When the body politic, long fleeced, begins to understand,
I believe that local weathermen will be in high demand.
Our politicians will all be seen as having feet of clay;
Venial types who sway according to the winds each day.

Weathermen are truthful; weather girls the same.
They tell us when it’s going to snow and when it will turn to rain.
Their forecasts aren’t perfect but I believe they try.
They consult the Doppler oracle and gaze into the sky.

They, daily, take the auspices like some archaic priests.
They prophesize the temperature for cold snaps in the East.
They are the only public voices who do not spin or lie
They don’t fall back on talking points or dare debate the sky

So if we now choose presidents from their appearance on T.V.
I nominate Bill Evans for president and Storm Field for V.P.

The box is fine mohogany,
the beads not used in prayer.
You kneel before my effigy,
as I'm no longer there.
I'm embracing my loved darling.
on a vast and astral plain.
Death has reunited us and we are young again.
I see the tears your grief compels you to shed.
I weep as you don't understand
the freedom of the dead.
While I still lived in nursing homes.
I was frightened and alone.
But now set free of all constraints, -
I have been welcomed home.

I woke up in a stranger's bed
in a room that's not my own.
I gathered, from the perfumed sheets,
that I was not alone.

Spooning with me was a girl
not like the girls back home.
The girls back home don't sport tattoos
The girls back home sleep clothed.

This girl moaned softly in my ear
and stroked my morning glory.
I'm not the sort to kiss and tell,
so here I'll end the story.

**** works all day at his factory job making I Pods for you and me.
The pay is low and his hours are long, but there’s job security.
The company boss is a suspicious sort of his minions on the job.
They must be searched before they leave for fear he might be robbed.
There is a safety net at work for **** and all his crew.
It’s not medical and dental like exists for me and you.
No, this net is a cargo net- to catch leapers, naturally.
for preventing suicides is key to profitability.

The Russian master hunched over the board,distressed by what he saw.
This Fischer fellow had smoked his gambit  out,
and now he was contending with a fierce counterattack.
A stalemate would be preferable to  defeat and resignation.
It seems  that there was no way out from this unpalatable situation.
The endgame had commenced and the outcome seemed assured.
His last bishop the latest casualty in this miniature  of war

Living a long lifetime without love,
I had forgotten what confidence was-
But confidence was reclaimed
by her warm summer rain.

Life in the desert can be hard at times.
I had my reasons but none of them rhymed.
but my desert was briefly reclaimed
by her warm summer rain.

When it rains in the desert the wildflowers bloom
And the night air is sweetened with hints of perfume
The desert is utterly changed
by her warm summer rain.

Wildflowers are fleeting, sand always endures.
I’ll choose to remember wildflowers’ allure.
I’ll always remember her name
And her warm summer rain

Washington and Lee were both proud sons of Virginia.
Both men were brave, intelligent and resourceful.
Both men were relatively a-political.
Both were generals leading armies in a revolutionary war.
Both men were beloved by their troops.
Both men were slave owners in an era of slavery
Lee won most of his battles, Washington lost most of his.
Washington won his war, Lee Lost his war.
Washington received financial and military support from
the French.
Lee fought on alone, with no foreign support or recognition-
Often the odds against him were two or three to one.
Washington, as a subject of King George the third,
was a traitor to that allegiance and would have been hung had he lost.
Lee, as a citizen of Virginia, was loyal to his home state.
It is an active question whether states have a right to secede.
Lee and his officers were never tried for treason.
The case against them was weak, that’s why.
We honor Washington because he won his revolution.
We dishonor Lee because he lost his revolution.
Lee’s decision to surrender rather than resort to guerrilla warfare
was a major factor in healing the wounds of a hard war
Both these men command my honor and respect.

Like a modern Diana the Huntress
Emma exuded appeal
She wore liquid black leather outfits
designed to reveal not conceal.
As a member of TV’s Avengers
She was her partner, John Steed’s, ideal.

Emma Peel in a Mini was fetching
Her clothing set fashion and style.
Leaving little to imagination
it made many a teenager smile.

In time she would leave for theater
and do a film as Mrs James Bond
Linda Thorson paled in comparison
but at least she was not a dumb blond

I sense the smoke
I taste the Peat.
My tongue caresses
each drop so sweet
The golden Goblet
in my hand
says to the cold and damp
“Be dammed”
While by the fireside
I sip and play
some favored songs
from yesterday.

In my father’s Father’s time
The violin sang
a tune to time
Grandfather too
would raise a glass
to toast the cruel winds
of Loughhesh.

I don’t drink any more,
This I freely confess.
Drinking too much
makes ones whole life a mess.

For when I drink too much
I’m a maudlin bore,
and as often as not
I wind up on the floor.

It’s hard to make waves
Or make a big score
When one for the road
means two or three more.

I don’t drink any more
But I think you can guess
My not drinking more
Means I’m not drinking less.

I came home from your funeral dressed all in my Sunday best.
The shock of losing you is past and now I feel depressed.
Our house is large and empty now and silence roams the halls.
I remember the happier times before I lost it all.

Some weeks have passed and I’ve resolved to sell this place and leave.
I’ll get a small apartment with just space enough to grieve.
Of course that means I’ll have to pack and cast some things away.
That’s how I came across the box saved from our wedding day.

How beautiful was the dress your wore on the night that we were wed
I still can hear the music played when you pretended that I led.
The hand sewn pearls, the lavish lace, your falling auburn curls.
How rich a man this pauper was when you were in my world.

The smoking wreckage is where once stood
our humble family home.
I am the sole survivor.
Everyone else is gone.

As I wander through the ruins,
I spy a little shoe.
It is the only thing remaining
of my brother who was Two.

My family has been murdered,
by your mutual hate.
When slaughter is indiscriminate
Peace will come too late.

The holy land? What holy land?
From the river to the sea
This has become the ****** land
And I? A refugee.

Though genetically indistinguishable;
Semites one and all.
Ismael will ****** Isaac
Or Ismael himself must fall.

My friend is gone.
No longer will she feel
the warmth of the sun
upon her face,
the chill of Winter,
or taste the Beaujolais Nouveau.

Still I will remember her;
in the warmth of the Sun.
in winter's chill grasp.
and in the crush of the grape

until I, too, forget,
and am forgotten.

What happens in Vegas won’t stay there this time,
It’s the scene of a terrible, unspeakable crime.
From high up above in the Mandalay Bay
Bullets rained down as the musicians played.
Carnage and horror. Screams in the night
People were trampled as others took flight.
The gunman is dead but the questions remain.
Was this act one of terror or was he insane?
Fifty Eight are dead, It doesn’t seem right.
Vegas, our playground, has been bloodied this night.
The Morgues overwhelmed and the E.R. is full.
The shooter had come well equipped for the ****.


Is it time to restrict weapons sold in our nation?
Surely it’s time we had that conversation.

What if the stars around us
are of Sentient life devoid ?
Binary stars and Giant blues
are common in the void.
Binaries do not provide
a habitable clime
Blue Giant Stars burn fast and short-
Evolution needs more time.
Giant Reds live long enough
but keep few planets warm.
Perhaps upon a distant rock
there is some primal goo
but that is quite a ways away
from beings like me and you.
So please be better stewards
of this third rock from the sun
That lovely little yellow dwarf
round which our race is run.

What is a Slave? A slave is a human being who works but is not allowed to keep the fruits and profits of his labors. He is forced by his master to deliver up the fruits of his efforts under threat of punishment and receives back a bare minimum sustenance. Tax Freedom day is now approximately June 30th each year. When we were younger it occurred in April, then May. So I figure that we now are "Half Slave, and Half Free" No nation can endure, half slave and half free- or so somebody once said.

As militant Mullahs mutter and pray

And plan their Mosque near ground Zero

Protesters march and people say:

“This isn't right! They'll have to go.”



But let's demur and make no noise

No tears, no threats, no signs approve.

It would profane our civic faith

To tell the Mullah he must move.



The Towers’ fall brought harm and fear

Men reckon what that did and meant;

But building a “cultural Center” near

Though demonized, is innocent.



Dull couch potatoes of the Right

Those ditto heads who can't admit

Tolerance, cause it doth reprove

Those thoughts that have them in a snit.



But we, my love, are so refined

that we ourselves don't care one whit.

Let them build it, come what may

But build a brothel next to it.



Two buildings place there, cheek to cheek:

the Mosque and “Annie’s House of Pain”.

One dealing with things spiritual,

The other deals with things profane.



In both, salvation is for sale

It seems to me a perfect fit.

For do not both invoke God's name?

-and both, I fear, use whips a bit.



students at the Madrasah may

hear the cries of Joy next door

on her mattress, hard at play

While they use prayer mats on the floor.

.

Will they too prove as tolerant?

Live and let live, for now- they say

When they enforce Sharia law,

The folks next door will learn to pray.

George Zimmerman
desperately
sought some way
To silence those
who call for blood.
He’d be defenseless,
Once released,
As Eric Holder has his gun.
In such a desperate situation
The answer came
Like sweet salvation.
To keep his name
off the public tongue,
where he’s reviled
as if a ****,
George filed a name change
with the courts-
And henceforth will be called
Ben Ghazi

In fear of saboteurs, we parked planes wing to wing
which made them easy targets from the air.
While relations were uneasy with Imperial Japan
up to this point war had not been declared.
Peace ended when we heard the drone of their incoming planes
and saw a row of Hawks go up in flames.
Wheeler field was target rich and their pilots were well trained,
They bombed and strafed, destroying all they found.

In the lull between the waves of the onslaught of their planes,
We got a dozen war hawks off the ground.
We twelve angry would be heroes
had little chance against their Zeros
but we struck a blow and shot some bombers down.

Ford Island was half hidden by the smoke and flames that rose
from the stricken battle-wagons on the row.
It was dangerous to remain flying any sort of plane
as the sailors there would shoot at friend or foe.


The attacking fleet made sail and returned back to Japan.
They had hurt us but they left their job half done.
Our fuel farms were still here and facilities for repair;
We’d raise our ships to fight the rising Sun.

I’ve been an Oceanographer for forty years or more
But what’s happening here in our north west I’d never seen before
From Santa Barbara to Alaska, all along the shore,
The sea stars are all dying, melting into gore.
We’ve noted small white lesions and weirdly twisted arms.
We’ve seen whole populations die and we’re sounding the alarm.
The ecosystem’s dying, there’s a virus on the loose.
I’ve brought up buckets of remains to help search for the truth.
There’s a killer lurking off our shores, one, as yet, without a name.
If there’s any consolation- dying sea stars feel no pain.
Our oceans are in trouble from pollution from the shore.
Vast swathes gone anaerobic can’t support life anymore.
When all the stars are gone then barnacles will spread unchecked
We’ll race with time to find a cure before the shore is wrecked...

They married in secret,
perhaps in some haste.
They longed to be one
having tired of the chaste.

Donne's employer was furious
and he threw them both out.
Donne did his niece
but neglected accounts.

The two lovers suffered ,
due to tightness of purse.
When you marry a poet-
plan on better or verse.

He'd broken hearts, he made girls cry
to him twas all the same.
He was, you see, a player,
and "love" his favorite game.
It helped that he was handsome
in a rakish sort of way.
When lovers turned the talk to "Love"
He'd get himself away.
Until one day he met his match;
a colleen with a fiery mane.
Blue eyed and fair,with quite a pair,
Her wit drove him insane.
The knave of hearts was *******
by the mere mention of her name.
Thereafter nothing seemed the same
as back when it had been a game.

In Orlando, there’s an emptiness words struggle to convey
As survivors try to comprehend what happened yesterday.
When the music and the laughter stopped, then fear and screams began.
The children of the city died at the hands of a madman.
Sons and Daughters, brothers, sisters; fifty dead in the attack
There is sadness in the City as the rainbows fade to black.


How beautiful that night had been; the dance floor pulsed with life.
Here were youth and beauty on display; not bitterness or strife.
At the bar with cash in hand they drank craft brews on tap.
It was last call for one and all, the D.J. played a Rap
Then sadness in the city as the rainbows fade to black.

Some blame the gun, some blame a Faith, some bluster; others hide.
In Orlando a grey mood prevails where sons and daughters died.
By dawn the sirens stopped their song, but there is no turning back
There is sadness in our Country as the rainbows fade to black.

Her parents weren’t there to cry
The day that sleeping beauty died.
First Dad, then Mother, slipped away
as their comatose daughter slept each day.
Through forty two years of dreamless sleep
Her loving family did their promise keep.
A drug reaction was the cause
of her coma irreversible.
By the power of
Unconditional love
The faint flickering flame
Of life stayed possible.
Until today did beauty lie.
Until today did life endure.
Today she smiled and opened her eyes
Only then did beauty die..

Saint Hilary's day, the coldest of our year,
when snow and ice enshrouded London town,
was the day the Prince of Poets died.

His home in Ireland had been pillaged and torched.
His wife and young son murdered that same day.
The Irish were hot for English blood;
some said the O'Neil accepted Spanish pay.

He was not young, yet not particularly old,
when death arrived to place him under arrest.
His hostess found him lying on the ground.
His body cold; no sign of pulse nor breath.

His friend, the Earl of Essex, had decreed
The Prince of Poets be mourned by all his kind.
Edmund Spencer beside Chaucer would lie down.
and be eulogized by poets of renown.


Ben Jonson came ; the young John Donne as well.
Beaumont and Fletcher, Chapman and sweet Will,
followed his hearse, then bore him to his tomb.

There in the nave, the poets did him homage.
Reciting there their hastily written lines.
Each man than dropped his poem into the grave
Each poet's pen dropped in the grave besides.

Where were you when the towers fell? I’m sure you must recall.
The frame is frozen in your mind as it is for us all.
A New York City sky so blue; It seemed a perfect day;
Then came the news about a plane gone terribly astray.
That crash was not an accident, I sense everyone knew-
that moment that the second plane crashed into tower two.
We watched in shock and horror At the rising smoke and flames.
The fortunate all fled on foot; Three thousand souls remained.
Some of these perished in the flames; Years later their traces would be found
Other broke the glass and leapt; Their bodies littering the ground.
South tower was the first to fall; In ten seconds she was gone.
Her mortally stricken sister For a few scant minutes lingered on.
From every corner of the City people saw day turn to night.
Emergency vehicles were crushed like toys; our brave responders nowhere in sight.

Where were you when the towers fell? I’m sure you must recall.
The frame is frozen in your mind as it is for us all.

Elizabeth, the ****** Queen, left vacant the English throne.
Her Scottish Stuart cousin came and claimed it for his own.
Two nations with one monarchy joined in the Union Jack.
The Scottish lost their nationhood and now they want it back.
Saint Andrews’ Flag of Bonnie Blue will have to be unfurled
if Scotland votes to take its place among nations in the world.
Quebecois and Basques today are eagerly looking on
to see if Scots will vote to tell the English to be gone.
Hadrian’s Wall will, once more, mark where their dominion ends.
Remove your subs from Scapa Flow; your lease is at an end.
There still remains a problem which, just now, occurs to me.
If the English take their Pound with them, what is our currency?
It’s true we’re rich with North Sea oil and better off than Spain.
Yet how do we do business if the Sterling won’t remain.
We need a new “Gold” standard based upon the single malt!
Who needs pounds when we have ounces stored in barrels and in vaults?
So pour me a “MacCallan” on the day the rent comes due.
Hand me a glenfiddich and I’ll purvey food to you..
Our creditors will be well pleased with hints of bog and peat.
We won’t dilute our currency as Scots men drink it neat.

Sophie was just twenty-two, arrayed in prison grey,
Sentenced to death for treason; this, her final day.
She was a faithful Catholic who defied the twisted cross.
She saw through the Fuhrer’s lies; those golden piles of dross.

Her boyfriend was a medic who served on the Eastern front.
Then, wounded, he returned with some hard truths to confront.
He’d seen the mass graves filled with Jews; the horror, the despair.
Demons such as ****** require more than prayer.

When they authored their first leaflet they surely must have known
That they would be discovered and how they would atone.
With each succeeding pamphlet, they courted their demise.
Their Martyrdom a certainty; the truth is treason in men’s eyes.

One by one the White rose died; death by the guillotine.
They had committed treason; their sentence guaranteed.
When Sophie heard the guillotine sing she knew what they had found;
As she, too, cast off her earthly cross and exchanged it for a crown.

Sophie was just twenty two, arrayed in prison grey,
Sentenced to death for treason; this, her final day.
She was a faithful Catholic who defied the twisted cross.
She saw through the Fuhrer’s lies; those golden piles of dross.

Her boyfriend was a medic who served on the Eastern front.
Then, wounded, he returned with some hard truths to confront.
He’d seen the mass graves filled with Jews; the horror, the despair.
Demons such as ****** require more than prayer.

When they authored their first leaflet they surely must have known
That they would be discovered and how they would atone.
With each succeeding pamphlet they courted their demise.
Their Martyrdom a certainty; truth is treason in men’s eyes.

One by one the White rose died; death by the guillotine.
They had committed treason; their sentence guaranteed.
When Sophie heard the guillotine sing she knew what they had found;
As she, too, cast off her earthly cross and exchanged it for a crown.

An Aussie Couple in their middle years
had despaired of children of their own.
To fill that empty room at home
They would need a womb on loan.

A Young Thai woman without a mate
agreed to be their surrogate.
To spare them from a childless fate
Ten Thousand was the going rate.

Fraternal twins, a boy and girl,
were implanted in the Surrogate.
The little girl, a perfect child.
Her brother faced a darker fate.

A child with Down’s is often slain
before they see the light of day.
Identified pre natally,
They are aborted right away.

The surrogate, in awe of God,
would not accede to such a fate.
The “Parents” refused the “damaged goods”
and were “understandably” irate.

His “parents” wouldn’t take him home
Due to his mismatched chromosomes.
His surrogate who gave him birth
became his only friend on Earth.

One child accepted, one denied;
They say “He is no child of mine!”
The surrogate will raise him as her own;
Though he be less than kin she’s more than kind.

They monitor the internet.
They listen in on calls.
They spy on foreign Heads of State-
Believe me that takes *****
Their surveillance apparatus
Makes the KGB look LAX.
Omniscience is their stated aim
to “protect” us from attacks.
So put up with whole body scans
And show your papers please.
I believe the cure for terror
Will prove worse than the disease.

As darkness falls the shelling stopped and the Earth grew ever colder.
It’s taking far too long to die for one badly wounded soldier.
Abandoned by his comrades for the safety of their trench,
He’s dying out in no man’s land amidst the gore and stench,
too late for prayer, too late for Love Too late even for repentance.
He hears the cries for “Mother” from those under the same sentence.
With labored breath he, too, gives voice to the dark forbidding sky.
The last word from his dying lips is the simple question: “Why?”

We knew of your use of Holinshed; that you “borrowed” from Plutarch’s Lives”
We suspected you dredged for characters in various bars and dives.
Now scholars have discovered your main source of “Richard the Third”
From which you borrowed liberally, and sometimes word for word.
Macbeth, King Lear, the gang’s all here -you scene steal-er you!  
(You rummaged Marlowe’s “The Jew of Malta” for your Venetian Jew.)
Sophisticated software has snared you in its trap;
As you read North’s manuscript, bet  you never thought of that!


Since you are my favorite dramatist, I’m inclined to let this pass.
If you were a college Freshman- I’d be seeing you after class!

She came to me at Calvados,
A single night, without repeat.
The woman of my soul’s love longing,
to consummate with kisses sweet.

She entered in my midnight room
a simple pastel shift she wore
Smiling as she bared her shoulders,
the garment dropping to the floor.

So beautiful, this child of Gonne,
to this poet’s bleary eyes.
How often I had praised, in print,
her auburn hair and hazel eyes.

I was silent, she as well,
neither keen to break the spell.
She kissed me deeply on the lips
just as  the stroke of midnight fell.

Her fingers deeply  in my hair
she brought me to her freckled chest.
I licked and nibbled at one ******
like a baby at her breast.

She mounted me, her Rocinante,
and slowly, we began our quest.
My Willie in warm velvet wetness
wrapped as I returned her thrusts.

In spirit, we belonged together.
In truth,she’d wed another man.
A brute who’d tried to **** her sister.
She, too, had suffered at his hand.

As we played, she bent to kiss me
sweet Celtic sweat was in her hair
In another life she’d been my sister.
In this life’s love war all was fair.


She gave out with a little cry
as she took my Willie deep.
we came in unison so sweetly
but quietly, her child was asleep.

I remember, one time, Maud had asked
what type of bird I’d like to be?
Back upon the hills at Howth
when we were young and both still free.

“I think”, I said,” I’d be a gull,
playing at the shore for free.
Soaring high above the water
taking my living from the sea.”

Now we lay here in Calvados
near the town  Colleville sur Mer
Her villa was named “Les Mouettes”
For one night only, we coupled there.



It is rumored that, in the Summer of 1907, William Butler Yeats and Maud Gonne shared physical intimacy for the one and only time in their lives. He the famous Poet and Playwright, she the famous Irish nationalist.
At the time she was separated from John MacBride, but they had not divorced, being Catholic. Yeats had a belief in reincarnation and both had, at times, dabbled in the occult. See also my poem
" Making Iseult"

The child asleep in the adjoining room would be Sean MacBride, later in life a Nobel peace prize winner.

Les Mouettes is French for "the (Sea)gulls."

I have read that Yeats wrote a love poem about this night, but that it has been lost. This is my attempt to replicate that lost love poem.

I thank Patrick McFarland for helping me revise the original version of the poem. His suggestions improved the flow of the piece.  










.

Wilmer McLean had seen war in the flesh;
Near Bull Run he had purchased a farm.
When rebellion broke out, Stonewall Jackson came up
Causing Wilmer distress and alarm

So McLean sold his farm, moved his kin far from harm;
-kept them safe to the very last day.
Until Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant
chose his parlor for the end of the Fray.


From Fort Sumter’s surrender to Appomattox Court House
Through five Aprils, ****** war had held sway,
It began in his back yard, ended up in his parlor
From fate he could not get away.

They can’t be seen.
They won’t be felt,
when you and they collide.
They’re like universal glue
That keeps the Heavens bound.
In the dark of seeming empty space
Is where the W.I.M.P’s abound.
Invisible, undetectable
the source of beings’ ground.
Science hasn’t seen one yet-
They’re difficult to find.
Yet Scientists believe in W.I.M.P’s
Though they’re tricky to divine.

The City of Light wears a blanket of white
As snowflakes and darkness, in tandem, descend.
I walk her streets, alone, with just your memory as company
The old bookstore that we loved to shop
Has made its last sale and closed for good.
Our favorite restaurant is still here, open for business,
but new people have it now.
It, too, is changed.
In happier times we sat at that outside table
And watched, together, the subtle shades of light
refracted on the waters of the Seine.

In your company a simple crust of bread
And a bottle, or two, of calvados seemed a feast.
In your absence the finest foods are, to me, chaff and straw.

Years of living in your love
has not prepared me
For this life alone
I watch the snowflakes falling down, down.
through the cold dark of this Parisian evening
and envy them their resolution that I cannot yet share.

For twenty years
they loved and bickered
She was smarter,
he was quicker.
They then divorced
In acrimony
He got freedom
She got alimony.
For ten years then
They lived apart.
But hunger grew
within each heart.
So they remarried
Made a new start
And this time only
Death did part.
What did he tell friends?
What was his take?
“We got divorced
But it was a mistake.”

In the shadows rose the gallows,
his execution date drew near.-
Wolfe Tone, denied a soldiers ‘death,
could not hold life that dear.

He took a blade to his own throat
and cut a swathe of red.
It’s said he lingered but a week
then brave Wolfe Tone was dead..

He was the father of desire
for an Ireland brave and free.
Desire famine could not ****
nor emigration flee.

He choose the manner of his death.
He did not die a slave.
It put his life in context-
His words transcend the grave

Each year on the day he died
as long as Wolfe’s lived there
They lay a spray of roses
on his graveside in Kildare..

Were there skeletons in her closet?
Did he meet another ghoul?
Was he in it for her *****?
Was she a loving trusting fool?

Some say she’s a gold digger,
was In it for his buried treasure.
She had no body to go out with
and relied on herself for pleasure.

Anyway, they’ve call it off,
renounced their wedded bliss.
The spirit was willing but the flesh was weak
And so its come to this

For every aging boomer
There are one or two they've known:
Heroes of the battlefield
Who never made it home.

Some classmate who was butchered
in a fire fight in “Nam.
A sibling who had perished
in the standoff at Khe Sanh.

Perhaps the Tet offensive
left some friend's blood spilled and spent.
Politicians speak of glory-
It’s the grunts who pay the rent


From the walls of Hue to Cam ranh Bay
from Tonkin to Saigon.
there is a wall in Washington
with their names inscribed thereon.

The lucky ones who did come home
Recall the name and face
of some heroic eighteen year old
who perished in their place.

For every aging boomer
there are one or two they've known:
Heroes of the battlefield
Who never made it home.

Some classmate who was butchered
in a fire fight in “Nam.
A sibling who had perished
in the standoff at Khe Sanh.

Perhaps the Tet offensive
left some friend's blood spilled and spent.
Politicians speak of glory-
It’s the grunts who pay the rent

From the walls of Hue to Can Ranh Bay
from Tonkin to Saigon.
there is a wall in Washington
with their names inscribed thereon.

The lucky ones who did come home
recall the name and face
of some heroic eighteen year old
who perished in their place.

A word was born, some years ago,
Perhaps from Mister Marlowe’s pen.
Will Shakespeare stole it for his play.
The groundlings picked it up that way.
It gained currency by the hour-
For such is a poets’ power,
though Marlowe died in a tavern brawl
And all but scholars forget his name,
Words conquer worlds, thoughts persist
far longer than his Tamburlaine.
Genetic lines may hit dead ends
From war or pestilence or fate-
But words poetic or prosaic
Survive (though sometimes they’re Archaic.)

“Till death do us part.”
Is a comforting phrase
To all those who repent
their impetuous days.
Those whose “I do’s” were followed
By a question mark,
Or who subsequently experienced
a quick change of heart.
It’s a comfort to them,
on their terminal day,
that their sentence is over
and they can get away.
When the last breath is expelled
Then their marriage is through.
They are free then to love
Anybody but you

If I had the world and time,
ample wine and leisure,
then I might be well content
to give myself to pleasure.
Oh what fun indolence is
with all the world my treasure.
But infinity is not the cloth
of which I'm cut and measured.
The Fates that cut say time is short,
I cannot bide forever.
I preserve my time
in bits of rhyme
so posterity thinks me clever.
A prophet in his own home town
appreciated never.

This was a place of happy memories;
some sad ones, also, I recall.
It was a detached frame colonial
and, as such, doomed to fall.                                                            ­                                

Our old neighborhood was changing,
multi-families all the rage.
The zoning laws permitted it,
it was time to turn the page.

A new brick building has replaced
the home my parents made.
They've carted off the remnants
Not a single scrap remains.

The new building doesn't interest me,
It's the old walls I recall.
I felt as if my own chest caved in
when they felt the wrecking ball.

Consider the plight
of the poor young black male
with only a mother at home.
He has no role model,
No Father to love,
Poverty darkens his home.
The school teachers care
for their pension and pay,
they let these kids slip through the cracks.
“ If their parents don’t care,
Then why should I care?”
Their attitude, I think, sadly lacks.
When you don’t have a job and you
Wander the streets
And the “dealers” won’t leave you alone
Is it any surprise when a young black male dies
or makes jail his permanent home?
We have more kids in jail than the rest of the world.
More die here than died in Iraq.
Wall Street is flying and young blacks are dying.
They’re not doing as well as Barrack.

From the beginning  was the Wyrrd,
and the Wyrrd  was in the hands of the Norns.
These three weird sisters held men's fates .
They handled , measured and cut
the strands of fate
Some think them witches
or else the classical Fates.
These are the Norns.
They measure out our days.
Do not look
Do not dare to gaze upon
The faces of Fate
The Weird sisters

Flee, Macbeth, thane of Cawdor!

Fly Thane of Glamis

X used to mark the spot
where two hearts intersected.
X used to mark the spot
On a map where  treasure was hidden
X used to be the variable
For which I sought the solution.
X turned out like all the rest
which explains why I’m disillusioned.


Nowadays X marks the spot
Where love found its conclusion.

When Dorothy trod the paths of Oz
Her companions were deficient:
One lacked Courage,
One lacked brains,
One was heartless, but
Ax Proficient.

She was an illegal alien,
from Kansas, of all
places!
Imagine, when she and
Toto came-
the look on people’s faces.

Still that was seventy years ago.,
In another place and time-
Just before we went to war
against evil personified.

If Dorothy, today,appeared
with a similar convocation
The Wizard might mistake them
for a Congressional Delegation

For lack of brain and heart and spine
Our Congress is more than sufficient-
Some lack Courage, some lack brains
Some are heartless but
tax proficient