This morning
we woke

to a powdering
of snow

on the streets
the cars

and most beautifully

our lamppost
still lit

radiating

frosty
but warm light

Whit Howland © 2020

If I had it to do
all over again

it would be 1991
and I would be writing
poetry then

instead
of three years later

because there's this nagging
feeling

much like a gnat buzzing
in my ear

that something is missing

Whit Howland © 2020

moon imagery
never grows old

but the older
I grow

the crazy love affair
I once had
with ten-dollar words

starts to wane

images are now
only digestible
in bite-sized
green cheese flavored
morsels

I've been at this
so long

that much of what
gets done is under
weak and pale light

and by fingertip
feel

and finally

most people
want you to speak to them
directly about sadness

rather than
take them down
a moonless
wet and lonely street

Whit Howland © 2020

Maybe it’s the only way
to pop the dud days of the gone year
like popcorn

yet in lighting a string of firecrackers
hands that survived bullets and shells
still tremble uncontrollably
as if facing a fierce enemy

A kiss
on the moon
backed

by marbled blue
and white clouds

inside
a sentimental verse
or rhyme

something to remind me

that there’s a time
and a place
for everything

and now’s the time
to switch hats

from a Gatsby
to that of simple straw
and not

give more
then the world is willing to take

Whit Howland © 2020