We chanted “I am rubber. You are glue,”
when someone playground-called pejoratives.
“Your words bounce off of me and stick to you.”
And that’s a clue, when comprehending Trump.
We’ve learned he won’t say anything that’s true,
but also understand the names he calls
are properly applied to him. His view
is so reflexive that each insult gives
a case of how he fails to think or do.
(Magic 9)
Is this our future now? Will we contend
with summer fires till all fuel has burned?
Will conflagration make our weather bend,
or weather rend our fortunes overturned?
In San Francisco, Berkeley, San Rafael,
in Oakland, Portland, Talent, air is hell.
The visuals are noxiously obscured –
each day’s a greater ill to be endured.
Although we understand it could be worse
(the earth might quake, a fresh calamity
could visit here, and wrest new ransom), we
are wearing thin without parole. The curse
of poisoned air removes all remedy –
shut in where even breath cannot be free.
(Pushkin Sonnet)
A dozen years I rarely sat outside;
the space was broken rock and rotting wood.
But then I spent a fortune, modified
the cottage, and installed a redwood deck.
I contemplated furniture. I tried
a chair, but soon I opted for a bench
and table, where my pen could be applied
to puzzles and composing what I could.
The glad result’s a deck well-occupied.
(Magic 9)
They roomed together 50 years ago
in Berkeley, at the height of its unrest.
They both liked drugs, but one of them was slow
to move and opted for cocaine as best;
the other raced a lot in legs and brain,
and liked how marijuana modified
her processing, let TV entertain,
increased the challenge friends did not provide.
The two are close and frequent even now,
and sometimes they indulge their youthful trade,
but allocate the tasks a bit. That’s how
the hophead bruised her finger with the blade
she used to chop the coke for her old sis,
whose wrist arthritis limits acts like this.
I love your love and value your respect
but honestly, your vehemence is dire.
I need your ears and heart – I don’t expect
defensive bold assertions, and your ire
becomes a force that forces me to pause.
It’s like I never own my own complaint.
I want to judge my kids – they give me cause,
but you reduce my words to quiet feint.
The soapbox isn’t tall enough for you,
but legs you up to mount the highest horse.
The wrath young you suppressed is overdue,
but not on my behalf. I was a force
indignant, all my childhood and youth;
with anger I don’t need your help, in truth.
I had career ideas when I was small,
but couldn’t zero in on one to tell.
I wrote and read a lot, as I recall,
but knew those loves would never pay me well.
My English major let me read some more
and write enough, but had a shortened reach.
A solider degree would be a chore;
(I knew for sure I didn’t want to teach).
I wandered into self-employment then
(a job as clerk provided doors for me
to open and explore). I loved some men
and married one, and soon a pregnancy
occurred. I seldom sought. Among the stuff
life offered, close attention was enough.
I wrote this poem a week ago, when I
was moving slowly, woefully depressed.
I woke again to ashen air, white sky,
and blue within. Of course I was distressed
by politics, infection, how we’ve messed
with planetary goods. We fail. We’re toast.
Rebounding with no reason, here’s the post.
(Rime Royal)
I can’t find decent mayonnaise of late.
I’d make my own, but it goes bad too fast –
my need is sparing, for I nearly hate
the stuff, enough I fantasized a vast
conspiracy of friends who’d say they ate
it, just to freak me out. I know at last
it’s gold to you; to me it’s merely lube,
and I don’t want to take it from a tube.
(Ottava Rima)
Deleting emails every day, I find
they’re poorly crafted and irrelevant,
for half are retail offers not designed
for staying home with shopping funds unspent;
the balance are political in plea –
they’re begging a donation out of me.
A robot urges, using my first name
as if it had some right to stake a claim.
A monthly pittance will not help a cause
that asks for funds but not for how to plan,
and runs statistics none know how to scan.
Deleting with disgust and clenching jaw
I’ve given how I’m driven. I began
and will continue, writing what I can.
(Pushkin Sonnet)
I bought my bike in 1985,
and soon I took to riding every dawn
(I’d left the hospital. I aimed to thrive).
It had a reading rack. I fed each yawn
with coffee from a shelf beside my arm.
The exercise was nothing hard to do,
and soon I felt my sweat was like a charm,
and added calisthenic workouts too.
But over time my aptitude has changed
along with appetite and tendencies –
the order of routine I’ve rearranged.
No longer drinking while I push my knees,
I’ve started doing squats and crunches first,
before I pedal or address my thirst.
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