dread
about the fell aridity ahead.
(Ottava Rima)
I heard a Republican speak
as if his path leads to a peak.
They cannot disguise
all their cheating and lies,
but gaslighting is their technique.
Extrapolation fails me now I’m old.
The past is no predictor, we’ve been told,
of stock market performance. Such is true
in fact, more than we ever dreamed or knew,
for disconnects are booming big and bold.
No vision of tomorrow can be sold
when knowledge of today is uncontrolled.
The history of culture gives no clue.
Extrapolation fails.
The weather grows too violent, too cold
or hot – we’re stuck, and no one gets paroled.
Our politics plants wisdom in the few.
The vectors fade or hide from me and you;
the ether interweaves a mass blindfold.
Extrapolation fails.
(Rondeau)
We know that Rick and Sally fell in love.
We figured their relationship would thrive.
They seemed to put commitment plans above
all selfishness, and they were 35.
Rick’s health conditions came as a surprise,
when sadness grew and daily pain attacked,
but Sally was his mainstay. She’d advise,
confer, support her mate and marriage pact.
She never lost her trust in medicine.
She modeled patience and tenacity,
and Rick in time remembered how to grin.
His symptoms eased – his days are now pain-free.
She met the threat, deflecting a divide,
but lately Sally feels dissatisfied.
Δ
This cottage is my haven and retreat.
It shelters me from noise and people-stress,
but comfort’s only absolutely sweet
when following some outside busyness.
At times I’m bothered by the words or act
of one I love, upset and near-obsessed,
that’s other than deliberate or in-fact.
My subsequent relief makes me feel blessed.
I’ve heard that we evolved to notice change.
Our eyes react to movement just as fast
as fingers flee a surface burning hot.
So clearly I’m describing nothing strange.
To savor pleasure, I must sense contrast.
I used to hold this true, but I forgot.
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