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John Mahoney Jan 2012
Dear Lesley,
I'm sorry to have to do this through a letter, but
last time your crying just humiliated
the other couples in your group session.
Although, this might save embarrassment,
and make me look better, now that we are
both sleeping with other people. (If you
can call conjugal visits to your ex-husband people.)
This letter may well be the last memory
you will have of me, if your social worker
lets you keep it as a memento anyway.

I am leaving, and I won't be looking back either.
I am sure you won't be surprised or terribly upset.
It is completely your fault, no doubt about it!
Mainly, it is your long history with lying problems,
even more than your alcoholism, that keeps me
from being even remotely interested in continuing
this relationship with you. (I told you I forgave
you for sleeping with your boss, but I guess I
never really did.)

You would be so much better off finding someone
that can accept the emotional baggage that
you carry around, the ones with the orange tags.
Maybe your analyst can explain that to you better
than I can. I must say, I will miss some of the exciting
times we had together. Like when you got so drunk
and flirted with my father at our family Christmas
dinner. My mom has still not gotten the red wine stain
out of the tablecloth where you puked on it.

I'm glad this is finally done and we can go our
separate ways. I think you will find someone else
with whom to have an unhealthy relationship based
on physical attraction and a passion for strip-club bars.
Hopefully, this will happen incredibly far away.

Good riddance, and Happy New Year.

PS Maybe you should just go back to being a lesbian.
PPS I have no idea where you parked your car.
6.2k · Sep 2011
The Message Has Been Sent
John Mahoney Sep 2011
The message has been sent
among the stacked corroborations
remain the only touch
perhaps night will
obscure the notions
honor, trust, courage
a remembrance of  things passed

the message has been sent
the water endlessly seeking the sea
an eternity
pebbles roll along the stream floor
underfoot
the water ankle deep
an moment

the message has been sent
within the certification
release the only intonation
duty, mercy, hope
all living things relent

stretched before me forever
new chains have been forged
the message has been sent
John Mahoney Feb 2012
i had a poetry reading
last night, well not
just me, but i read
some of my poems

it did not go well
this fellow in front
would not stop
talking into his mobile

as though everyone
wanted to know
what time his girlfriend
was going to arrive

and why she was
such a ***** in the
first place just because
he would not pick her up

when she knows that
she lives on the
completely opposite
side of town and

would make him late
late? to a poetry
reading, i thought,
why don't you hang

up the phone then
and what kind of
a woman puts up
with this **** anyway

so, i paused, and
asked him to stop
talking on the phone
people clapped, i said

that i know i am not
exactly "on" tonight
but did not think he
could do any better

i was wrong this
**** was brilliant
he stood and began
reciting with clever

lines and impossible
rhymes he did not
even stop to breathe,
well, my fault i guess

his girlfriend showed
up and of course she
turned heads as she
walked past to sit with

him, and i heard her
apologize for being late
then they left so i
just stepped off the

stage and sat down
then i left just as
soon as i thought
no one would notice
4.1k · Dec 2012
a blanket on the floor
John Mahoney Dec 2012
don't call out her name
she will not
there is a hole in the bottle
a blanket on the floor
the hallway isn't empty
shoes scatter when they fall
don't turn at the corner
or start towards the door
the light from the window
never reaches very far
shadows cast the grey
the grey narrows to a point
meaningless gradual losses
have taken her astray
don't turn away
you can't reach her anymore
3.6k · May 2012
mowing the bird bone garden
John Mahoney May 2012
all day long, their banging disturbed me at my work
startling me from my reverie, lost deep in the world
of I Wish I Had A Heart Like Yours, Walt Whitman

the birds, returned early from wherever it is they hide
during the long winter, have come to fling themselves
against the over-sized picture window in my living room,

songbird pitch themselves into my poet's dull daytime
so that i am moved to rise from my desk, to look out,
to seek a bird flying away, or peer down to search for the

tiny body maybe roosting among the stalks of the overgrown
hydrangea, which captured  autumn’s maple leaves, worn
like a Chicago matron's mink to keep the winter chill at bay

and, as the spring surrenders to the warmer days, i mow the
brightly greened grass, innocently cutting row after row,
to turn finally to the narrow strip nearest the picture window,

a mixture of grass, dried leaves and tiny twigs, all mulched
by the power mower, where i discover these dessicated bodies  
exhumed from shallow graves at the base of the newly leafed

hydrangea, their stiff, dry feathers bristly, colored a washed
out grey, tiny feet tightly balled, with all the soft parts missing
and the beaks a startling white, as though bleached, bright against

the dullness of the little corpses which seem to have sunk into
the mosses of the yard, so that they lay preserved below the blade
for the first late-spring chore -- mowing the bird bone garden

i sleep with the bedroom window ajar despite the overnight chill
and dream of the memory of birds, their shapes, their white beaks
and, still, the bird songs wake me in the cool green spring morning
John Mahoney Feb 2012
never wanted it to happen this way,
did not really think it could,
don't know what i was thinking,
now the blues have come, to paint
my whole day away, now i wake to
the blue walls all around me
what did i expect, never really
gave it much thought, not
known for being this way, did not
even clean off the brushes, or put
the tops on the cans, left it all
lying around, tripping over on my
way to the bathroom at night
wake you up with a start and
find that you never can fall back to sleep,
greet the morning this way, not after
being awake before dawn again, cause
the blues have come, to paint all my walls
(for you, just because you seem to be awake at two most mornings)
John Mahoney Sep 2012
i.
morning sand chills my feet
damp grains cling between my toes
a predawn morning cold
mid-August summer day

ii.
down the beach
i watch hawks circling
hunting the tree line, they
work the shore grasses
a narrow strip of tall plants
between beach and wood
circling closer and closer
     coming to me

iii.
they soar a steady breeze off the lake
hunting prey which i hear
scurrying frantically among the tall grasses
the hawks circle now directly above
white bodies with dark wing feathers

iv.
in the beach house
hang two paintings by a local artist
children playing on this very beach
chasing one another and crouching in the tide-pool
shown in fine detail
especially for water color  
yet, i notice, the children
have no faces, merely brown smudges
     featureless

v.
that night, sitting
around a beach bonfire
sparks jump from burning logs
about me forms glow red
i see these faces too appear as
smudges,
     featureless
like an infant
     at it's birth
John Mahoney Oct 2011
O, king
bones ground to chalk
the Herero cry in the dust

The Kaiser had enough
he sent General Lothar von Trotha
to impose his will,
the ending of the Herero
as a people

von Trotha says,
'I wipe out rebellious tribes
with streams of blood
and streams of money.
Only following this cleansing
can something new emerge.'

Ten-thousand heavily-armed men
and a plan for war

von Trotha says,
'the Herero, who in their blindness
believed that they could make successful war
against the powerful German Emperor
and the great German people
I ask you,
where are the Herero today?'

twenty skulls gather dust
in the drawers
of Germany
monument to anthropology

O, king
skulls in drawers
the Herero cry in the dust

Is our language ever rich enough
to name
the evil man has levied

Is sin enough
to encompass
the vast, the richness, the full
depravity

of our visits
to the Herero

O, king
bitter herbs, unleavened bread
the Herero cry in the dust
In the 1880s, Germany acquired present-day Namibia, calling it German South-West Africa. In 1904 the Herero, the largest of about 200 ethnic groups, rose up against colonial rule killing more than a 120 civilians. The German response was ruthless. The Kaiser sent Gen. Lothar von Trotha to make war. The general signed a notorious Extermination Order against the Herero, defeated them in battle and drove them into the desert, where most died of thirst. Of an estimated 65,000 Herero, only 15,000 survived.

In 1985, a UN report classified the events as an attempt to exterminate the Herero and Nama peoples of South-West Africa, and therefore the earliest attempted genocide in the 20th Century. In 2004, Germany's ambassador to Namibia expressed regret for what happened.

The skulls belong to 20 people who died after an uprising against their German colonial rulers more than 100 years ago. They were among hundreds who starved to death after being rounded up in camps.

Some of the dead had their heads removed and of these, about 300 were taken to Germany, arriving between 1909 and 1914. German scientists took the heads to perform experiments seeking to prove the racial superiority of white Europeans over black Africans.
The skulls gathered dust in German archives until three years ago when a German reporter uncovered them at the Medical History Museum of the Charite hospital in Berlin, and at Freiburg University in the south-west.

German researchers believe the skulls belong to 11 people from the Nama ethnic group and nine from the Herero.

They were four women, 15 men and a boy.

This September, German officials held a ceremony to return the skulls to a delegation from Namibia.
John Mahoney Mar 2012
i.
we spent the autumn day wandering
above the great river the woodland
of the bluffs as dusk fell, shots echoed down the
river canyon, we had completely forgotten
the deer firearms season had opened
down the old logging trail,
a glorious stag eyes wide with confusion
lurched from the wood

ii.
despite our noise, he stumbled ahead
down the  road, and toward the hunters,
we could not turn him into the safety of the park

iii.
as the black night descended we
were surprised by a glow racing towards us
a man on  a bicycle, brightly lit, not with just a
headlamp, but a whole string of lights,
wrapped around the tubes of his
bike frame, like a Christmas tree,
he nodded at us and rode past

iv.
as we sat around the fire back at camp,
silent, pondering the odd events
we had witnessed that day,
and the stag we had maybe sent off
to be killed by some hunter,
i wondered at the strangeness
of it all, this day, and all the days
like it, and all the days to come,
would they have been strange
without my being there to see them,
or, was the strangeness my seeing
              them,
and my being, at all
              stag, still, i am so sorry
2.0k · Dec 2011
midwinter thaw
John Mahoney Dec 2011
the snow has melted
in a midwinter thaw
exposing all the lies
you left so carelessly
in the garden
i see them scattered about
before the breeze
as i look out the kitchen window
i catch them in the yard
trying to pretend that
no one can see them
where they rest.
something has led us
to this day
chasing your lies
out on the lawn
cleaning up after you
(again)
but if we left them
until the spring
what kind of bitter
**** might grow
to choke the garden
with their nettles
John Mahoney Mar 2012
the farmers, hard, winter toughened
Minnesota plains, quiet men
have been spreading manure

the wet fields sink the
green or yellow tractor
wheels into the muck

that the melted snow
has given to us once again,
stuck almost above the rims

(maybe that is why they paint
them such a bright yellow)
but these men press on

as though maybe denial, hard
work and quiet lives could let
them, too, walk on water

against this last assault
of winter, these men
work to renew the life
of the fields with compost

every spring, like tulips
pressing up through the
frozen slush, reaching for

the promise of warmer days,
too early, once more, asking,
has this gift been received

with thankfulness?
John Mahoney Jan 2012
we had everything we wanted
not a care left in the world
we left all our inhibitions
in the hall outside our room
put the locks on the door, firmly

i could hear the traffic
moving on the streets below
but never even wondered
where they might all go
you took my hand so, gently

we had breakfast sent up
orange juice freshly squeezed
the bathtub water running
i wrote your name in the
steam on the mirror, Lesley
1.8k · Jun 2012
impulse boys
John Mahoney Jun 2012
impulse boys
shooting themselves out of skateboards
into the hearts of lovely girls
sitting on the picnic tables
pretending not to be seen

lonely girls
what more is there to say
about these lonely girls, willing
their way through to picnic tables
pretending not to look
John Mahoney Jan 2012
i.
we drove north
on highway six
the night a perfect black
close about us with
neither moon nor stars
to shine their light and
cut the darkness

ii.
the pines hovered at the very
edge of the narrow road
making a long, dark tunnel
when, after a curve
just north of Nisswa,
we emerged suddenly
in to a birch stand

iii.
the car lights caught
the white birch bark
which reflected the light
an eerie white stand
of bright, white birch
in a pitch black night
the trees on either side
rising in a gentle *****

iv.
i heard the breath catch
in every passenger
and then, just as
suddenly, we are
come upon an
automobile accident

v.
the glitter of broken
windshield glass
flashed in the car
headlights as i stop
a car had wrapped
about a pole, the
driver's door open

vi.
soon, the drama was over
we got in the car to drive home
the whine of the tires on road
filled the silent cabin
the white lines of the road
the white birch trees with
their black shadows
the far-away moon in
the sky exactly over the road,
seemed now living their own life
apart and incomprehensible,
yet very near to man

vii.
it was the beginning of April
after a warm spring day
the night had cooled
a faint touch of frost fell
the breath of spring
felt in the soft, chilly air
the highway ran endlessly
through the northern woods

viii.
on both sides of the road
the night was lit by the
the headlights and birch trees
in the brilliant, peaceful
moonlight night
and all were silent
sunk in thought
everything around seemed
kindly, youthful, akin,
everything--trees and sky,
and even the moon,
and one longed to think
that so it would be always.
[The last three stanzas adapted from the short-story "The Bishop" by Anton Chekov ]
1.7k · Dec 2012
shoveling snow
John Mahoney Dec 2012
it is winter,
still
although warm days
deceive us

dead branches
brown lawns
desolation

now, finally, in a winter's
black night
giant, sodden,
perfect
snowflakes
drift

the sky clouded
     full of snow
to make the night sky
     day

we stand
each wielding a shovel
working

sharing the joy
in this
perfect
winter
moment

         in which
the universe once again

seems to work

yet,

it is the bond
of the shared moment
which generates an
intensity of
closeness

a perfect understanding
between souls
strung out along
the driveway


shoveling snow
in a cloud of grey
steam
John Mahoney Dec 2011
i chanced to see a
tin foil car
in the library parking lot
yesterday

the carpet, molding, side panels
all removed
tin foil
had been duct taped
on every surface that
was not glass

even the shift ****
and the steering wheel
wrapped and wrapped
in tin foil
a Volkswagen Faraday cage

i searched the faces
of the people about me
would it not be obvious who
would drive around in a
Faraday cage
listening to voices
chasing around
their mind

tin foil car
reading Julian Huxley
and muttering about telepathy
or reading Faraday to get rid
of those nagging radio-frequency
electromagnetic radiation signals
in a hollow conductor

but, then why leave the radio in the car
1.4k · May 2012
a walk on the ocean beach
John Mahoney May 2012
and, as i stood there
on an unpeopled shore,
as the waves rolled in, one
following the other, i knew
with certainty, as in a
remembered dream,
that there was no returning
neither a going back nor
a turning away...

i felt the salt spray, cold on
my face,
and now i heard the sea birds
and looked,
to see them wheeling
above the water, now diving
and fighting one another
for the catch

and the beach, a grit of
seashell white, seemed as
the ocean itself, endless,
the evidence of great age
all about me in the sand
quartz ground from the
action of the water upon the
mountains
eroding even these
wearing down everything
in time
am i the sand, always washing away, or
the waves, eternally crashing against
the shore

what was it i was saying?
oh yes, i remember...

then, i walked back to the car
John Mahoney Feb 2012
i have wandered these forests,
     ancient redwoods enshrouding the foothills
          rolling back from the great Pacific to the Sierras

this ancient range of the coast redwood
     tallest trees on Earth. i walk a path well trodden
         above Mill Creek water flowing to the estuary

turning around to head back to the trail-head marker
     ferns and rocks protrude from the walls
          sediment of time, written in the canyon walls
          
i ramble into a growth of California rhododendron
     in full bloom, their flowers bursts of red and yellow
          against the dark green leaves

here, i pause, enchanted by the consuming
     majesty of this ancient place abounding in life
          entirely indifferent to my passing, enduring

and, once again, i am able to return to nothingness,
     suffering comes from the desire to exist, and, i remember
          that there is a path that leads to the end of suffering
John Mahoney Mar 2012
i.
we bundled in the car
wet wool and *** roast
the car that my father
brought home as a surprise
a big 1970 Buick Electra 225, four door sedan
     in pale yellow

ii.
winter, the sky an eternal black
the stars all about us
the woods, my parents silent
as if they, too, know
not to break the spell,

iii.
only the whine of the tires
all the way home from
my grandparents, down the
long rolling road, cozy
my sisters and i on the
back seat bench, the heater
blasting the car to an
     overwamth

iv.
feeling safe and loved and
knowing we could ride
     like this
forever, chasing the full
moon all the way to its
     home
but we all knew that spring
    was coming
John Mahoney Oct 2011
After all this time, the rain has come again
soybeans bursting in the pod, dry brown fields.
The lake as low as it has ever been
clouds pass, thin wisps, withholding all they wield.

We too have dried, mere husks, once plangent
await cadences, intimacy's desires.
A chair rests on a deck, first child's salient
artifact of family life once resonant.

Not first love, but founded in maturity
enough, perhaps, to defy time's ravages.
Embarked with proclaimed mutual surety
to weather all a life's uncertain passages.

But, for now, we tender loves rebuff
and find the rain must prove to be enough.
1.3k · Sep 2012
the weight of the moon
John Mahoney Sep 2012
there is no middle of the night
     only a beginning,
endlessly recurring,
     waked
by the body's vigilance
alert, for that hint of pain
like a woodland deer downwind
from his hunter, wary, agitated

woke last night at two am
walked out into the woods
down the drive to the intersection
all aglow from the blue moon
i can feel you in the muggy air tonight
     in the blue of the corona
and in the weight of the moon

when the new day dawns
we will seek visions
fully splendid with glory
but harder to hold, and
we will recognize each other
perhaps for the first time
for what we really are

but for now in the moonlit
street, standing here alone
all losses reassessed
to become as nothing
     inconsequential
in the weight of the moon
in the soft blue
night
With apologies to John Darnielle for stealing some of his beautiful language. I just could not get his song Against Pollution out of my head!
1.3k · May 2012
forms of water
John Mahoney May 2012
1
we ran outside
          gathering the hailstones

before they could return
        
to rain

2
spring thunder storms
        refreshed the

runoff ponds
        
the spring peepers
        chorus chirps


3
soon, to be Indra, Lord of Heaven,
        the God of War as well as Storms and Rainfall,
starter of war

a war which shall engulf
     the planet and

        perish all

4
in solid,
ice
       which shall melt

and drown the littoral lands
lands peopled in the
        billions
and so shall follow
disease plague typhus dysentery
death
         in its many shapes and sizes

5
in drops
       flows from your eye


6
according to religion
        holy water
1.2k · Mar 2012
the bright afternoon sun
John Mahoney Mar 2012
i leave all the pain
         out on the counters
like ***** pots and pans

ready to be scrubbed
        clean in the sink and
put away

stacked to size
         hidden in the pantry
the bright afternoon sun

melts the icicle
         that has formed
against the house

where the coil turns
         under the eave
or, maybe i will soak them

overnight
1.2k · Oct 2011
John Berryman Is Dead
John Mahoney Oct 2011
John Berryman is dead
all his invitations, rescinded
unlikely as it seems, Pound has not been uncaged
and Pisa remains uncovered by the summer's sky

John Berryman is dead
his cantos have, indeed shaken my courage
expressions have been lifted
and letters signed and delivered

John Berryman is dead
it seems he did not die at too slow a rate, after all
the Washington Avenue Bridge spoke too quickly
and too loud, whispered in his father's voice

John Berryman is dead
released all his demons and avoided all his devils
grieve for this stranger, made friendly and strange
the bells sing too late

John Berryman is dead
bones go all the same all the same
accept our envy O winner of praise
sing your dreams dead poet
John Mahoney Jan 2012
hot cheeks burning
tears salty and sweet
run like wildfires
burning off the undergrowth
chasing woodland creatures
down to the streams
someday, we won't remember this

passion drained us so sweet
clear the pathways
ravage all the fields
burn down the bridges
pull down all the monuments
someday, we won't remember this

souls entwined as lovers
brought down to her knees
drained of all blood
stripped of dignities
laid bare to each
but never felt so free

i don't care what's right or wrong,
i won't try to understand.
let the devil take tomorrow
lord tonight I need a friend


light the match,
stoke the heat
feel the burning
(no one here will get out of this alive)
and, someday, we won't remember this...
lyrics by Kris Kristofferson "Help Me Make It Through The Night"
John Mahoney Apr 2012
i.
the blood scared me
would mother be angry
maybe stitches
the hot anger of betrayal
mixed like a bonnet pepper
to spice the fear
and the confusion

ii.
playing with friends
in the neighborhood woods
the oldest of three brothers
threw a wooden potato
masher and struck me
in the back of the head

iii.
the root cellar seemed
a good place to hide
i ran out of the wood
across the open field
across the street
in through the
open garage door
the kitchen entrance
to the mud room
and down the back
stairs to the laundry,
might she be there,
and into the root cellar
filled with mold, dust,
and musty mason jars

iv.
hiding there, i forget
how long now, but the
had the blood stopped
running warm and sticky
down the back of my neck
i felt a swollen lump
and an aching head

v.
i do not remember
now how long i hid
there in the root cellar
but the feeling of betrayal
the sense of exclusion
the intense longing
to be a part of that
boyhood group
all seemed lost

vi.
some things are
not forgivable
deliberate cruelty
is not forgivable
i hope that cruelty
is the only real thing
i lost, crying, in that
cellar, so long ago
deliberate cruelty
the one thing of which
i have never been guilty
John Mahoney Feb 2012
i.
i drag the canoes over the granite shingle
of our island's beach the battered Aluma-Crafts
leave my hand a dark metallic looking gray, which
even smelled of metal we walk up to the
campsite, a ridge, overlooking the lake,
spread out around a fire ring set beneath
pine trees so thick that no understory grows

ii.
as the long summer day cools we decide after dinner
to explore choosing one of the island's many
game trails, leading from the water back up into
the woods beyond the campsite, we pack the
food back into the bear proof barrel, grab our
boots and set off down  the trail

iii.
the pine give way to a grove of aspen, the
leaves fluttering as if by some wondrous
enchantment, as the shrubs started to grow
thickly on the ground channeling us into a
narrower game trail with the large, misshapen
granite boulders like a maze stretched out before us

iv.
suddenly we stood face to face with a giant
bull moose with velvet covered antlers that seemed
to be at least four feet across, he shook his head up,
like a horse shying, so i slowly moved us behind a tree
     to give him the trail

v.
around the fire wrapped each in our
own paddle-worn thoughts
we could hear wolves, calling
across the island in mournful howls
such a delicate balance of nature at work,
my moose so full of life and spirit would be
     safe yet from the
wolves
1.1k · Jun 2012
summer at Sand Creek, 1968
John Mahoney Jun 2012
i.
standing almost five feet tall
she must have been eighty five
but there she was, great-grandmother
standing on the trunk of an
ancient pine tree that had blown
across the driveway at Sand Creek

ii.
we used a two-man saw
must have been six feet long
with a handle at each end
the handles made of wood
one hand above and the other
below the blade, which cut on
both the push and the pull

iii.
in the garage, below the
house, the wall held a
wicked looking scythe,
just like the one which
death carries, with a long,
sharp blade, which we
used to mow the fields
around the cabin, to keep
the woods away, as a
     fire break

iv.
my cousin showed up,
riding on a horse, with
a dangerous looking local boy
who had scar across his cheek
white against his tan face
when her horse tried to
lie down and rest, the local
boy jumped off his mount
and started kicking, viciously,
her horse in the ribs

v.
once, we walked right in
front of two long snakes,
making there way between
the porch and the car, i jumped
and ran back up to the porch,
and would not leave that day
grandmother said those
snakes had no business
being this far north
     i agreed
John Mahoney Nov 2011
i have come to discern
a great breach
a chasm that stands
between
apprehension of the world
and the world
itself

like some character
in a play by Chekhov,
perpetually seeking answers
yet, offering no
truths...
as an eternal madness, a seeking,
ever seeking, yet
accomplishing neither end nor
resolution

a tune, played almost to
conclusion,
missing that final chord,
so that we see, that life has,
tampered...

(as grief enters, stage right)
"line please..."
John Mahoney Jun 2012
So we are where we were at the beginning
     you and i, amid the waste of so many years
         and lives spent living amongst one another

I put away your things in the places I have
     learned that you expect to find them and also
          I know the places where you like to put away my things

I know that we must not try to eat breakfast together
     you must have the newspaper fresh, even if I put it back
          so that I have learned to get my news from public radio

You have learned to like my cooking, even when I cannot
     seem to remember that you do not like pears, except in salad
          and I have started to use ketchup on my turkey at Thanksgiving

Now that we have achieved this balance, we find ourselves alone
     again, with no children to referee our lives and focus our attention
         so we are where we were at the beginning, and I wonder, how long

Can we learn to fall in love with the people we have become, you and I?
John Mahoney May 2012
Hey Fragments! a Haiku Contest!!

Spring is everywhere.

We want everyone to contribute to the first, "Quarterly Season Greetings Haiku Contest!"

We will select a panel of judges, who will send me their three favorite haiku submissions. The haiku with the most selections will be declared the "winner" and enjoy a warm feeling of satisfaction.

Please, have those haiku in by the end of May

No limit on the number of submissions. Your haiku should follow the traditional form, but as always, the poem is more important than strict observance of form.

Write Every Day!

John and LP
1.1k · Nov 2011
10 Word Poem - 7. snows
John Mahoney Nov 2011
the snows
will
never melt
in
the Himalayas
1.1k · Sep 2011
Medusa, Unawares
John Mahoney Sep 2011
I have looked upon
the Medusa, unawares
and been turned to stone
1.1k · Apr 2012
the unexpected gifts
John Mahoney Apr 2012
1
         i watch the ice
melt from the roof,

in slow drips, the one
     chasing the other down,

slipping to the pool of
water, edging out onto

  the driveway, where, tonight,
i expect it will refreeze

2
        and,
i wonder,

if i have given you something
and you have given me something

         a gift neither expected
nor intended

       will the sun shine any warmer?
John Mahoney Aug 2012
i laughed and answered, no,
i have not written anything new
it is summer, after all, no moods
no times for reflection, sweet remembrances,
bitter musings banished
summer needs no poet, for
summer should be for the living of it
1.0k · Oct 2011
Haiku.7 steel wool gathering
John Mahoney Oct 2011
polishing the varnish
of just finished wooden floor
steel wool gathering
1.0k · Mar 2012
poem, 2
John Mahoney Mar 2012
is it
         that the winter nights are so long
that has me sitting
here, before the window
looking out at the stars

or, watching the deer
          sneak up on the
     dried stalks of Desdemona
that keeps me
awake
so late at night

or, maybe,
it is you, there, thinking of me,
here
that keeps me awake
     so very late
into the night
1.0k · May 2012
i woke up again
John Mahoney May 2012
1
when i woke up again
on the bathroom floor
the tiles were so hard and cool
you stood over me looking
into the mirror with the long
flowing hair hanging down,
which surprised me, as your
hair had not been this long since
1984, why did you let the house spin so,
just, please let me have
a glass of water

2
the owls call a warning
the moon creeps over
the lawn and crosses the
threshold of the window,
the moon has waited so
patiently behind the
line of maple trees along
the ridge,
to wake me now, with the
owl calling, the moon,
the moon

3
the next time i wake
sitting on the edge of
my daughters bed as
she whimpers and jerks
in her sleep, i try to slip
away, and she grasps out,
again, for my hand, soft
her hand is so soft, and
small, in my hand

4
your long hair, the owls
hooting for the moon,
my daughter's soft hand,
whimpering, softly too,
in the night, and the
bathroom tiles, so pink
and so cold, i wonder
did i choose this
wallpaper, or did you?
1.0k · Mar 2012
three junes
John Mahoney Mar 2012
i.
you fought like a tiger -
to stop me from rubbing
sun screen on your delicate
skin, you hated the greasy
feel, and so ran into the ocean
then rolled in the sand and
kicked sand in my face,
               at four
Great Hollow Beach, Truro
     June, 1994

ii.
you never could resist -
if we turned our back
even for a minute you
were off to find the largest
boulder, you would climb to
the top and raise your arms
in victory, and always, always
land in the water, wet and cold,
              at eight
City Beach, South Lake Tahoe
     June, 1998

iii.
oh, how Mt. Baldy called to you -
the giant of a sand dune,
moving inland as a glacier,
a sweep of sand blowing
from the peak ridge, like
the banner of heaven, but
i carried you all the way
back to the house after
you cut your foot on a shard
of glass, carelessly abandoned,
              at eleven
Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore
     June, 2001
John Mahoney Nov 2011
let them come
let them all come
in the remaining hours of daylight
i can see them as they run
down to the shore
out on the sands
of the impossibly green ocean.

it had been a hot northern California day
but as the sun sank low in the western sky
the wind picked up and the air got cold
i sat in the back of a rented Ford
when i saw you standing there
among the young surfers camping
on the beach near the parking lot
of the Clam Beach county park.

the most beautiful girl in the world
with your long gold hair
your back so strong
and your legs so long
you smiled at me
as you walked along
to the back of your car
parked three spaces from mine
you pulled your wet suit off
with your eyes on mine
i fell in love at that moment in time.

let them go
let them all go
in the fading black star-filled night
on this western shore
i can feel my heart break
as we drive away
frozen in my memory
the girl in the parking lot
at Clam Beach county park.
996 · Dec 2011
no love songs, now...
John Mahoney Dec 2011
i.
no love songs, now...no lost, no forlorn
no love songs to the mourn
awake (too late) mind racing,
words floating images roiling...
a poet's heart made empty,
boxing shadows in the dark,

a broken dreams club
a bell echoes


ii.
(like a boxer past his prime
sitting in his corner head hung, bowed,
slips his gloves and examines taped knuckles
as though they, too, have defeated him)

a bell echos
a broken dreams club


iii.
the muse abides, and, perhaps, at least
the poet may regain his voice but for now -
no love songs, now...
no laments, no elegy

a bell echos
a broken dreams club


iv.
every poets' muse -
fall in love, absolutely, true love is, for him,
the embodiment of his muse, indistinguishable,
the goddess, manifest in her absolute glory
and the woman, made her instrument -

a bell echos
a broken dreams club


v.
*what do i see?
a bowl with a quarter and a pocketknife
a lamp
a clock with dull red numbers glowing
a book of verse
and in the distance

a bell echoes
a broken dreams club
995 · Oct 2011
speak my name, softly
John Mahoney Oct 2011
come to me, silently,
    during the night
speak my name, softly
    pretend it's all right
go to the fountain
    wish for insight
depend upon constancy
    keep a hold tight
tomorrow find trauma
    let your spirit take flight
come to me, lonely
a surrender outright
    trust in your nature
*now just turn out the light.
John Mahoney Jun 2012
i.
your drunken goodbyes
hang so sweet in the air
filling the space with a
desperate needy embrace

ii.
i stand before you with
no defenses and nothing
i could possibly say except
what do i know about love

iii.
i walk you out into the
East Village night to
see about hailing a cab
sun peeking over the bridge

iv.
everything seems to be
coming apart i wonder
when i surrendered to you
what do i know about pain

v.
i wave goodbye to
the back of your head
and turn back to look
at the pink, foamy sunrise
Acknowledgement: This poem was first published by IMPpress, 2012, Issue No. 3, p. 29, available at http://www.imppress.co.uk/index.html
John Mahoney Jan 2012
imagine lips
like delicate peach-blossoms
I await longingly fingertips'
suggestion
John Mahoney Nov 2011
I.
time to hold, but i am falling down again,
as i call out your name three times,
and a rooster crows, somewhere,
and i am now laying in the dust,
of the road, beyond the wall
that leads into the square

II.
and there are lots of people, who are now
gathering in there, i can see that
they are angry, angry at someone,
maybe anyone, maybe me,
and maybe you, so
i call your name
as the rooster cries again
cries again

III.
but i have fallen, in the dust, on the road,
and i called your name three times,
i can hear the dogs bark at the
sound the crowd makes, in the dust
of the square, beyond the wall,
***** loud angry people shouting,
dust rising all around
your name three times

IV.
and i do not want to die, that is
nobody wants to die, and yet here we are
lying in the dust, and in the dust, and
fallen away, but all we have, for
we have all fallen away, now
and the rooster cries again

V.
and, i know now, what i have done
what have we done, all of us done,
and there is a great nothingness,
and there is an eternity, a darkness
and there is a day, and in fullness
and i know that i called your name
three times, what i would not have done
and i break down and weep
927 · Feb 2012
loose screws
John Mahoney Feb 2012
you told me
     that you
had a ***** loose
     it took me a long
time to realize that
you keep most of them
     in jars,
lined up in the
garage, above the tool bench
sorted by size,
rather than
     function
John Mahoney Feb 2012
i woke last night
listened for some sound
that might have disturbed
     my sleep
the moon hangs low
over the treeline, just
     past full,
moonlight floods,
reflected by winter's
snows, to light the
house with a silver,
        incandescence

i step down the
stairs and stand at
the picture window
overlooking the
     gardens
wrapped against mid-winter,
nighttime chills i see that,
    overnight
the pane has been lined with
     frost
and i know

reaching to the pane,
the frost is most excellently
cold, and i come alive,
burning with
     desire
frost melting beneath my
         fingertips

for i know, now, whose
distant thoughts have
     sought mine
to wake me
at this new and
     wondrous
hour of the morning

looking out the
     window
the garden rests,
deep in snow, with
bits of straw poking through
and burlap wrapped
         shrubs

imagination brings forth
a summer's growth of
Victorian roses
for my distant love
as she thinks
         of me

here, burgundy, to say
she is beautiful to me;
there, the yellow of
joy and friendship;
next to a pink,
a wild rose bush,
the color of gratitude
     and grace;
and, of course, the
     red,
for passion, standing with the
white rose, the mix which
conveys
             unity
918 · Oct 2011
Haiku.4 Autumn, unsettled
John Mahoney Oct 2011
Overnight storms
fill my gardens with sticks
Autumn, unsettled
John Mahoney Oct 2011
Hammer fall echoes
the woods have no silences
even the squirrels bury nuts
John Mahoney Mar 2012
1

          i must have missed something

all the neighbors have left
     their yard light on overnight
filling our woods with the
     insidious dull blue glow of
              mercury vapor lights

2

i stand in the yard among
          the sleepers but not of them

apart, distinct, set aside by
   my own inability to sleep
and now they have taken
         from me this too the night's sky
         
     has no stars

3

     the sun has sent us messages

across the reach, a reminder,
         a storm, a simple burst of
        
radiation, which spills across
the magnetic skin of our
   home, to light the sky with

ethereal glow, but hidden
         from me by these neighbors

with their mercury vapor

4
               fear of night
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