It's almost mid-December
...no more november thrills,
....just colder winds that give me a chill
and, remind me of a kind of peace...a rural calm,
in the old country days...simple celebrations
and the natural beauty of hand-made stars
hanging outside windows of houses...
their low lights seem dots , yet....seen, from
farms, ricefields, and from the old chapel,
:::
the old chapel.....where people's most
ardent wishes, dreams and  prayers, rest,
the old chapel, which sounds so heavenly,
when "silent night," and "o holy night" are sung
....in the cold hours of dawn masses...

no one feared the dark...people were guided
by lanterns.......star-shaped and lighted...
white-painted wooden Christmas trees
adorned the small living rooms...small, but
filled with that holiday warmth, shared with
family, neighbors and friends...

in lieu of those humble huts, rows of
pompous concrete structures now stand tall
over once vast pasture-lands and rice fields,
mostly gussied up with expensive decors...yet,
......bereft of the true Christmas spirit...
...silent nights, are not so silent anymore...

my chest goes high and low,
the late november winds have blown
farther away,  taken over by the boldly cold,
yet, welcomed  festive airs of december...
i'm always happy about Christ's arriving,
i am sad.......the old ways...they're vanishing...

Sally

Copytight November 27, 2017
rrab

Windows were once green
bricks fabulous red
upon the wall daylight
glowed like newlywed!

So lovely did it stand
the toy house in the moon
did it ever happen
didn't it end too soon?

Words were fewer then
wild thoughts ran galore
of mysteries now boxed up
behind tightly shut door!

Who stole the girl cutest
was it time or a man
that left her robed whitest
spinning the widow's yarn!

What really it yields
the house that once was red
with love and bricks was built
then broke and never remade!

Premium Leaded, Leaded, News, and Weather

The talking gas pump down at the Conoco
“Please enter your zip code and press the pound”
Says the temp will be thirty tomorrow
“Will this purchase be credit or debit?”

And that snow is a possibility
“Please remove nozzle and select product”
And that we must watch the road conditions
“Begin fueling now (beep beep beep beep beep)”

In a whisper:

But that’s the number 6 pump saying so,
And that one acts all weird in Bible class

When it comes to matters financial
we all need an ounce of sense
They say a fool is very soon stripped
of his pounds shillings and pence

And if we borrow we have to be sure
we can pay back what has been lent
or else we get in a muddle
with our pounds shillings and pence

Diddlers thieves and con men
can cause us immense expense
so don't let them get their ***** hands
on your pounds shillings and pence

We come into the world with nothing
with nothing away we are sent
but in between it's handy to have
some pounds shillings and pence

I spied
'out of the corner of my eye' (Pink Floyd)

a fire
'it would be untrue' (Doors)

'all along the watchtower'
(Jimi Hendrix)

'a slow train coming'
(Bob Dylan)

'Imagine all the people'
John Lennon.

We are elaborate animals made of wood
earth, flowing like water into the veins
of the sky.

The sun being a fist of lava, and the night
being an enticing molar—we are
a succession of tides, being swallowed
by successions of day; and how beautifully
we wilt in the presence of joy.

The moon may be nothing
but a luminous
stone

and to eat the poetry of it
is how one chokes
on love

but the romance of morning
is that if by midnight
you are alive, that is joy.

It was not, by any means, a loss of faith;
Indeed, her devotion was a boundless, unfettered thing
Beyond proscription, beyond rote chant and catechism,
And what she found as a novitiate
Were shuttered gates and gossipy confessionals,
Standoffish priests, pig-eyed and pinch-lipped
Sisters who thought life’s commerce
No more than mechanical prayer and spotless linens,
The whole enterprise
Smacking of the exclusion of Heaven’s bounty.
So she demurred when the time came to take her orders,
And she returned to the world of pavements and lesser pieties,
Free to seek God on park swings and barstools,
In pleasures of the pastoral and the profane,
Though her faith is no Dionysian walkabout,
As she is passionate to the cusp of maniacal
When it comes to the Book of James’ admonition upon works;
She is often found among the sisters she once tiptoed alongside
At food pantries and clothing drives
(She is scrupulous about ministering to only secular needs,
As the Bishop is not happily disposed towards those
Who choose not to take the veil,
And the specter of excommunication is a prospect
Too awful to contemplate)
Afterwards clambering onto some vaguely roadworthy MTA bus
Back to her studio apartment in Green Island,
Where she often walks down to the Erie Canal lock nearby,
Praying for those who have travelled  near and upon the water,
Convenience store clerks and ragged Irishmen fleeing famine,
Feral kittens and insufficiently mourned mules.