It's nice here
above
the clouds
the fog

like a Bronx Cheer
the roar the din
lifts us
up

at this
height
we're clear
as a bell

instead
of a little
punch
drunk

whit howland © 2019

Tried to push
back
against
the knives

outside
skinny
cats
screech
and scratch


the sun is coming

time
to paint
a pink blush

on another
early
morning
chagrin

© Whit Howland 2019

sliver
of light

often
line

between

soft eyes
hard stares


jokers faces
sad mugs

steady hands
restless feet

sweet dreams
choppy sleep

sliver
of light

sometimes
just enough

to mop
***** floors

wipe
grimy counters

and

sweep out
dusty corners


whit howland © 2019

Full Moon
lunar fever
why I write

pale light
bent through glass

spinning emotions
like a top

left you a message
hope you'll call

whit howland © 2019

A curt goodbye
no good luck

just hard stares
and harder bargains

78 degrees today sun
cloudless

in our neighborhood
lawns freshly fertilized
cut
and green like dollar bills

walls stripped bare
now cold

papers shredded

family photos
trophies

some silver some
gold

all tucked
snug
in banker's boxes

whit howland © 2019

Not the first day of the rest
of your life

nor a chance to revel
in new beginnings

trains have already
left their stations and ships
their ports

some advice my grandmother
once gave

just write a note

I've treasured our time
sorry it couldn't have lasted longer

but alas

it was perhaps 
as long as it needed to be

whit howland  ©  2019

I know that
if I am true to my art

my craft it will give
back and be true to me

truths are always that simple

every 44 to 120 minutes

Old Faithful
from its joyous maw

spits wet pure
celebration at our
spacious blue skies

simple direct
profundity

whit howland © 2019

Hotpoint
magnet
refrigerator
white

we pray
for rain but poetry
never comes

words
birthday suits only



whit howland © 2019

Pelting drops
of rain always

the soundtrack
of our stormy Mondays

but Mondays sad songs
turn to Tuesdays
water color moments

which beget
Wednesdays workmen like
prose and philosophy


whit howland © 2019

There are some things I want to say
to you
tough medicine
rough music if you 're so
inclined not the kind you snap
your fingers to on the radio
it's more primal than that but
like the radio
when you hear it
years from now you'll know
exactly where you were the first time
you listened
and more importantly the year
make and model of car
you were driving


Whit Howland © 2019

Six of us crowded
on those
splintered steps

general store
Bunker Hill Illinois

my hand unintentionally
on the thigh of the girl
to the right

she took a took a number
long ago

and the store

burned down in
one of many decades
I intentionally missed

whit howland © 2019

Today sunny
thunderhead
loomed on the horizon

but the storm never happened

wind warm
touch of chill
blew gently

but the storm never happened

all day I waited
behind the eyes
a slot machine
spinning wheels
one round in the chamber

but the storm never happened

whit howland © 2019

The most I can muster
is to exhume life
from a sentence

about death
and decay of the human spirit

pledging to myself
dear reader and
everyone else

to never let such
a blessed thing go
to neglect and

maintain my own
like a trusty automobile


Whit Howland © 2019

past simile
past metaphor
we longed again
for clanking

fact

the shrieking
so bad
we could no longer
turn our backs
or shut the door

we called

a plumber worked
into the night

violently
snaking the drain

his pound of cure
could only repair


whit howland  © 2019

marriage
of bull to cow

slamming facts
obstructing with opinion

sworn testimony

tainted evidence

equals

misplaced translation





whit howland © 2019

MAD

don't write about it

paint a scream

a pen not a brush
only corrupts the scene

turn paper to canvas

let colors cry
flow tears and bleed





whit howland © 2019

Skin and teeth play
into this

Milpitas California

uprooted
culture shock
our lives changed

but instead
we opted
one more time

for wheat
cows and corn

and today
window men

cutting  the eyes
from their sockets

new windows for our home
not our soul

more curbside appeal
and better outward vision

whit howland © 2019

Silver never seemed so close

those quarters
filched from my pocket
by Tahoe's
invisible hand

but at 13
a baker's dozen
from repeated dives
I found out otherwise

water clear
aquamarine and shallow
near the dock I was fishing off

yet so cold it almost choked me out
I had to let the quarters go

like Uzzah knows and
I once said

the world speaks

sometimes it says BLANK OFF

put down your cameras  put down your pens
for the love of God no pictures and
most definitely

no poems

whit howland © 2019

My poetic life these days
is all about taking sadness,
fear, angst,
and distilling them into a sour mash,
then creating an elixir for the soul.

In other words, poetry is not about purge,
but of purification,
of myself, my psyche -- how do I do that,
you ask?

Simple. I'm a man of few words,
and because
I am man of limited diction,
like Caleb did for Moses,
I let life and my universe speak for me.

For instance, take this barn near my house ...

It's timbers blighted, brittle, almost bone weary,
its middle sags,--
but its not sad, its belligerent, mean--

just one more gust of wind, it all comes crashing down,
and brother, sister,
if your around,
near it's wrath, lookout!

Or the motor court down the road ?

Paint peeling, windows broken--

but regardless of her looks-- her voice is angelic as she sings to you for another chance at supper and glory.

So you see poets,

the sun, moon,
stars, trees, structures,  streets, walls,
all laugh, scream
and weep for you --

you just have to tune your ear
to their frequency.

whit howland © 2019

Buttered boards

sturdy frame

in front
a gi-normous
unapologetic
Holstien

next to it
big boot shiny spur

lassoing huckster
towers above
elicits tautologies

it is what it is
what you see is what you get
and either the steak is good
or it ain't

to further impress

broad  bold brush strokes
sells the tickets
moves the iron
and always wins the day

whit howland © 2019

The dream the intent
gone long ago
like all good things

whether it should have passed an unfortunate
unnecessary debate

but also
up for discussion
grabs

the importance
of form structure of a dream

and the worth of a historical
timeline of an automobile
from fin to future vision

Whit Howland © 2019

Dear Sister

Although right now
you're not too keen on memories

there was a time when it used to be

stories and memories
were our musical symphonies

masterpieces serving only
to pass the time and get us past

the dreadful weekends of our
chores and other drudgery

so let us take one more trip
down the red brick road
and reminisce
about the robot we tried to build

the end result being
nothing we planned
but more than we ever could have dreamed

for the eyes the arms
the hands and metal feet
of our doomed creature
that should've have worked

failed miserably

but what was successful
was our monochromatic journey
through lands
of pewter steel silver and
shiny chrome

and at the end the road
was this marvelous monolithic
impotent monster that I still see
in the wee small hours of the night
when I close my eyes

and let that be the coda
for this fantastic voyage

signed

your fellow maestro of absurdity
and your brother

Whit Howland © 2019

Dear Granny

Not sure where you are
but I am positive I know
who you are with

Grandpa that is
again
somewhere  sailing
deep at sea
in the far far east

and like when you were here
I've ridden many waves

some with expert ease
and some so towering
I almost crashed myself
upon the rocks

but Granny
I am really writing
because
there was one thing
you once said
that now has hit the mark

sometimes there's no hurry

just float and see
life through many lenses
at all different angles
before you launch

plain word and verse

though over time
profound and most treasured

signed

Your Loving Grandson and Fellow Sojourner

Whit Howland © 2019

A place I've been to before
and one I must go again

the Fairfield Connecticut
of my youth in dreams

the scene

plate glass window
Blinn's Toystore

framed in red
Christmas time

a model train
traveling through tunnels
toward Christmas lights
up hills and down again

to the station
pick up cargo and off it goes

again

cheerful and tireless
in its work

naive simplistic
a dreamer

maybe all

but all I've got

I will survive

Whit Howland© 2019

Today I'm on an even keel
because today

I'm reminded of the time

a breezy sunny day

I saw my  nieces sail
out on San Francisco Bay

they among others
in a junior regatta

playfully braving
wind and white caps
chopping at their hull

and heeling as they
fought the elements
a fight

they would come to lose

but the boat did not sink
and neither did they

their bodies buoyed
like their spirits

and they returned to port
wet ruddy and
full of vigor

ready to sail again

Whit Howland © 2019

Dear Brother

I hope you are well

but since we've  fallen out
I have no way of knowing

as well as
whether you mind these letters

however

these letters

are the power cord I'm trying
to unravel and some day
with a lot of fumbling

I'll find a socket I can connect it to

because brother
you see and I really hope you do

I'm trying to give a lonely lamp
some companionship
and further light the room

signed

with the warmest light
I can find

your brother


Whit Howland © 2019

What's to fear about

a memory of a lazy
summer day

laying on a patch
of lush green grass

staring at a benevolent
kingly blue sky with a firm
but gentle sun

that suddenly
is drawn on
with frosty contrails
of  a jet with a silent
calm and steady hand



Whit Howland © 2019

Chrome
almost mirrored

yes yes
that's what I remember

and the stainless steel counters
the Silver King

yes yes

and more chrome
on the stools

yes yes

bordering the festive red

of the yeah

seat pads

and boy

can I still
hear the rollers
of the shiny steel mop bucket

rolling across
the black and white
checker board floor

no not chess

checkers

a more primitive game

don't like something

jump it

oh  you mean like
ratty menus

burnt stale coffee
and leathery breath

no no sorry


I don't
remember such
****** things

just chrome
and more chrome

  Whit Howland © 2019

In heated moments
I now to speak to my dad
with calm aplomb and authority

and he now sees I'm no longer
his boy with needs not met

but who am I


a question I'll scrawl
to myself on a postcard
with a half dead
felt tip pen

waikiki
now in sepia tones
fading and fainter
with each passing day

this weekend I thought
my wife and I were
un moored from our marriage

almost as if it happened
on an overnight flight

(the felt tip pen now dead)

but she sailed back to me
when I suggested we shop
for postcards

if they still exist

and send them
to each other even
though we are here
and not there

I'll also try to find
and buy a new felt tip pen

I like the way
the wet sloppy ink
kisses the card stock

gentle water
lapping the hull

bossa nova
clinking glasses
a tickle
of the piano's ivory keys
and you're lost

in giant strawberries
of a daiquiri
dribbling down your chin
onto your palm frond top
and shorts while you

swing and sway
poolside

tomorrow Ocho Rios Jamaica
but today sun and sea

tonight the crown stars
and a ruby juicy
fingernail moon

Whit Howland © 2019

torchlight dances
on the aquamarine
blue of a hotel pool
deep in 1963

when happiness
was still on the Hi Fi

coulda woulda shoulda


Whit Howland © 2019

I've come to love

and know
the color blue to mean
not a Blue Monday
Blue Note or joke
and don't much care to sing the Blues

or for that matter
give them
because truth be told
most of the time

I want to caucus
with those
pumping and stumping
for a Blue Hawaii
or the warm blue waters

pickling poetically
the clam shell white bottom

of Palancar Reef

Whit Howland © 2019

pitter
patter

rain taps glass
                                   the beat  changing
                   
                                  sometimes
  on a dime

                             then just a nickle
    all the way down
                         to a penny

    no rhyme or reason
just naked drops of raw

improvisation
              
                   soft

with thoughts
          
                            flowing freely

and happily        

while windshield wipers

                                                wipe

awa­y
                            any feelings

of sadness

                                                or consternation

Whit Howland © 2019

Not new
but new to you

your first Nikon
my father gifted

when he saw
your countless
flowers

it was six years old

but it was like
a wrecking ball

concrete blocks
and mason's tools

******* in an
ethereal sky blue
ribbon

which sparked
your desire for art
and commerce

coupled with my need
to find again
the line and verse

adrift
in the harbor fog

and record it
for posterity

that ultimately
leveled and rebuilt

reclaiming
in what felt like
three days

a  beautiful thing

that will
and should never

cease and desist

Whit Howland © 2019

Years ago at a college
reunion

       an old friend

said she didn't remember me

and to this day

   I still unpack and

           repack that memory

   of she

who took

all those seconds minutes

    hours  days

                              years

and scrubbed them from

every shelf cubby alcove
and wiped them off

                                 the front door
the counter
                               the cash register

     the stairs

swept them from

the basement

and dusted them from the  attic

   I try not to take

it personally

                              but there is no

other computer out

                                         there

on the market        

                                            that needs

these types of memories stored

                                                         ­                           in a mouse maze

                                               of how to dance

and how to smile and how to love

                                   and how to laugh

in order to function
                                                        ­                and drive the

vessel it is
                                                 commanding

and as tempted as I have been

                                                           ­         I have fought

the

                                                     pressures

internal                               external

to simplify and reorganze

                                        the trivia facts

figures                                bar and parlor tricks

                                    pool shots anachronistic cheese

                                                         ­                       
                                                                ­                           ***** humor
****** stories


that  are crammed into shelves


                                    and stacked floor to ceiling

there will be no hall of records

                                              and when they come


which they will surely do

                                          you have my word


I will not slip away quietly

into the night


   Whit Howland © 2019

We walk uphill
almost parallel  
with the sky

but like all our other
adventures

we are out
to conquer different things

mine is to take this hill
one paced but ragged

breath upon breath
foot over foot
to plant my flag

yours is to shutter
to and fro

distilling object
place and time
and what is now

into an orderly
chronicle of us

Whit Howland © 2019

Do we close our  eyes
to imagine
the smells of Paladini Fish Company

and let our minds
launch and wander
to thoughts more abstract

or

perhaps we keep
them peeled and fixed
on the scale depth  and width

of Aliottos  
and Pompeis Grotto

or the current
human interest
both manicured
shabby and in between

but yet

maybe there's
a better way

faint lines
here and there

fuzzy and grainy
photographs

just the essence  
of a place
moment or time

a verse about
what we loved

and someday
what we will miss

Whit Howland © 2019

sunset never fades
until a new

orange brighter dawn
takes its place

and sea gulls caw
in between

the perfect tempo
of the waves

that sun bronzed
surfers carve

as they ride poetically
to shore

and its all here
in images restored

with words and music
never more

visceral and true

Whit Howland © 2019

Bright orange
liquid served

in a wavy
glass bottle

so sweet
tangy
and tingly

riding its way
down
your gullet

like pounding surf

what memories

of such a crude
but tasty delight

and of a sunny
long lost

California afternoon

even for
the non aficionado

when you say
such trite things as

step up to the plate

knock it out of the park

they can still feel
the solid oak of the bat

smell the oiled
leather of the glove

and hear the crack

as the ball soars
higher into the sky

past the cheap seats
and beyond

and I wonder

how could I
have dismissed

these words
and turns of phrases

so raw
golden
sweet and bardic

Whit Howland © 2019

Classic red

a sturdy chassis

plain

front and back axles

tough rubber wheels

and a functional
metal black handle

simple
perfect in design

a blue print
and a vision

only for
the naked eye

©  Whit Howland 2019

Pop crackle flash
white red and blue
flowering

glimpses of liberta

and anxious
fresh-faced youth

with only dreams  
about the future

© Whit Howland 2019

Like beginnings
endings are just as hard

knowing what
is finished looks

like nothing
you started out with

so many twists
turns and evolutions
along the way

© Whit Howland 2019

There used to be
a witching hour a last call

but now
this station never closes

an oasis in  the heart
of a pitch black night
for thirsty cars and drivers alike

just passing through
a state a place

and trying hard
not to lament

what appears
to be lost

with time
and age

©  Whit Howland 2019

Amber liquid
ripples
in the blown glass globe

a top a pump
somewhere
outside of Oklahoma City

a roadster sedan
or wagon
topping off their tank

before
continuing to the coast

sun  sand

ocean spray

and good old fashioned
California fun

the route  chosen

a simian crease

though now
broken in many places
can still be connected

if one just
closes their eyes
and opens their mind

and journeys again
toward the ever constant light

The walled city
slick and wet but
preserved
by drizzle
salt and spray

came with a monastery
peopled with nuns
and monks

that worked wasn't
just for show

and
planted us firmly
on a rock and back
in time to give us gifts

before it launched  us forward
to a better sense of place

What seemed like
a long ride of
growling diesel
on a slash of road

up an
unforgiving cliff

dissipated
once we gleaned
that ours
was not to battle

but rather
refer the case  
to a higher court

and now up here
in Taormina

the sky is clearly blue
the air so sweet and light

streets are  ruled with beyond
what we thought was gold

they're platinum

and the Cannolis

are to die for

it was the one
that roped me in

the picture
you sent me long ago

the one with
your bright smile
and eyes wide
with anticipation

you are standing
among other revelers
on Spring Garden Road

there's a beer stein
in your hand

you must have
been celebrating
something big  that night

what was it
what was making
you so happy

that one thing
I could never crack

your happiness

anyway
I've kept this one around
even though I shouldn't
and

today I'm older
and right now

I'm standing in a
harbor side gift shop
in Catania Sicily

a new wife
and happy life

she just bought some
post cards of the city

pictures of side streets
and ally ways
scrubbed so clean
and shiny
they almost smile

I'll keep one
replacing yours

because it just hit me
like a blinding beacon

what you were doing
that night and why

you looked so happy

but today
the sky was a canvas
of royal blue

the sun
a  blooming flowery yellow

and that's why
I can't say what I wanted to say

something about
for such hallowed ground
you're quite a ***** place

it just wouldn't fit
the  tone and tenor of this moment
however quick it is

because on this breezy
less then hazy
temperate afternoon

I know there's
someone up there that loves you

much like they love me too

A deep red silo
a ruddy  
split rail fence

bales of hay
framing a  modest
full patch
of healthy buttery  corn

a candy apple and
white American
striated
muscular tractor

and a hot warm
breeze the perfect

conveyance for
the distance growl
of a mower and

the wafting aroma
of manure and fertilizer