Category: Theme Issues

Keep your voice steady and strong
Show your adherence to the objective correlative
With a studied stoniness
And when you look up from your words
Swimming like slippery eels on the page
Stare with assertion that
You alone know what it’s all about.

.

But your eyes threaten tears
When the words committed to paper
Suddenly jump from the page to your mouth
To the charged air
To the strangers watching you
And your voice breaks
Like a wall built of sand
The particles falling steadily like
A broken sky.

.

Afterward it seems
The women have heard and easily echo
Some of your words that are shared
As if they were their own
And the men remark on what they liked
Having jotted down some phrases
As if they were clues to understanding women.

.

And you yourself realize that
Those words chose you
Plucking you from a whirlwind
And filling your mouth
With their magic
For which you can now be
Grateful.

Up is down
Left is right
The umbrella drowns
And day is night

.

The stars twinkle
The umbrella hangs
Calls sprinkles
Dryness rains

I touched it once, with fingertips,
Too clumsy for a grasp
I had it for a moment
Like drinking poisoned flask

.

Exchange my soul for promises
Required barter’s band
From Mayan tombs the gold was dug
For diamonds African

.

Precisely fit to finger size
The liquid turned to sphere
No Alpha, no Omega,
Could make this prize adhere

.

Though time could never sweep the shine
From gold to black – I saw
Omniscient– with sight behind
The love that wasn’t spent

.

All riches do not yield reward
A soul may come up poor
Unless the gift behind the gold
Is made of purest ore

Some call me a closed-form elitist
And might ask of me to delete this
Though free-verse may be a purple rose
I will often say, “this could be prose”

.

Flowery words which at random break
Give me a feeling I just can’t shake
Stanzas that eschew a firm meter
Go with the Daughter of Demeter

.

On “lack of periods”, don’t be Harsh
My structure is clearer than a marsh
My words are bound precisely with twine
Showcased with breaks of stanza and line

.

All ascending alliterations
Dastardly driven derivations
Reinforce rapid repeating rhymes
That tell these things to temper their time

.

Free-verse cannot bring this form of art
Though those who write it may be quite smart
Pattern is what can be learned by heart
Closed-form shall always be set apart

“Shall we dance?”
You whisper in my ear
Extend your hand
Tell me words I want to hear

.

Take a bow
As the music begins
Don’t lose me in the crowd
Keep me close with your grin

.

Spin me around
Look me in the eye
In your movements, let me drown
Stay with me tonight

.

As the others break away
Keep us in the center stage
Move with me like there’s only today
Hold the story on our page

.

Twist and turn me like a tornado
Lift me up to the skies
Ground me like fallen snow
Let me know that you are mine

.

Secure me in your arms
As the song comes to an end
Protect me from all harm
Ask me, “shall we dance again?”

Dad didn’t get it

.

when I sent him a letter
asking him to guide me through
repairing my mother-in-law’s old radio,

.

rather,

.

he told me to bring it to the wedding,
he’d take it home with him,
fix it in six to eight weeks.

.

Takes a lot of knowhow,

.

equipment, requires good soldering
skills and WHAT to troubleshoot.
Must know knowledge of circuitry
of solid state and vacuum tubes;

.

Electronics is NOT easy.

.

Under the covers with my wife,
I wonder if I’m meant to try again
or let him dwindle day by day, clueless

.

in his bedful of acquired tools and parts,

.

keeping them for himself.