Kentuckiannna on my Yankee Cell Phone

Electronic tones singing Miles From Our Home
erupt over the music and road noise,
Belly a proud marquee on the tiny silver screen.
Thumbing the ANSWER button, the vocal musing
of my favorite mass of contradictions fills my ear,
Kentucky and Texas blending brashly in her voice.
The current stop on her quest
to know what friends are thinking,
I answer her questions, but mostly I listen.
A boisterous hillbilly cackle
delimits the droll effusions of her narrative
as she paints an aural picture of a world uniquely hers.
Smiling, I return her parting assurance of love
before hearing that final drawled-out "Bye!"

The Sound of History

The air in Gettysburg whispers.

Rising slow but insistent
above the lazy buzz of flies
and gentle whir of breezes
bending the morbid grass
quite late on a summer's day,

I hear the faint but unmistakable
serial crack of musket fire,
a soft boom of artillery,
the muted shouts of generals,
and quiet vivid moans of pain
as life ebbs relentlessly
from a soldier's torn body,
his cause abandoned.

Last Night's Dream

The Western begins with a dust storm at night
savagely galing the horse-lined old street.
In an awkward apartment I shelter myself,
sharing a bedroom with four dear old friends
and their faces are all unfamiliar.
A younger Jennifer Aniston is there
but will not consent to sleep with me;
her gigantic closet has at least 30 switches,
but none will illumine the uppermost shelf
whereon, I am sure, lies the syringe
that will become crucial evidence.
Half-eaten turkey parts litter the floor
and we're all under suspicion
for a murder we may or may not have committed,
but free to go until the arraignment.
A brick in my pants delays my departure,
when I leave the flat all the others have gone.
I'm pursued by three nurses, huge and identical,
who gather to beat me with belts in the hall.
Slipping out to the street, I'm back in the dust
and the dawning light makes the cloud look like snow.
Running stark mad down the narrowing street
I dodge the dark figures moving all toward me,
emerging so sudden from the billowing glow.
My legs are yanked out and then I am flying,
pulled by a lasso, and from upside down
I can read the big banner
Welcome to Dodge
on my way out of town.

A Virgin's Lament

I seen him in the eastern field
early on a hot June morning.
His mama got sold to the Garners
and him they bring down here.
Just another strapling boy
with his grin and his straw hat,
singin' soft while he pick the cotton,
but something when he smile at me,
I feel like I can care for him.

Late at night when supper done,
I meet him in the sycamores
back the old cabins where we sleep.
He tell me about the farm he work
up further north, by Birmingham,
and how his poor mama cry
when they put him on the block.
By the by he stroke my arm,
and then I set real close to him
and lay my head down on his chest.
I hear the way his heart beat fast
and then he kiss me, warm and soft,
and I feel so bright and happy
like something in a dream.
Mama tell me, My sweet girl,
I trust you to know your time.
But mind our life ain't not our own,
fast as he here, he may be gone.

Next morning, down the Nanny come
from the house to Mama and say
they want her girl to work the kitchen,
old Mabel she too tired and sick.
Mama say she glad for me
but I rather stay in the dust and heat.

Now I wait the missus' table
and help the cook fix up the meals.
The houseman watch us day and night
and field slave can't come in the yard,
but sometime when the sun is right
I can just see that boy I love
out the small window of the pantry,
and I pretend that he see me.
I sweat with him out in the field
because he make my heart so glad.
Every night I think on going
out by the sycamore where we kiss.
I feel him hold me with his arms
and we make that sweet joy together,
but soon I know my dream is done.
I seen the massuh look at me.

Strangers in the Bathroom

She tosses her hair
and tugs at the halter,
absorbed in the mirror,
oblivious to me.

What she is thinking
I only can guess at,
boys and Eminem and
who's bringing the weed.

But I still remember
a girl in a jumpsuit
who laughed and yelled "Dad!"
as we skied in the trees.

The bike rides and zoo trips
and Halloween ghost walks,
her fond endless chatter,
the wet kiss on my cheek.

I miss her so bitterly
I choke on the toothbrush,
and the girl who replaced her
leaves without words.

insatiable

there's gotta be more
the soul ever cries
been after nirvana
since Santa Clause died

Homecoming

Familiar streets call out her name
and summon back the cold dead nights
of flame-black spoons and cheerless men
who paid for half an hour's relief.

The man whose arm she leans upon
and girl whose hand she tightly holds
know just the shiver, barely felt,
acknowledging a desperate youth.

A Gardener's Triumph

From a steadfast place inside
she flowers, proud and undefeated,
needing love to grow and lately
feeling safe enough to ask.

I wonder at her stubborn skill
in tending such a ravaged plot,
to make a patient garden thrive
where once was only dirt and tears.

Fishermaiden

A few words said warmly
and with such skill,
the hook is never sensed
in the pregnant charm
of the utterance.

Helpless on the line
and frightened by imperiled will,
there is sweet sad struggle,
then spasms of joyful pain.

Hauled onto the deck,
a glimpse of fish heaven
before being fileted.

A Poet's Choice

She wasn't meant for this world,
a stubborn mangled flower
damaged at the roots,
budding bravely among Darwinian weeds
that muscled without mercy
for their place in the sun.

No real surprise then
to learn that, appalled at the ugliness
and weary of the fight,
she decided to end her life.

Sorrow, like a blanket
wrapped around myself for comfort,
greets the note from a friend
describing the event.
A perfect tragic scene
like those she so admired:
A dozen careful roses at the bedside
in a cabin on the lapping sea,
baby's breath trembling
at her slow subsiding exhalations,
Schubert's songs on the stereo
echoing terminal despair.

It makes me sadder still
to think she chose
another's tear-filled eyes
to witness her farewell.