Poetry for Play

8/6/2019 Poetry for Play

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Bruce [email protected]

Poetry for Play

Tonight is a night for poetry for play,of the word well turned in gracethat gently caresses the long neck,softly lifts the red hair on your head,

opens the fleshy pink folds of your mind,whispers tenderly to your soul's desire,and raises, raises, raises and kissesyour expectations with a female understandingof the worth of tending to the other's wants.

Tonight I will hold you with no abruptness,take your flesh's warmth and embraceand merely embrace it back as fiercely,expect nothing more and demand even less,bathed in this moment of pink-dawn lightI will supplicate before your spirited ways,go to the altar of your life and love,take the communion of your hopeand live up to it...no lies...no deceit...no obstacles to your thoughts or beliefs.

Tonight, the ending of this poem is yours.


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Homeland Security Parable

Heres the secret to homeland security.

My truck blew a tire

On a suicide curveIn a forest so remoteMy cell phone would not workAnd I was stuck in a forest.The wind chill factor was minus 5.

I had to pick up my eight-year old EamonIn a half hour from day careOr I would be charged a years mortgage payment.When I tried to get the spare tire offThe underside of the truck carriage,It was frozen solid and would not budge.

My clothes became filthy in forest dirtAs I tried in vain for 45 minutes to remove the tire.

I went into the truck to get warm and think.I had water and beef jerky in the truck cabin,So I still had time. I had a full tank of gas for heat.But the phone I tried o call my wife. No signal.I tried to call my brother. No signal.Theneurekawhat about 911?They must have a stronger skip tower.It just makes sense.

I called 911.Where are you?In BennetRegionalPark.You want the Park PoliceNowait but he transferred me.Park Police.Im stuck in BennetRegionalParkYou want the regional Park Police.Were the federal Park Police.NowaitI cant get a signalFrom my cell phone where I am.

Can you call my wife and tell herTo pick up Eamon and to call USAATo get me a tow truck out hereSure. He took the information.An hour later, she and the tow truck arrived.

But it was not over.The tow truck took me to Pep BoysWhere no one spoke English and, worse,


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No one wanted to fix the flat.On to Wal-Mart where they statedEmphatically they were closing in 10 minutes.I told the truck driver to take me to Gods Country,Mount Airy, where I moved 3 weeks after 911When I saw biological attack circle maps

Did not reach when they hit Washington, D.C.

On the way the driver said,Wait. In Damascus theres a garage I knowWhere the guy is in my AA group.You cant say anything becauseIts all supposed to be anonymous.You said you do volunteer civil defense, right?Yeah. I answered.Well then he has to help you. Hes a firefighter.Law enforcement has to help each otherWhen theyre in a fix like you are.

But Im not law enforcement. I protested.Im a volunteer for homeland defense.Doesnt matter. He said. He has to help you.

A few minutes later, the firefighterWho owned the garage opened the door,My truck was in, and fixed, in minutes.I returned the next day and boughtFour new tires from the same man.

Thats the secret to homeland defense.You depend on other people,

And they depend on you.Some call it the golden rule.


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Mummers Miracle

Like soldiers exhausted in battle,

They sit in a back alleyAt Juniper and Market,Having marched 9 milesPushing props and stagesDressed in a black outfitThat does not take attentionFrom the plumes and sequinsOf the up front show mummers,These marshals finally rest, 9 miles later,After miles of walking up Broad StreetIn Philadelphia during the New Years

Mummers Parade of 2005Where they never got to strut,To prance, to show off,To enjoy the crowd, the applauseOr the recognition of the mediaIn this-media driven society.

Like working men everywhere,They do their job quietly,Far in the backgroundWith no complaint or brag,The job well done satisfaction enoughAnd the smiles on the faces of childrenThe extra bonus, the Mummers Miracle

Until, laid out in their coffin at the wake,As mourner after mourner at the kneeler prays,It is said so many times, but neverLoses its genuine feel and graceHe was a good man, Lord. He worked hard.He took good care of his family.Make a place for him in Heaven, Lord.He deserves it. He was such a good man.


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And the string band FerkoOr fancy QuakerCityOr comic Froggy Carr line up,

And join him for one more march down Broad,To a City Hall where he is not judged,But welcomed with O Dem golden SlippersBy hundreds of thousands of mummersWho make the journey before himAnd becomes one more saint they sing aboutIn When the Saints Come Marching In.


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The Electric Life

Mouths agape,spittle and blood drip out,

the 24,000 volts struck hardfrom the overhead line,drew in the ladder,sent a shock through my handsthat burned, as well,it drove hard through the bodiesof Andy and Jimmy, Andy the elder,had his feet burnedinto the concrete pavement,Jimmy the younger was killedInstantly; the electricity passed

right through his heart.Nanosecond eternity.

Now I see my 16-month oldtake the plug and jam itinto the electric socket

so that his thumb becomesa flesh water conductoras so many years ago.SHIT!!! I scream as I lunge for him.SHIT!!! he repeats and then wails.

Now he knows the electric life.It took me thirty yearsto be free of the electric lifeby embracing its currentand convincing myselfit is only electricity,life giving, mostly,but life denying sometimes.

Read this one day Eamonand know of one of the many timesI failed you ...miserably.I'll take it to my graverather than pass it on to youand descendants and millenniums.


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Zamler*

It took me 50 years before I realized Im a zamler.From my childhood, I look for happy memories

That may help me make it through a day.From my parochial school nuns, I seek writing skillsThat help me to write design documents for pay.From my early marriage, I search for remembranceOf love and insight of a whole life, repaired damageFrom all of these memories, people, and things.

I act as my own zamler, ever saving, preserving,Thinking, recreating, working and smiling,Happy in the quest, anticipating the next find,Always sure that this memory, this time,

Must be cared for, preserved, into the futureIf only as a poem that somehow survives,The past as real as the present,The future as real as the past,If only my passion for gathering myselfMay one day help me to know myselffinally.

*Yiddish: A person who passionately collects scattered thingsto form a collection


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Dont Remember

That was so long ago,I dont remember.My mother would sayAnd quickly look awayWhen asked a questionBy one of her childrenAbout something so painfulShe did not care to discuss it.

Eventually,We came to knowThat no matter howWe rephrased the questionWe would get nothing moreOut of her on the subject.

Now my own childrenAsk such painful questions.

Most times I answer them,But increasingly I find thatBecause Ive lived long enoughTo know enough pain of my own,I find myself relyingOn the wisdom of her line,And I repeat her words exactly:That was so long ago,I dont remember. Ill say,And quickly look away.


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Christian Theology

When you break a windowNo matter how hard you tryYou can never pick upEvery last shard of glass

When you cut the grassNo matter how hard you tryYou can never cutEvery last blade of grass

Sin is like that.No matter how hard you tryYou can never eraseEvery last sinful trace

Which is why, listen,No matter how hard you tryYou will never exhaustThe crucifixions grace.


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Republican

He drives his foot into my groinand thinks I will talk.I look through the blood and sweatto the peace of the concrete wall, instead.He fails to understand, that here,"Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with Theein the damp concrete, I am home.The vomit smell cannot mask it."Blessed art thou, amongst women"

The brown blood stains are mere paint.The basement has always been my home"And blessed is the Fruit of thy womb, Jesus"in my youth and when running guns.I feel the sharp sting of the pins again,and the electricity shocks my whole body.It helps me to pass out long enoughto awaken to the sight of concrete walls.They put me back in a basement celland fail to realize I am home free.

One more secret I protect from Brit troopsand Brit torture observe the great Anglo Saxon,owner of the most dangerous mind of all,the mind that closes to history and literatureand music and a peoples will to win.I am back in the basement. I hear the boots approachand take one last look at home. I feel the approach of hands.Any more talkative today, Paddy? Well see, eh?I feel the surge and the voltage run wild and knowtoday is the day I disappear in the earthen basement."Holy Mary, Mother of gracepray for us sinners

That is as it has to beAll my life I watched my backonly to lie on it with no one to see.How defeat, Brit, such as me...Now and at the hour of our death, Amen"


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Civil War

Tell the children

Of their Civil War ancestorsChiseled in stone on markers in town squaresAnd remote fields everywhere in AmericaTell them the cost of civil warAnd the greater cost of forgetting it.

Tell the Old AmericansWho have forgotten their ancestorsAnd the blood sacrifices madeAs at Petersburg,Where blood spilled on mudThat went from scarlet red to brownTo earth but did not grow foodOr children but women who keenLong and hard in he black, alone night

Tell the busy AmericansWho value business above everythingThat what matters is faith for businessWithout faith business is empty prattle

And tell the New AmericansWho see only the $450,000 houseWith no thought to give backIn service or the blood of their childrenThat civil war is hard,Tell them, forgetting the lessonsOf The Civil War is harder still

Tell them all,That where a peopleForget their ancestors warsAnd especially the Civil WarsAnd ways and sacrifices and blood


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Attila the Hun and his modern hordesStill circle and gather in the steppes,In the internet, in New York CityAnd the town you call homeBut mostly in mosques

Ready to make take youfrom Jihad to Dhimmitude dimminhIn their caliphateThese are their wordsnot mine.They understand, if you do not.That civil war is now global.


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Meeting

Here, ideas float mid-airas open targets of word,

Cryptic and terse, that firemachine-gun rapid

To take them out...one...two...three...four...

Until at 5, an idea stays,

deflects all shots,Floats higher and higher

and settles backApproved, accepted, accurate

and written downBy consensus and commitment

and nods of headsAs certain as a hundred

thousand years agoThe light of electricity replaces

the light of the sun.

Remember: the idea for firestarted as humbly.


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The Need for Saturday Poetry

There are those who write Friday night poems,manic, frantic poems of word grenades

that are thrown in your face fiercelyand emotionally with no thoughtto consequence, restraint or the future.It is here, man, it is now, man,it is in your face and your mammas face and dig it,I don give a [chose your own curse word]see, man, its my, poem, my poem that matters,and only I matter in all this worlds creationright now, man, understand what Im sayin...and the poet leaves the stage and spotlightto screams and high fives and another shotof cavorsier as institutional as the poem was not.

There are those who write Sunday afternoon poetry,wonders of iambic pentameter and tetrarchsand thought and word constructions so denseand thick that the early settlers to America,had they faced the same dense forest of words,never would have made it past the white sandsof the Eastern Seaboard; great pedantic wondersof words on page and now on the Internets wallbeckoning but leaving the soul as cheated and emptyas the stomach fed on grass in a famine;these poetry Pharisees and Saducees leave the lectern

and the seminar to the abject loneliness of the deskwith no window and soldier on, cursing theirsuperiors orders while obeying them religiously.

Others write Saturday poetry, work and art poetry,poetry that takes the everyday and routine knowsthat, yes, the baby must be fed, but the baby hasalways to be fed not only the sweet and nutritiousmothers milk, but the poetry and song and gentlymental caress of the word well turned so that,generations hence, poetry is still sung to babyswhose eyes dart back and forth in half sleep

and are touched in the deepest corners of their mindby words that connect them again to the peaceof the womb and the ultimate peace of Heaven:Like Emily Dickinson, they scrub the floorsof the halls of poetry just to raise their headsoccasionally to hear the angels sing.


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I Am the Serbian Sniper

I am the Serbian sniper, and you cannot stop me.Three confirmed this week, seven the last,And it is all the same to me. Some movement?!Down "Sniper Alley" a child dares the run,And I see her form clearly in my sights.Perhaps a Croat. Perhaps a Muslim.Maybe a Jew. In seconds, I make them all oneIn death the way they could never be in life.The head appears huge in my scope.I squeeze lightly the trigger.Her head cracks back in one movement.

She is the one of a thousand rabbitsI have hit so easily. The bullet hits bothAnd their bodies spasm and the blood squirtsAs they hit the ground lifeless. Like the rabbitsI downed by the thousands as a child in the forestAlong the Adriatic, I do the honorable thing.I wait to make sure she is dead. If she moves,I will put another bullet into her body or headTo end her agony and win another confirmed.Unlike the rabbit she pretends no stillness.I chalk another form on the hard wall.

I am the Serbian sniper whom the mightOf the new European Community, UN, USAnd the so-called "world community" combinedWith its bragging of "human rights" cannot contain.I daily ruin their plans of a "new world order."They fail to realize I am the new world order.I create it with each bullet splintering bone,With each quart of blood drained from a fresh hit.I am the enforcer of purification, perpetual war.When they hold conferences, I unleash bullets.You can see who gets more headlines each hour.In fact, I care nothing for nationalism, communism,

Or even for the "ethnic purification" about whichAll the puke politicians in Belgrade preach.I care only for confirmed kills, for the adrenaline rushOf the aim, release, hit, blood, and stillnessOf the prey as it twitches and then stops breathing.For I am god at that moment deciding who will live or die.

I am the Serbian sniper, the fright of diplomats


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I baffle with my simple understanding of man's motives.One bullet from my rifle speaks more than allThe documents and peace treaties they will ever sign.I am their younger brother who killed cats and rabbitsWhile they studied so quietly and diligently at school.I am their boorish father, brother, son, they tried to disown

Only to find that I have come back, with gun, for their home.I am the Serbian sniper and you'd better invite me to dinner.I am tired of stealing food from the pantry of thisSqualid hotel from which I gain my confirmed kills each day.Otherwise, the people who give me my bulletsWill continue to be my employers when it is a new home,And not this damaged hotel, for which I kill so deftly.And, as I prove daily with my sniping skills, new homes,Like new systems, can be built anywhere in the "New World Order."Perhaps you think we could not be neighbors?Then consider this when next you turn offThe evening news because I look so far away:

As long as there are rabbits in your yard,There will be willing hunters like me in the shadowsReady to take down whatever moves but never learns.


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Screaming Like a Banshee

My wife screams like a bansheeWWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!to cover wailing with neutral soundwhen my toddler Eamon fights herand refuses to take a nap.

I hear Grandmom Curley screamedlike a banshee when the telegram arrived

from the War Department in 1945to tell her the oldest, Frank, the onewho was supposed to be the Jesuit,instead had been killed in actionwhen the Japanese ack-ackturned his B-24 into a fireballon his 39th mission over Haha Jimain an ocean grave in the South Pacific.

Grandmom Curley screamedlike a banshee for weeks

until they hooked her upand shot electricity through her brainto cover wailing with neutral sound.She never screamed like a banshee again.

Instead, she wailed so deep down for 20 yearsbecause the hole in her heart was so vastlaughter was no longer a planet in her galaxyand the only way people would describe her was,She was never the same after Frank died in the Pacific.


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Permanently Bent Back

Thats the kind of poetry bookI hope to publish someday.

The one over there on the Writers Center shelf,

The one titled:The Figured WheelNew and Collected Poems 1966-1996by Robert Pinsky, Poet Laureateof the United States emblazonedon the gold sticker as an after thought.

Not for the fame, not for the title,Not for the poems themselves...But for the cover permanently bent backafter being mauled by so many hands.

That is how I want my poem books to lookNow...and after I am gone.


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Moving

Ten years in a houseAnd it comes down to this:

A dime dropped years agoRevealed when the closet is emptiedAll the earthly possessionsOf a family of fourStacked into the backOf a 24-foot rental truck

A few flowers leftFor the new ownersOn the breakfast table

A full bag of birdseedEmptied into the back yardAlmost gone by the timeThe truck is fully loadedCobwebs in places you forgotEons ago the back of dormers,The eves in the attic,The back of the sump pump

What looked so grand a houseTen years ago seems smaller now,Worn, used up even,Though thousands in dollarsAnd sweat equity went into itOver so many days and nightsUntil it becomes clear to meA saying by a Politics of Fascism professorWho in 1975 sat before me in classPounding his fist into the desk screaming,This is metaphysical! Not reality!This is not metaphysical! Not reality!This is not metaphysical! Not reality!

I let the metaphysical house become realityWhen it is only sheetrock, wood, nails,

Screws, paint, caulking, Reflectix,Glass, steel, appliances, concrete, dirt.

May family is my home.


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Their very bodies my house.Their health and success the future.

And if bioterrorists hit hard,Or planes drop out of the sky nearby,

I may have to move on again with my family.

As Pete Thompson,a friend who spent 2 toursIn the Special Forces in VietnamLiked to remind me,the only thingyou can carry across bordersis what you keep in your headand in your heart. The rest canbe taken from you at any time.

So work on those things you can keepIn your head and heart.The rest is just window dressing.


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What a Poem Is

A poemis a compressedthoughtor emotionlike this

smiling.


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Treats

I dont ever want to beA burden to my family!My mother would frequently sayW hen she was still alive.Having buried her last month,I want to tell her what joyWas in her massive smileWhat tenderness in her wordsOf solace and praise as whenFour months unemployedJust last year during the downturn

She said so easily and quickly,God doesnt close one doorHe doesnt open another!Youre a good fatherAnd a good man, Bruce.Someones going to see that!

And out of the blueIm working on a manualFor a robotic gene detection systemTo protect Americans from anthrax.

She didnt know what job I would get,But her unquestioning faithIn God, her children, and her countryTold her that some job would arrive,As if by an angel delivered expressFrom God, whose mystery,Manifest in the Sacred Heart of Christ,Shone from cards on the wallsAnd dressers from wherever she lived.


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Lets take a walkUp to the boardwalkAnd get a treat! shed sayOn cool nights in Cape May,And she would trundle her brood

Up to the one pier thereAnd line us all up for ice creamIn a ritual she repeatedWith eight childrenAnd 20 grandchildren.

Thanks for the treats, Mom,That helped me deal with unemployment,And other body blows life deals out,Like the threat of terrorists and anthrax.

Thanks for the treat of your legacyOf how to deal with lifes body blowsSometimes with solace and praise,Sometimes with self confidence,And sometimes with boardwalk ice cream.


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That Laugh

That laugh would startlike an ocean wave"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA "and build in volume, depth, and pitchuntil it became a tidal wave"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAand washed overmy brothers and sisters and I,

to our delight as children and adults,to our embarrassment when teenagersout in public, over everyonewithin a half mile roundand continue in undulating waveafter wave until you wonderedhow she got oxygen fast enoughto supply those great wavesof laughter that seemed to plumbthe very depths of a joyful heart.

It wasn't all laughter, of course.There were Harry's diseasesbut even during the worst daysthe laughter continuedin great bursts and passion.

And among her many sayings:"God doesn't close one doorthat he doesn't open another!""The lint on your clothesmeans your going to come into money!"she expressed the desire:"I pray to God every night for eachone of you and that I go first.It must be the hardest thing on earthto lose one of your children first."Now your prayer has been answered.

If we are allowed to carry


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one talent from earth into heavenwhen my time comes, and ifGod decides to take me in,I expect I will hear that laugh rising,as it did on earth, louder and higher

than all the others to say, as she hadso many times when she was aliveand knew that it was only half true,"You did it all on your own, kid,and I'm very, very proud of you!"


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Small Miracles

We expect miraclesto arrive like The Big One,

the earthquake that shatters our worldlike the one they have been expectingin California for decades.

But miracles are more subtle.

They arrive quietly and unnoticed most timesand only revel themselves if you listen.

Like today when my wife gave up the divorce talk.

I said divorce to me was likethe first five minutesof our house firewhen my mind kept screaming,This cant be happening!This cant be real!but her screams and the fireballthat kept assaulting uswas real and got worsesecond by second untilI saw enough to seethat not only the house burned

but the flesh on her face,shoulder, arm and hand had, too.

Or like when my brother Bobcalled and said BruceMom died.and I collapsed to the floorand I thought it couldnt get worsebut it did.

However lightly many Americans take divorce,Divorce to me is such moments,those house burningand mother dying moments,but accelerated and multipliedby a horror factor of ten.


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But my wife began to give,and I began to give,and instead of turning her backshe laid her head on my chest

in our marital bed last night,and a small miracle happened.

Then a box of red Texas grapefruitappeared at the doorat that moment of giving.to help heal her illness.

Maybe it was a gift from God.Maybe it was my internet purchase.But like every small miracle,

It was probablya little bit of both of us.


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Metaphor

On a walk today,I came upon

a caterpillarsoft and fuzzyand brownbut motionlessbecause his headwas coveredin black road tar.

He reminded meof someone I knew once,someone whos head

was once coveredin black road tarthe doctors calldepression.

Occasionally,that someone I knew oncewill drive over melike that caterpillarto force my headback into the statewhere it is coveredin black road tardepression.

Except that Ive learnedover many yearsthat getting upafter the tar coversmy brain,hard as liftinga weightten times my size,requires that Imuster all my strengthand all my spiritand all my resources


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Even thenI need 9 others,many I dont even know,some in the spiritual world,to lift myself off the road,

clean the tar off my mind,and walk on,vigorously,until the first smile arrivesand the hilarityfirebombs melancholiaback to hell.


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Heartwood

Every tree is a worldLike earth

Teeming with lifes elementsWater, cells, minerals, DNA,That with the sunAnd the cycle of seasonsRecreates the eternal planIn increments of secondsThat builds, each on each,Photosynthesis engineeringMore powerfulThan any nuclear power plantWeds sugar and water to leaf

Where a ladybug eats an aphidAnd is eaten by a blue birdThat carries foodTo four starving chicksIn a nest box made of woodDont you see?Everyday this tree yields life,Oxygen, wood. fruit, shelter,The very paper on whichI am able to write these words.Still, we obsess about deathOn the morning and evening newsWhen this tree stands tallAnd delivers life,Like a loving wife,With grace and loveAnd heartwood spiritIts prayer and work clear:LooklistenseeEven after the worst down pourOr the attack of the beetle,Its branches reach toward heaven.


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Work Ethic

Three missed spots on the wood

Stare at me, challenging me, bother meUntil I take up a brush and returnTo the deck wood, stain brush in hand,And take them down until the job is done,My fathers voice, now 17 years buried,Echoes down through the years,If youre going to do a job, do it right,If youre going to do it half ass, dont bother!A work ethic that still carries with me todayIn this age of greed and jobs half doneBut shipped to the customer regardless.

The same spirit that made farmers with pikesIn Wexford in 1798 to hurl themselves againstBritish troops with guns and cannonsOr recent immigrants at Antietam and FredericksburgTo charge well protected lines again and again.My fathers Irish and Pennsylvania Dutch bloodCompelling me on to get it done right, ignore the odds,See it through to the end, walk away from the jobOnly when it is completed and solid and will standFor centuries rather than days or weeks or yearsThe job well done its own reward, the money secondary,A work ethic I instill in my children dailyAs my father and mother instilled it in me,The class part of my working class childhoodThat makes civilization worthwhile, worth defending,Worth perpetuating, and worth the effort and time,The pure joy of work well done what makes the familyContinue through generations like moleculesLinked like coral, strong beneath the ocean above.


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Future Dust

"I'll never look like that!"

I said to myself when we were offloadedfrom the Lakeland Air Force BaseOfficer Training School busheard the upperclassmenbark orders at us, the arriving class,and saw the triple rings under their eyes.

Six weeks later, I looked like thatas I stood at the attention outside my roomon Saturday Morning Inspection

(as one upperclassman stoodoutside my room looking at every detailof my appearance for deviations"Details will save your life!"repeated by my teachers so oftenit is forever burned into my mind,and another ran over every detail in my roomfrom the folds in the mattressto the spacing between my socks).

I broke after they leftto scan my demerits bookaware that so much dependedon my finally bring those demerits down:my graduation, the cohesion of my flight, honor,the future of the United States of America.

And there it sat, like a turdthe inspector left behindfrom his white gloved hand:"Future dust."

When the inspector returnedfor questioning, I fired it right at him,"What's 'future dust', Sir!?""I'd have had a perfect inspectionbut for that demerit."

"Come over here, son."he said in a thick Southern drawl.He opened the blinds to let in the sun


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and pointed at the air.

"What's that?" he said,a thin grin opening on his face,all the muscles in his future fighter pilot's body

preparing to press the red button on the joystick

"Dust, Sir." I stated."Wrong, Officer Candidate Curley!That's future dust!In a few minutes it will landon your desk and you failed to prevent it!Therefore, you Sir, are guilty!Guilty of letting down your flight!Guilty of failing to prevent future dust!"Three demerits. Good-bye!

As our teachers told us so many times,they were preparing us for war.Waging war has rules and surprises,and surprises repeated often enoughbecome the rules of warfare.

Like future dust,Or the future dust of a companythat fails to plan for the next bear market,or the future dust of a family death,or the future dust of the lack of preparationfor the next war and the deaths that will result,or the future dust of skyscrapers brought downby fanatical Mohammedian jihadis,or the future dust we will findclogging the oxygen filtersof our interplanetary space ships.

So many years later,I now know they were right.We all must be eternally vigilantto prevent future dust from landing,if we are to have any chance at allof a life in the space dust of the future.


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Viking Demons

God save us from the fury of the Norsemen.Prayer said at Irish Masses until recently.

Just when you think it has disappeared at nightand fled to the outer space beyond knowingit strikes the microscopic nerve endingsthat bundle around your brain like the threadsthat by the millions lock to keep the newborn alivebut instead of life-giving warmth and comfortthis insipid force strikes into consciousness,binds reason into solitary confinement,and lashes out at every unprotected nerve endingthat dares to lie across its marauding pathand strikes hard and fierce and thoughtless

like Vikings pulling up ships onto the Shannons bankto slice open the backs of monks on the alterand to pull the lungs out before the villagein a game called the bloody eagle and ask,Now...where is the gold weve come for!?and like the poor and confused peasantsof those 9th century Irish villages who stoodfrightened and amazed that such evilcould be allowed by God to possesssuch massive and brutal broad axesyour subconscious stands dumbfoundedas this Viking-like mental illness asks,

Now...where is the sanity weve come for?!until somewhere deep, very deep, it startsand you charge the bloated Viking empty handedand grab his broad ax and begin to use it on himas he just used it on your holy monkand after a bitter and scarring fightyou retreat to your hut a new man,ready to fight off the Viking hordesready to claim your rightful sanityaware that as it took centuries to tame the Vikingsit will take centuries more to tame this mental illnessbut each hour to years to centuries begins with seconds

when you grab the broad ax and use it with courage.


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Girl at the Deli

You walk into this friggin deli where youve

never been before all summer hot and friggin angryand there, behind the counter, she stands,lips big enough for a zip code,hair as fine as spun satin and silkand skin that breaks your heart in two...

you look right at her and stammer, c..c...c...coffeeand she says back, two or three sugars?and you stumble again uh...two...uh...threeand cotton wads grow in your mouth,you smile wanly and she smiles backso unspoiled and athletic and young

and that chemical reaction startsin your brain and WHAAAAAAAMMM!!!once again life has possibilities and hope.

She brings you a cup of coffeeand you sip it and want to spit it outbecause it tastes like its been there since World War IIbut you smile instead because you noticehow fine and bright and clean her eyes speak to you nowand although you want to say Dear God!How can you sell this turpentine as coffee?!you smile again and gulp it down quickly

and say, Just what I needed! Hits the spot real well!And she smiles and says, Best for miles around!How long have you been in these parts?!and now you know the chemical explosionsare going off in her brain, too,so you drink some more coffeethat is so toxic and strong and fiercethat your taste buds have all mutiniedbut even it cannot kill the wonderful chemicalsthat now grant you the absolution, benediction,and grace of love and suddenly you knowRobert Graves knew what he was talking about:

for here, between the provolone cheese and the Zinfandel wine,is clear and living proof of the unbroken chainbetween the ancient Celts and the current White Goddess.


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Poetry in Wood

To create a piece of furnitureIs to create poetry in wood.

To take the raw wood of trees:Sweet-smelling Southern yellow pine

And strength of 3/4" exterior plywood;To cut them into only the necessary sizesAnd then to fashion them together,Like wood words into stanzas,That through sweat, muscle and mindBecome beauty and form perfect,Unity of form and function and use;Is to then create something more.

For those who refuse to see this,Consider that this simple book stand,

Made of mere wood, 3" deck screws,Some sand sealer and Helmsman's varnish,May one day stand in a future atticOn a planet we can't even imagine,To be seen by a spellbound descendantWho will look at its essence and wonder:What kind of ancient wood-working poetCould have written this poem in wood?


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The Last Rose

The last rose of the seasonremains uncut on the rose bushin the unnoticed corner of the yardby the crumbling yellow pine fence.

I could, it is true, cut itand bring it to you, as before;Or simply snip it and place itin the Waterford vase in the kitchen...

but it is the end of the season.This ruined Fall could soon be Winter.The days with no talk could be weeksUntil the weeks are years, and divorce.

No, that rose will remain where it is.

When it dies, its stem attaches to rootsThat are strong in minerals, dirt, and water.And Spring has so much renewal to give.


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Giving Speech to the Silence

Someday, you're an old man

and they're all gone:

One to the West Coast.One to man'sinsatiable appetite for war.One to marry a manyou thought unworthy of her.and the one here even now,the one who always returnsno matter what obstaclesthat keep the others.

He's the onewho from the timehe was a babyunderstood the silences:

The sound paper makeswhen crinkledin utter noiselessness;

the sound a heart makeswhen contractingwithout the benefit of other hearts;

the sound of a voice faintbut recognized by the inner spiritwho says at your deathbed,"God I love you, Dad!?"as you journey half earth, half heaven.

And you smile through the pain,try to let him know nowwhat you never bothered to tellhim back when you had so many days,that, deep within your hidden heart,he was always the onewho battled the silence for you


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making you knowthrough talk or humor

or his mere presenceat the tend of other hospital bedsthat nervous breakdowns bring,

again and again he reminded youthat silence is the cruelest,the most deadly illusion.

And with your last breathin this world you rememberquickly and silently why

you loved this one so:

He was the onewho gave speech to the silence.


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Seamus Heaneys Greatest Poem

On January, 30, 1972, following Bloody Sundayand the killing of thirteen civilians by British bullets,Heaney resigns his position at Queens Universityand moves his family to Glanmore, in County Wicklow.

Harvard ReviewThe View from Lamont,Homage to Seamus Heaney1995 Nobel Prize in Literature

No. 10, Spring, p. 7.

As when the bardfled to the interiorwhen the Vikings or Britishstruck hardand slaughteredthe best poets because,in them,rested Irelands future...

...so Seamus Heaneyhad to flee Southto the interiorto Wicklowto safety,and a thousand future poems,because in himrested Irelands future.


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Eamons Poem

Kicking your motherfrom inside the liquiduniverse of the womb

I feel so crippledand brokenwhen consideringI have so much to teach youand only the remaininglifetime to do so.

It is hopeless, really,except these two gemsthat came down from a long, long,

line of men and women who survivedcenturies of Viking invasionswhose barbarity was only surpassedby the neighbor invaderwho considered genocideby the rule of lawsuch a jolly good adventureand stole all the foodin the very middleof the famine of all famines.

Through it all,your ancestors survivedtenaciously creativeand green as mosson the back of a stoneon the gentle Shannon riverand these two gems skip acrossthat great river to the Delawarewhere once, when wonderingof ancestral roots I asked my father,Dad, what is it to be American?

Work. What? I asked.Work. he repeated.Your grandfather worked.I worked. Youll work.Thats all? Thats all. he answered.


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Then what is it to be Irish?Hilarity. He didnt miss a beat again.Hilarity. You gotta make em laugh.So there it is Eamon Patrick.

If God takes mebefore I get to teach youall you need to know,let these two words suffice:work and hilarity.

Work and hilaritysaved your peopleover centuries of warfare, pestilence,invasion, slavery, defeat, and famine

and eventually defeatedthe greatest power on earthso that I could write you this poem.

Work and hilaritycan carry you to the universeand to the other planetsand when you finda particularly hard planet,name it Work,and when you findan especially funny planet,name it Hilarity.

No matter what the planet or year,work and hilarity are in your genesas am I, and all of my dreams.


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The Wedding of Trees

Just when I thought

my marriage was twin oaks,side-by-side, backs to the world,outsides out, insides in,

it hits me it's much, much deeper.

The better analogy

the correct analogyfor this marriage 15 years inis the banyan treeroots as branches

branches as roots

what I thoughtwere two separate trees

is in fact merely oneall the veins intertwinedall the blood pumping throughone sacred flowfrom the same source so thatwithout even knowinghow or why or when

I have grown into my wifeinto her lifebloodinto these childrenwho continue the banyan treegeneration into generation

vine into trunkinto branch into root which,with water, sun, mineraland the holy breath of life

blows seed to new grounds

that goes to new soil,new banyan trees,new life so thatwhen it is timefor this banyan treeto break into minerals,


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the job has been done so quietly

the twin oak treeswho became one banyan treebecome millions

planted on planetsas yet unknown.


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When Fish Cry

Who hears the fish when they cry?Henry David Thoreau

This stream,

which space families will needas they populate galaxies past our knowing,feeds a river with hundreds of thousandsof its brothers and sistersand an oceanthat is so vastwe will know galaxiesbefore we will know its mysteriesis home, to fish,so many fishas there may be stars

in not just our galaxy,but all the galaxies we will know.

When fish cry,we should weepfor the galaxiesand the childrenwell never know.


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F. Scotts Gal Friday

She came all the way from California...to visit F. ScottFitzgeralds gravesite in Rockville [MD] for the very first time.

Frances Kroll King ...was his secretary during the last 20months of his life. She was with him the morning of his death. Shewas the woman who made the funeral arrangements, closed up hisHollywood apartment, tidied up his affairs and is in part responsiblefor making sure his legacy lives on.

Gazette Regional NewsA Respectful VisitJudy Hruz Staff WriterWednesday, October 1, 1997, p. A42

I was his Gal Fridaywho answered an adfor a secretaryand ended up beinga nurse, literary estate executor,a friend, confidant, and literary agentand just between you and me -----his muse.

When his bodyconvulsed from dry heavesI cradled his head in between lettersto publishing houses demandingpayment for short stories delivered.

When his faceshowed signs of the strainof too many years without good foodand too many nights with good drinkI made nourishing chicken noodle soupfor his tortured soul.

If you look hard enough,youll find me in his writing,words that sing an operato the human gift of language;which passages are our secret.


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When he died,I cried for a year.The world forgothe was ever here by 1940...

but not me; I loved himin a way even my husbandcan never know -----I entered his heart

When I became a writer, too,I wrote a memoir of our life,Against the Currentto honor him and to move on...

But when I saw his name

and the same line on his gravehalf a century later,I was 20 again, Scott was.......oh, well...all was possible.

Even nowthat my hair grows gray,I look in a mirrorand see a shyyoung girls reflectionin the mirrorof an older writer...

and smile deeplywith love of spiritlove of nourishingspirit with good soupthe loveof an accidental joband a determinedGal Friday.


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The DictatorForPlato of The Republic

Please! It hurts!

says the poet.

You think your facedoesnt hurt my boots?!answers the dictator.


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The Meaning of Space Silence

(For JohnG

lenn)

My computer, of course, knows what to do.It hums along in the same silence today,as yesterday, as tomorrow.

The line on earthwas that space was science, jobs,adventure, minerals, and wealthbeyond our imagining...

but it is silence, mostly.

Vast periods of silence

broken by an occasional evideomail from earthas if I even remember earth

in the magnitudeof this silence.

In this silence,I have discoveredand then talked tomy spirit.

Back on earththey may thinkearth is all.

In space Spirit rules...through silence.

The acceptanceof that silence

is ecstasy.


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Roy Orbison Lament

His voice soarsover heartsicknessover knots in the throat

over love possibilitiesover love delightlover love disappearto a balladsung in an American voiceinterwoven and splicedto French romantic poetry.

Even behind the dark glasses,a melody to dreamsof love given and takenmakes the prayer of songas St. Dominic reminded usprayed twice, half straightto the ear of God,half straight returnto our own damaged souls.


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St. Francis Bedside Lament

But Francis looked on with increasing anguish at what he saw as a harsh

and legalistic metamorphosis of his lifes dream. In his Testament, writtenshortly before his death in 1226, he uttered a wistful protest and tried to callthe order back to his lovely Lady Poverty.

A Concise History of the Catholic ChurchThomas Bokenkotter, 1979, p. 160

I lifted swords with these hands once,fought worldly military campaigns and rebuilt churchesstone by stone when God called me to His sideby speaking my name so many times

it drove me insane with flight until I returned,returned to His breath of life and His watersatiated my thirst, his bread fed my spiritual hunger,and my stomach, contracted from fast, could not hold downHis holy and precious wine. I took his strength, sowed itin fields and towns and villages and cities all over Italy.He gave me miracles when I did not ask for them,spoke to me through birds and animals as clearlyas you would hear the voice of your own father.But now the wily Pope Honorius and his enforcer,Cardinal Ugolini, take it all from me on my deathbed.I, who know well the mind of God in a way thatdrives one crazy or drives one to his lovely wounds,Am baffled, continuously and to my very deathbed,by the mind of man and its perpetual machinations.They invalidate this very Testament by desecrating my temple,Lady Poverty, my only comfort, as I see my Creators faceeven more lovely than I have known it in this life,in this stigmatas joy, this poverty that now allowsme to so easily leave this metaphysical worldfor the Spirit Who now whispers such sweet love,such sweet love. ---- Honorius, Ugalino,you can ignore me and make my order worldly,but not this sweet, sweet Love....this sweet, sweet Love....this sweet....this....


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Backyard Quiet Salvation

This is the quiet of the backyard:The roses roots dormant in winter,

The split oak logs ready to provide,comfort and warmth promise of lifethrough the next and the next deep freeze;

The fence high enough to deter intruders,but low enough to allow the seamless bondsof the domestic nature inside the gardento commune with the wild nature outside;

The gate double latched and lockedagainst criminals bent on violating

this homes domestic tranquillity;

The birds abundant at feeding timetribute to my mothers admonition:Feed the birds and you never go hungrythe reason the bird feeder is always fulleven in the worst weather,the birds that force us to leave the mundaneto consider the heavensalways to be treated with extra care and time.

And this baby in my armswho startles me everyday day with the thought:Where did he come from?!

Oh, I know the biological explanations,but they are never sufficientto answer such a mysterious question;

This baby,whose everyday existenceis poetry and the core reason for poetry;who supersedes all the academicand ego reasons, this life,this beautiful head and soft new hair,these eyes that can make me cry outfrom depths that are subterranean cavitiesthat lay fallow until he was bornbut which now produce love enoughfor him and some extra for street orphans


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and incompetents, this small bodywhose strength is already more potentthan my once formidable athletic prowess,this form in my armsthat sleeps in backyard quiet,

isolated from the worlds crime and crueltywho reminds me so discretelythat backyard quiet makes the poetryof the front yard performancepossible and necessary and good:

this life in my armsis proof of the unbroken chainof life that leads us back to Adamand the Original Sin and the promiseof eventual quiet back yard salvation.


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Beating the Black Plague

It is this that can makethe black syrup cover my brainat such odd moments:

the knowledge that thoughI know now the reasonfor your current sleepinessand lethargy is the baby,your womb that providesthe miracles and the reasonmen like me get an extra fifty yearsto figure out the reason we are here

still, I see the end in this, too,the corpses piled high in the plaguethat will hit as certainly from our ignoranceas those in the middle ages who builtroofs of straw that provided fine habitatsfor the rats who in turn suppliedsuch fine habitat for the fleas.

I want you to love,as I want to live,in health and happiness and peacebut the bargain we struck on the altarsaid, in sickness and in healthwith the sickness part first.

So I contemplate this only rarelyand have decided to say it once:I love you so that the thought of youreventual death is the realizationof the temporariness of all this:thereby, my temporary life and love

has on earth, been granted eternal worth.


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Old American Ways(A Valentine)

Wheres the gravy!?she said in a voicethat let me knowit was no metaphor.

I threw it outwhen I did the dishes!I shot back,confident my helparound the kitchenwould cover for anysmall mistakes.

You threw it out!?she answered as quickly.But that was Eamons food!The gravy is the mostnourishing part!

So make him other food.I dont think at 9-months oldwere particularly discriminating.

She was not to be mollified.

LOOK! Dont everthrow out the gravy again! NEVER!And dont ever do the dishesif youre going to throwout the gravy! I thrownothing out, NOTHING!I use everything. GOT IT!

This was from the womanwhose mother, I noticedwhen I had just taken Eamonto the doctor, had sewnhis shirt with thick, shiny dental floss.The very reflection from the brightlights in the doctors office assuredthat the doctor noticed it, too.In the area where we live,


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such signs can be readas child neglect and,given the right bureaucrator judge, outright child abuse.

Dont you EVERthrow the gravy out again!Do you understand me?!Its the most nourishing part.

Properly chastised,I remembered againwhy I had wanted to marrya woman from an orchard familyso many years and children ago,and why I still loved this one so.


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Coyotes Lament

Honey...this woman

had her tonguein his ear,one hand in his hair,

another God knows where,and they were speeding down

I-270 in a massive Jeepgoing 80 miles an hour!

For shame.For shame.

Why doesnt that

happen to meanymore?

Oh, theyreprobably

not married.she replied,

as if that answered it?

Who knowsif they were

married!Point is,

think aboutwhat I said!Her tongue

was in his ear,her one hand

was in his hair,the other handwas...well...

it could have beenanywhere,

and they werespeeding

down the highway!Now thats living!

I said, turning over sideways,dreaming of highways

and freedom


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and excitementand love

out of whackwith all sense of propriety.

Like I said,they probablywerent married?

she said again,as if that answered

anything.

Outside,a coyote

called to a jackalloudly,

while the jackalignored the coyotes call.

But, AHHHHthat moons bright tonight.

Just the kind of moona coyote might use

to guide him to the highway.


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The Splendid Routine

It is in the routines life is mastered,not the spectacular or heady.It is the sandwich made againand again to the same perfection,that feeds the millions;

The 2 x 4 placed in the same positionas a thousand times beforethat builds the house for millions;the prayer prayed with humble precisionthat reaches the ear of God.So, despite the media feeding frenzy,the 15 minutes of fame, the opening nightglory, the awarders giving each other awardsin Hollywoods special desperation,or the worship of the crowd in the standsat the sports cathedrals ritual of discipline

and moxy granting blessing and benediction,Remember this:the same crowd that worshipsin the stands has a cadre nearbyfashioning the crown of thorns,.and preparing the cross and nailsIt is in the routine task done wellfamily life rewards and the world ignoresthat generations continue; leave themere heady moments to the world.


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Mid-Night Milk Run

Ladies,Bewareof men

too willingto go

for a gallonof milk at night.

Such timeallows

copiousamounts of time

to hand the bookieor the dope dealer

or the other womanor any numberof temptationsfamily money

or the pathto your

mans heart.

So when he returnswith that gallon of milkalways check it twice:

Once to make sureall the cream

hasnt been skimmedfrom the top;

And once to makeabsolutely sure

both he and the milk

are still pure and white.


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The Kind of Woman to Marry

November 13, 1998

Dear Josh and Eamon,

We didnt go to the islands or Paris on our honeymoon.We went to Cape May, NJ, where the proprietor of a B&B refusedus shelter because we arrived at 3 a.m. after an all night drive.

That first night we slept on the beach by the nuns conventnear the lighthouse. It was freezing and my new bride, your motherand I, clung to each other for warmth.

Since that night, many others have slammed doors in ourfaces. Always, weve clung to each other near the outgoing tideand laughed with each sunrise after the cold, harsh night.

So marry a woman like that one like your motherone who shelters youfrom the cold and darkboth human and nature.

Love,

Dad


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The Swale

Into this swalewe walk

Word by word sentenceby sentence

silenceby silence

Untilknee deep

in mud

We try to exitfor dry land

only to hear the sucking soundof swamp bottom

on bootsThat render

escapeimpossible...alone,

But togetherwe can struggle

To safety,to love,

to caring enoughTo stop

this mad decentinto fighting

and angry wordsAnd the deaths

that follow these silences.Here! Here my Love!" I cry.

"Where?! Where?! you answer.Until all I hear

is mudAnd all I see

is the dead fruitsof false pride

and real anger.


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My True Home

Justthis morningI awokeso in love with youthat insidea cloud burstto lift me high

above the city lightsover highwaysand country roadsto an oak cabinin the woodswhere by a fireof apple and peach treeI laid my headagainst your lapand found theremy true home.


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To Believe in Angels

There are those who do not believe in angels.

As for me, I tasted the cold blued steelof the rifle barrel after climbingthe hundreds of ladder steps to the tower,pointed it to the sky, at the ground, at my own brain,until, when the time came to pull the trigger,an angel made me think of my mother,of my family, of what the future could beand then led me gently back to the earth,eventually to the cool, healthful waters of Shiloh.

Several children latter, I stare into the gray-blue eyesof my 4-month old and thank God that angels,human and divine, walk the water-filled planet.


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My Poetry Hangs in Donut Shops

My poetry hangsin donut shops

in hopes thatsome alcoholic

satiating the alcheesbottomless sugar tooth

by mainlining donutsinto his body

who may now have determinedto drink

the Seconal cocktail(to leave a worldthat stopped noticingten years ago

that he was even there)might look up

to read my poemsand decide

insteadlike me Dear ol Da

to get soberif for only a year and a half

so thathis eight childrens

last remembrance of himmight be of his final fight

in a life that was one long fightthat led him to rise in the night

(in a way only menwho have slayedinternal demonsthat attack so stronglyand with the serpents cunningand vicious appealeach and every nightcan know)

to slay the alcohol demonsinstead of allowing them

to be his final pallbearers.


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Cream Donut

Yeah, yeah, I know...Its filled with enoughmilk and butter and sugarto meet the needsof a small country for a year.

And I knowits loaded with enoughcholesterolto kill eight ratsin a drug company lab.

And I know its sugar doseis large enoughto meet any alcoholicsweekly sugar addiction.

But...if youre ever suicidaltry a cream donut.Treat yourself to its buddydonut shop sugar coffee, too.

As sugar endorphinscareen through your gray matterand thoughts of suicide

wither on the brain vineyour newly functioningand recently appreciatedbrain will remind you:

a cigar

may be just a cigarbut a cream donutand sugar coffeecan save your life.


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Early Warning System

At the Kennedy Space Centerwinged grackles perchfrom the straw-like antennas

of the SATAN Tracking Systemthat once received signalsfrom orbiting unmanned spacecraftwhich now sit silentat the outdoor space museum

just as one daythey will perchabove the remainsof our cities and farmswhen we are a gone

and forgotten speciesbecause somewherea wrong word was spoken.


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Larry Joe Bird

Where others see only obstacles,Larry Bird sees from mid-court

an opening as wide as the Red Sea

beneath the basket calling him.He breaks to the middle,pain stabbing his backlike a bayonet slicing

through muscle stabbedthousands of times before

more pain screamingfrom his swollen ankles

insisting like a wifetaken for granted and ignored

too many years that,"Yes, you will notice me now!

I'll make sure of thatThere will be no more abuse!"

Pain shouting from elbowsangry like abandoned

children from too many yearsof abuse and neglect,all shouting in unison,"Feel the pain now!Feel the pain now!"but like a soldier

wounded in too many battlesto know how to answer the pain

all Larry Bird'sbrain will allow attentionis the call of the open space

calling like spiritual salvationfrom a mere 15 feet away.

He instantly checks one last timefor an open teammate in the wilderness,

but there is no one to be found.Larry Bird's mind goes into overtime

and his photographic memorysees the moves he mastered

as a child on a lonesome court

in West Baden come on his screenand a countermove from when he was

only ten and basketball was pureforces its way into his consciousness

so that before his opponentseven realize he is onhis way to the basket

to bring faith and beliefto the masses in the stands.


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He tips his hand to the rightslams the ball to his leftand then twists his bodyinto a pretzel-like pattern

and now the pain is purification,the pain is release from sin,

the pain is fire and icestabbing only numb muscle

because he has mastered its forceand he leaves it behind him now

to leap from the confinesof the earth

to defy what laws of gravitythat still claim some

physical control of his body massand leaps into the Heavens

into the spacewhere there is no pain,

where there is no sufferingbut only the pure white lightfrom the gyms stratosphere

to light the way until"WHOOOOOOOOOOOSSSSHHHH"

and the gym explodeslike a holyroller tent revival

and the Celtics fans high fiveeach other in physical celebration

like the ancient Celtsembraced Brian Boru anew

each time he defeated

the vicious marauding Viking hoardsto preserve Ireland for the

Christian faith and the believersand Larry Bird lands on the earthfully aware, also like Brian Boru,

that the celebrationonly lasts until the demands

of the next skirmish or battle,until the final basket's call.


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The Curse of the Irish

Many say the "Curse of the Irish"is their frequent drinking of alcohol.

They're quite mistakenif they believe that.

The real curse of the Irishis that you can never forget the past-------

or what people say or do to you.


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Words Never Die

When they ask you at school,"And what does your father do?"

Tell them he is a craftsman,

A craftsman of fine words.A craftsman in the Medieval sense.A man who takes pride in sculptingCompleted poems out of a vast quarryOf known but inartistically used language.

And when they say,"But isn't that a rather unproductiveAnd silly occupation for a full grown man?"Say to them back:

"No. His words may survive intact,

While your father's money is spent,And your father's property is divided,And your father's corporation is absorbed,And your father's wife grows old and dies.But words cannot be spent, divided, absorbed or die.Words never die; only the people who poorly use them."


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The Fruit of the Orchard

In winter, these trees are not dead.their strength lies buried,

ready to burst through when next needed,like humans in the face of disasterwho rely on spirit to transcendmaterial barriers and weaknessto make the transitionfrom this worldto the spirit worldacross our artificial divide.

in spring, the earth moves below.Nutrients flow into underground water

to be leached by root hairsinto the trunks of the apple treeswhich bring them up through heartwoodto the baby-like hunger of the branches.the sun delivers its warmth and energywhile the moon pulls the water forth.Buds explode into flowers that beesvisit to suck sweet flowing nectarback to their queen in the hive.Flowers become small applesin this season of tectonic rebirth.

in summer, the Orchard man steps forthmore strongly. Like a general,he summons his wife and sonsfor their wise counsel, in-gathers family and friends,marshals tractors, machinery and tools.also like a general, he feelsthe enemy's approach long beforethe dust appears on the horizon.he works to prepare for the opening skirmisheswhile dreading the battles that follow.He squints at the sky and knows it is time.he musters his people, machines and knowledgeto fight off the most ancient enemies of man:drought, pestilence, disease, insects, ignorance.

The Orchard man has seen the fury of warin the Pacific in world War II as a marine.He knows this will be like al the other wars,


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and, therefore, fears the expected surprise.Too much water, too little water,Too much sun, not enough sun,insects and brown rot, hailstorms and lightning,

floods and drought nature's arsenal is endless.

He looks at the sky again and curses the weather.he stands alone and shakes a fist at cloudless sky.

In fall, each row a cathedral of trees gleams light;light of pink flowing through the rose windowsof the golden delicious apple trees,bowed branch nave to the altarthe trees yield their fruitthe way God gives us childrenby the unity of seed, spirit,and organic material blending

over myriad and passing seasons,through storms that assault and cleanse:and animals that eat buds and branchesuntil the fall comes and the treesform this cathedral of blinding lightand these trees are alive,these trees want to be handled tenderly,these trees demands careful, loving,selfish love before they yield their fruit.

The hands that love these trees

know how to stroke each twig and branchtenderly so as to yield all its fruituntil the storage bins are heavyand full and luscious with sweet fruit,and the full harvest brings full measure.

In Harvest, the feast is set beforethe Orchard family's spare table.The families of apples' dancea ballet of sweet nourishment:applesauce sweet rich from the goldensand johnnies and grannies fills the bowl.Honey-colored apple juice is poured.The new baby is fed diced Yorks.Cinnamon and sugar explode on her tongueand the fruits of labor, human and divine,in that very feeding from father to daughterand from mother to son, ensure again,the continuances of the eternal plan.


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Everybody Should Have an Aunt Pat

Everybody should have an Aunt Pat

Who could bake cookies from HeavenAnd when you took four from her traySaid, "Go ahead, Hon. Take a few more!"And when you looked to your own motherFor permission, her smile and nodSaid, "Go ahead, Hon"So you grabbed eight more.


Who knew what a Christmas display meant!

Who even when the president himself saidIt was unpatriotic, put up huge displaysGalaxies of brilliant lights that said,"Go ahead, Hon! Enjoy life!Isn't it beautiful!" in that glorious, ChristmasyWonderful, beautiful, Philadelphia way!


Who defined what a 4th of July, fitsOf laughter, all-American party should be,Adults arguing politics, children runningThrough marshlands gathering punks, neighborsSchlepping food and drink to the gathering,And fireworks that lit the night sky withthe light and laughter of family love.


Whom every engaged member of my familyAutomatically went to when they needed a ringBecause she, in her twenty years in jewelrySales and service and marriage counselingHelped more hearts through their early loveAnd young marriage than the average parish priest.


Who, even in retirement, checked eating placesFor the County Health Department and, when the


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Roaches or rats or whatever were in violation,Shut 'em down, and thousands ate safelyWithout knowing to whom they owed great thanks.


Who, after a few years at war with cancer,When told, "We can perform another operation."Had the courage to say, "No. Enough operations."And nestled her soul in God's waiting hands,And sent her heart to Heaven's gate express.


Who raised a good family, laughed a lot,Loved her husband, helped her neighbors,

Honored her God, worked hard, tolerated most,Baked great cookies, and changed the worldBy love and laughter and lights

Everybody should have an Aunt PatFor Heaven would be a more crowded place.


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At the Diner

At the Diner,love, hope and tragedy,

faith, broken livesand buckets of warm coffee,but most importantly,fast and cheap good foodall mingle in cosmic proportionto the big-tipping customersand life-giving waitresseswho pass their moments in spaceand time co-mingled in experienceof talk and talk and food and drinkand talk and talk and talk there.

At the Diner,When the waitress says,"What'll it be, Hon!" she knowswhat it will be but still asksand you still reply, "Usual. Number 3."you know it will be as good as beforeand lickety split, three stacks wheat pancakesgolden brown and fluffy upon which you dropa half stick of butter and a carafe of syrupwith marble sized blueberries insideand toasted scrapple

and easy over country eggswith buttered toastbefore shoveling inthe Pennsylvania Dutch scrapplewith Heinz "57 varieties" catsupas a roof on top.As the first juicy pancake sliceslides down your throatto your famished stomachyou start to hear Frank Sinatra's"Strangers in the Night"

and it seems as if love werepossible tonight, right here, right now,maybe you and the waitress or thegirl much younger than you in that boothwith the unjilted smile and honey hairthat might consider you, Yes You,in her life and dreams and future.


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At the Diner,so many memories crash throughthe minds creeping depression to reveal

cracks in the thick walls of melancholia,and openings where light and therapy from waitresseswho double as mothers and nurses bringinggood hearty food to souls who, due to life'smachinations, often forget to eat.

At the Diner,so easily and languidly...the mind drifts,and my father sits in that booth over there!I am five, and we have stopped

for lunch in the middleof the beer truck delivery runand I have his undivided attention,one of the few timesthat would ever happen --and he is regaling mewith stories of his childhoodof how during the Depressionhe had to go to schoolwith orange shoes his mother boughtcheap and put black shoe polish onexcept it rained and washed the shoe polish offand all the kids laughed at himand he was so embarrassedthat even as a kid he always worked two jobsso he could afford good clothes,and the timethey rolled so many old tiresdown the street they were able to hold offa squadron of police only to findthe police knew their parentsand they returned homethinking they got away with murderonly to find their parents on the doorstepwaiting to give them a lickingbecause the police,who belonged to their same parish,had visited beforeand tipped off their parentsto do the punishing.


79/80

79

At the Diner,in another booth,Tony Fondots and Ihave stopped at a Circle diner

in Southern New Jerseycoming back from the shoreand young and drunk and laughingand goofing with some young girls who respond,"I have my doubts about you Fondouts!"in a play on Tony's nameand we all begin to laugh so hardthe tears run down our cheeksand this was way before a guywho didn't like government employeessaw Tony had on a Postal Service shirt

and tossed him from a bridge in Norristown, PAcausing his pelvis to fracture in 186 placesand then got off because his Dad was able to afforda better and slicker lawyer than Tonyand offered this wisdom afterwards,

"Why do you think it's calledthe criminal justice system?It's justice for the criminals."

At the Diner,in another booth,My body is old and spentlike that guy at the end of the movie "2001"and does not respond too well to stimulilike talk or thought, but the foodwarms my mouth and stomach,the coffee is good and hot,the waitress is kind and funnyand ignores my drooling on my plate.The pancakes fill my hungerjust before my heart stopsits power-plant strength contractions,and it is all over...

(Or so I thought...)


80/80

...Until, at Heaven's Gate,I'm hungry and tiredfrom too many years on the road

and stop in this diner where St. Brigitimmediately brings me ice waterand hot coffee, winks, and says,

"What'll it be, Hon!"and I wink back and say,The usual. Number 3."Pancakes and scrapple.And another cup 'a java, please?"and she smiles back and says,

"You betcha! It so happensI just brewed another pot

because we were expectin' ya, Hon!"and we both laugh in that Dinerand let the tears run down our cheeksto bring water and love and strengthto all the diner customers on earth.

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