hymns on sunday
I grow hibiscus
tall I block
your eyeline
it’s
a fence
between the life of me the
life that I
imagine here there you
not raking at the earth hear
listen to that leaf blower
line trimmer follows up
your Victa more spark plugs
than the car across the road
Sunday is
to listen
to your syncopating tendency
to clean my
hard heart
bounces you burn
up
on re-entry
desist and cease
your rattle
on my bar
Ah. Dear Kerri. It's true. Nature loves a mess, I say. They draw a weapon.
ReplyDeleteLord. Did I not tell you that I think it's a true and wonderful poem?
Delete(And by "true and wonderful" I mean it's true and wonderful on several different levels at once.)
DeleteOh Rob, thank you. I have been not so wonderful this week as I struggle through the morass of manuscript. It is nice though to be pressed a little harder!
DeleteEase up, dear Kerri, when it's smart. ;)
Delete
ReplyDeleteThe formatting here is always a bit suss, but here's an old Sunday poem of mine. :)
IDLE THOUGHTS ON A SUNDAY
for Chris Harvey
Screaming children run from their souls
their voices pitch them ever closer to hell
(the misfortune to be born so soon so late)
but if they were lost we couldn't be having
this conversation you and me like this
subway demons exorcised by the wind
the screech of brakes the lucky fireworks
in this incomplete disguise of indifference
we sit on long benches and count the stops
(we’re never lost or we'd not be talking now)
true we're very slow to flee our souls
and sad that poetry advances knowledge
while misfortune goes running to distraction
though we count the stops we're never there
(it's my stop here now I must get off)
now Monday hum
ReplyDeletefrom traffic blur
let manuscript
now come
Today is the day. It looks manageable and less like it was assembled on a lazy susan.
DeleteIt's all in the butterfly valve, ignore the noise. Wonderful!
ReplyDelete