Miles down,
by jutting ankle bone he reaches.
Retrieves the fallen peanut shell.
With smiling morning memories
of bathing in autonomy.
They have left on a shiny shopping spree,
and they smile too, at their well-earned freedom.
Home now, from the wars of the ward,
he has his ticket, his assurance.
The snakeskin of sickness is shed.
Crunch one more, such delicious.
Another shell he lets drop,
in amused clumsiness.
Spies it with new eyes,
and down he dives.
Category Archives: Uncategorized
The Hospitable Cabin
A comforting story of a revered gathering place, by Gael Mueller. Loved it, especially the plaque on the wall.
Tres Pinos.
The cabin was built in 1923 by my great-grandparents. It is where they went every summer to escape the heat of the Central Valley.
It was a Cabin. With a capital “C”. One room, a wood stove for cooking and heating, a kitchen sink and cupboards with curtains (no doors). There was running water from a spring. My mother spent summers at the cabin with her grandmother when she was a child.
There have been a few upgrades. It has electricity. It has indoor plumbing. It now has a bedroom and a separate kitchen. All the comforts of home. Except there is no television, no radio, and, until recently, no phone. There is no such thing as cell service.
New front wall and porch. 2017
The place is stocked with very old books, picture albums of the family, fishing poles, flashlights and mouse traps. There is a granite…
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In plain sight
the adolescence of a nameless bird
studied, through patio glass
nothing to eat here, my friend
one or three peremptory pecks he makes,
then sees me
why aren’t you flying away, old chum,
like birds do
I look more closely-
sure looks like the one who hit our window yesterday
and we couldn’t find him
there’s a peculiar head movement
a familiar cockeyed tilt
he bobs up and down, takes his leave
a spinal chill comes to me
I ring up Charlie’s room
Charlie passed in the night.
JULY 6, 1957 THE GREATEST DAY OF THE 20TH CENTURY- THE DAY JOHN MET PAUL- 60 YEARS AGO TODAY
A glimpse into a moment of musical history. From https://slicethelife.com
On this day in 1957- 60 years ago today-John Lennon met Paul McCartney. Maybe I overstated it- calling this day the greatest day of the century, maybe I didn’t.
John Lennon’s group the Quarry Men were playing at the Woolton Parish Church Garden Fete. John Lennon and Paul McCartney had a mutual friend named Ivan Vaughan [who was born the same day as Paul was} It was Ivan’s idea to invite Paul to the event and introduce him to his friend John.
The Quarry Men were playing in a field behind the church [ a picture from the performance is above-with John and the Quarry Men- there is no picture of Paul on that day } This church fete was a big deal in Woolton- you have to wonder how The Quarry Men got invited to play at this?
On the way to the Fete- Ivan filled Paul in on…
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Moonlight
Such finely worded paintings she makes…a poem by Devika Mathur at My Valiant Soul.
i hear jars of jasmine in the pale moonlight singing and swallowing the day's lie the fallen mask of scalded hearts. the night has a belly of jam and butter smooth, a swamp of blood moons. a feverish rush of adrenaline, saying chants to hypnotize.
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Scene seen
Broadest blue
Clear palette
One white wisp
I’ll not forget.
Doppelgänger
Last night I was dying the sleep of the dead
It lasted for forty one hours
It must have infected my intimate head
Because now I have heavenly powers
As I lie in my armchair, I’m watching with glee
As I sip at my hot whisky toddy
The housework is done by a double of me
But another is moving his body
https://poetlee.ca/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/doppelganger_3_by_doppelganger47.jpg
Well, I would drive five hundred miles…
There, and back again. I wish it had a happy ending, like Bilbo Baggins’s book. I dropped my wife off to spend a few days with her sister in the North country. Last night I stayed in a motel and bedded down for the night at 10 pm. I am by nature a light sleeper, and unused to sleeping in strange beds. Unfortunately, I also had the neighbours from hell. They stayed up all night, and the door to their room must have slammed fifty times. Finally, at 3 AM, I summoned up the courage to open my door and see what the hell was going on down the hall. At that point, I saw two figures dressed in deep hoodies, and sporting backpacks. They seem to be in a hurry to leave the neighbours room, and kept their heads down and their hats pulled over their faces. I am no babe in the bush, and it struck me that probably what was going down was a drug deal. This could be a flight of fancy on my part, but pieces fit together pretty well I think. Someone who is dealing could rent a room reasonably cheaply and use it as a headquarters for the evening to do their transactions. Hence, the multiple door slammings and conversations in the hall. At four in the morning, still without sleep, I got on the phone to the front desk and did some yelling. Things seem to quiet down for a bit, and I was drifting off by around 6 AM when the shenanigans resumed. So, not one iota of sleep the whole night really. Around 7 o’clock in the morning, I grabbed a coffee and went to see them at the front desk. I told them how my night had gone. They expressed sympathy and offered me a discount. Ha ha. I said a one hundred percent discount would be more in line with my thinking, and that’s what I walked out with. It is 6:45 PM as I write this, and I am going to bed for the night in my own comfy quiet room. Wish me luck.
Stopping by woods on a sunny evening
Interrupted greenness laps at a concrete shore.
Pines conical
Squat bushes like smudged thumbprints
ubiquitous ferns with a grace of lowness
No single berry or petal resides
Birds are gone or struck dumb
I am stopped in this nondescript time and place
out of fatigue, tension, and the chewing of unpalatable thoughts
on this long and lonely trip home.
The idiot noise of the highway derby buzzes by.
I regret that I must rejoin it soon.
But I sit and sip some coffee.
Things have a vital brightness here.
Each is a home unto itself.
There is permanence, potential.
The verdant perfume of forgetfulness.
Please…I…tell me what is needed, this day.
So things can be set right.
Please, oh please.
Head banger
It is debatable whether I should share this.
Tomorrow I will drive 500 miles for the umpteenth time to see my wife’s sister. This is a person who, in the 40 years I have known her, seems bent on self-destruction.
I will spare you the lurid details of her life, except to say that she has been in trouble with the law on more than one occasion, and is close to being jailed for the things she has done and continues to do.
It’s a sore point between my wife and I. Over the years, she has made attempts to rescue, save, or reform this person. All to no avail. We take food up to her, “lend” her money, take her out shopping, buy her cigarettes, you name it. Two years ago, she had a stroke, then booked her self out of the hospital. Since then, my wife has been beside herself trying to get social services to help her out. She can’t understand why they won’t put her sister into an assisted care facility.
As I see it, there are a number of reasons. She is a gangster, so to speak, and has been in that life for years. You don’t just get out of it that easily. She herself will not get involved with social services in case she gets found out. So she is laying low, keeping her contacts close, and living the life.
It seems that every time we go there she’s in a different “house”, and the characters she associates with make me very uncomfortable. We have even brought her into our home for a vacation and, more than once, my wife has broached the idea of having her live with us. At least I have had the guts to say a flat no to that one.
This has been a constant irritant to me, and it’s hard to know what to do. I do understand that this is my wife’s sister, and that she has tried many things to help her get out of the life she’s in. But it’s come to a point where something has to give.
Aremyfeetofftheground 
