There will be two epiphanies
On January 6th.
Christians around the globe will celebrate
Little Christmas, The Epiphany,
The Word Made Flesh,
The arrival of the three wise men, The Magi,
And they reveal to the world
The Savior has come.
The same will happen on the Senate Floor (sans three wise men)
When the President-Savior
Is presented to the world,
And his detractors will bray, cackle and neigh
As he is adorned.
Saviors don't build walls,
They raze them.

I know I'm not alone
Knowing readers like good-feely poems;
Not poems on politics,
But on love and gnomes,
That offer happiness to you at home.
I'll forgo writing verses on death,
My lovely images will ****** your breath.
I'll ink lines about an old flame's door,
The hesitation to knock once more,
To see if she, like me, is free,
And re-ignite the flickering light
That rained down from our starry night.

People want to feel good more,
So I won't write about Civil War;
Or Armageddon on the horizon;
Millions dead with a final solution;
A leader devoid of absolution
For lies without resolutions:
For a sin that should not be.

I'll write about aging well,
Finding water in a dried out well,
Overcoming not feeling well,
Lifting a grandson with Well, well, well!

These be poems that one reads well.

I heard there's a shot today.

There's good reason to forget infant memory.
Too many colours, sounds, and faces back then.
My upsets were soothed with a soft hand and a healing kiss.
It wouldn't be fair to compare,
I would feel weak to compete
With those faded images and feelings.
It's bad enough with my adult recall,
Stories and pictures that bring on palpitations, clamminess and racing.
My school is an empty lot, beside an empty rectory, and an empty church.
My childhood avenue is derelict, like Mockingbird Lane.
My Triumph Herald is still baby blue in some photo.
With each memory, I feel the nausea.
Look at this one. All ten of us.
Five still.
I'm already beginning to feel queasy.
If I were five still, I'd forget.

While jogging on the flyover
The orange dressed Sun
Looked at me،
Played hide and seek

And the trees kept like parents
To their child
Kept
holding it
On their shoulders

I said hi
Through my smile

The 🍊 orange moon
                   Hung from the green rope

The leaves
                   Wore yellow dresses

We
Are
Here
To breathe

No tragedy can choke us

It's enough to claim our existence

I was sound asleep. Work tomorrow

Tuesday, December 9, 1980. 6:30 A.M.

Alarm on. Out and into shower.
Shave. Can't hear radio.
Getting dressed, and in the background's playing, Imagine.
Then Wheels, Beautiful Boy, Help, I Should Have Known Better.
Why?
And the news sinks in. And I have to go teach Grade 6 English
and read Curious ******* George to four classes of Kindergartens and Grade ones.
And, I'm alone in my new house, in a small town called Aylmer (population 5,000).
My wife is away during the week at University, and I hate my job,
and he's decaying on some slab as I read to twenty-five five year olds. Some of these kids will get to know and love his work. So will their kids and grandkids. I know. Like Mozart.

Tuesday, December 9, 1980. 10:00 P.M.

Me, Johnny Walker, and the turntable going round and round, like his wheels.

It was forty years ago today,
In New York where he longed to stay;
At the doors to his apartment rise,
With devil's envy rising in his eyes;
He imagined his confusion wasn't wrong;
Then the curtain in the tower tore,
The Cavern shook beneath its floor,
And the needle scratched across our songs.

I want to let him rest in peace,
Still waiting at the end of his road.

The assassin doesn't seek release,
And it doesn't really matter Bro.
For John is dead, and
And we're a bit lonelier now.

The overnight fall
Is framed through my bedroom window
This morning
I will wrap myself
In the blanket
Before tires, squirrels and bootprints
Mar my pristine scene.

These are images that once were
The tan lines stretching across your shoulders;
Like starlight from some supernova;
Your photos in my albums;
Our shadows beneath bright suns;
Those ghosts have come and gone.

Then love became a memory;
And memory is the ghost
That frightens me the most.

Many of the world's greatest Leaders throughout our tumultuous history have;
Many of  the insightful Revolutionaries in stink hole and glory hole countries have;
Many of the oppressed, disenfranchised and cheated also have.
Look to Lenin, Mandela, Gandi, Nehru, Havel, Bhutto, Ceausescu, Charles I, Papadopoulos, Lady Jane Grey, Louis XVI, Marcos, Milosevic, a pile of Mohameds, Mussolini, Nicholas II, Pinochet, Saddam, Marie Antoinette, Pope Clement V, Selassie, Baghdadi, Duvalier, and, let's not forget the author of Mien Kampf, Adolph the Tenderizer.
And what do they all have in common?
Some, before they became boldly notorious, and others, after they became criminally notorious.
Some, looked out their window and saw platforms being erected.
Others witnessed gallows, guillotines. posts and walls.
They all got some time in:
PRISON. GAOL. JAIL. COOLER. LOCKUP.  DUNGEON. KEEP. PEN. BASTILLE. CLINK. STATESVILLE. SLAMMER. STOCKADE. THE BIG HOUSE.
You get the idea.
His time will come.

I am part of your smile today.
I might be in the curl of your lip,
In the corner glint of your eyes;
Or the concave of a dimple.

I will trip across your tongue today
When you speak of plans;
I will be today's man,
Clear the wreckage from the storm,
The tempest that began your day,
Reminding you we too were young.

When on your morning walk,
You might feel my hand slip in
And be with you awhile,
In your thoughts and smiles.