Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Wry is one of many things you do well....
~~~~~~
dedicated to, inspired by Paul Anthony Hutchinson, who wrote those words to me but two hours ago

Wry
- produced by a distortion or lopsidedness of the ****** features: a wry grin.
- abnormally bent or turned to one side; twisted; crooked: a wry mouth.
- devious in course or purpose; misdirected.
- contrary; perverse.
- distorted or perverted, as in meaning.
- bitterly or disdainfully ironic or amusing: a wry remark.


It is bitter,
It is amusing,
the distorting that gives a shape and thereby
meaning
to a misdirected life,
the ****** muscles perused,
all reversed, all per-versed

t'is not just the smile that is loopy,
or simplistically turned upside down,
twisted but not dubious, nor devious,
twisted but straight, I say,
wry is not a seething something I do well,
wry is in every nuclei I ever split,
every line etch-a-sketched in every poem
worn down,
physically inscribed on my face.

so much to reveal,
but not here not now not,
ever on and ever in, explicit
but blurred, burred, and buried
within them is the ironic of a man
that laughed through the better part of his life,
for in that period, there was no
better,
just worse

I was born wry.
the last of three, I was nameless till I was twenty one,
they called me just
brother, or the brother.

at twenty five, I married the wrong woman,
though we both wanted not too,
thirty five years of wry, the lawyers rejoiced,
the judges celebrated, the poets went mad,
swear it true,
the family counselors said
beyond hopeless,

and with wry smiles at the spectacle of years wasted,
spent like there was no tomorrow,
for there was none
in the titanic disaster of more, new lives corrupted

I lived life wry.

now, in the final fourth quaternary,
see how he,
the master of the unceremonious,
in on bent knee, hands clasped, on bed, rested,
when he seeks comfort and guidance for the upcoming
finality following a two minute warning,
warning that even now,
the future wry, turned to one side, when all he wanted,
was to live quiet in the straight and narrow
and not write poems asking himself with trepidation,
from where will come the courage to make this
last passage....

oh yes, I do wry so well,
and all things that wryhme with hell,
you will be spared,
for wryly he exclaims
"Enough, enough"

wry why!
for in all the days of his disheveled life,
there have been but a few,
when it has been simply,
enough
Back behind Gianni's bar
The Bluesman sings his tunes
To all the local n'er do wells
And to the stars and to the moon

His voice is coarse as forty grit
His playing smooths it out
He plays upon an orange crate
Comfort is not what he's about

Bluesman, Bluesman play a song
One sung just for me
One that paints pictures in my head
A song that I can see

Buskers, lined the concourse
The street where he was not
This was just a place for tourist fare
He was where the world forgot

His tunes were sung for no one but
Himself and to the air
Out front, that was another world
Bluesman, did not live out there

A crowd has gathered slowly
More of a group, than a real crowd
They heard about the bluesman
And out front was too **** loud

In back, you heard the feelings
Felt the music, heard the strings
You experienced the atmosphere
That a good old bluesman brings

Out of the crowd of fandom
Working his way through the mass
Was a young, tousled haired boy
Everybody let him pass

He rocked in one position
He felt the music ebb and flow
He looked where the notes were airborne
He saw the music go

The bluesman sat and watched him
playing stories, telling tales
Of drunks in old Las Vegas
And of sailors fighting gales

the young boy stood and rocked some
always looking at the air
He wasn't looking at the bluesman
He didn't know that he was there

He walked up to the old man
staring out into the space
that streamed the bluesmans music
right into the young boys face

the bluesman watched intently
As the young lad touched his hand
And he held the bluesmans old guitar
He became a member of the band

The boy moved even closer
If that were possible at all
He was feeling the sweet music
He was having quite a ball

The crowd watched as the bluesman
and the boy became as one
The boy resting his head now
On the guitar, having fun

He couldn't see the bluesman
But the music, it was there
The boy was blind, autistic
He saw the notes that filled the air

The bluesman kept on playing
For that was what the bluesman did
He was playing for the starry sky
And for this wondrous little kid

His mother came and held him
She took the bluesman by the hand
She said thank you for the music
For letting him be in your band

In a voice as smooth as Bourbon
The bluesman told her that her son
Could come and feel the music
The music makes us one

Bluesman, Bluesman play a song
One that's only just for me
Bluesman, Bluesman play a song
That only I can see....
~

as pages turn 
his memory greets her... 
the filtered light 
of saddened beauty, 
yet, without would be 
but crushing darkness,
his footsteps welcome, 
an entrance crossing 
lightly o’er the 
threshold of her mind; 
his visits she could 
not bear to miss. 
and though it wets 
her cheeks with weeping, 
though it fills 
her pail of tears
from sorrow’s ever 
deepening abyss,
this, her rose of hope 
its beauty precious
its fragrance borne 
on petals crushed.
each page she turns 
his memory greets her
with each his visit 
she prolongs;
and moments sweet 
she dare not rush;
dispels her darkness
when nights are long.

~


*post script.

he visits on pages that fill her life... 

the photo albums,
the turning calendar, 
books that bear his footnotes... 
cards and letters beginning with the words, “Dear Mom...”

ever so slowly, she is learning to welcome, 
even find comfort, in his visits
among the pages.
 Feb 2014 Carl Joseph Roberts
r
Cold Mountain's calling
Winter days die young
Cold rain is falling
Black cloak has been flung

Carve my face
upon Cold Mountain's ice.
Chisel a trace
of a smile around my eyes.
Cut hard lines
deeply soft beside my mouth.
Send my heart
on a slow boat headed south.

Cold Mountain beckons
I'll be there too soon
Cold river reckons
Cold rain hides the moon

r ~ 3Feb14
Next page