Sure, there are events
That mnemonically make sense,
But the entirety of that day, yes,
Slips as we take new steps
Toward the promised morning beyond our essence.
Trials become more, we grow to become less,
Something we need not confess,
For it cannot be concealed, even in our code of dress.
There are groans for the day to cease and those for the day to onward press,
How can this opinionized split be reconciled? Unless
Our own lives we assess
And remember those moments that still impress
Our minds and attitudes, this can we address.
When the day and our remembrance
Of it seem to fade in all hopelessness
Of retrieval, remember at least the happiness
That kissed you in distress,
That lifted you like incense.
A quintessence
Of what it’s like being on the fence
When time unleashes an offense
In weak defense
Against what we hold nevertheless
Not with hands, but with dense
Feelings, those with irreplaceable innocence.

When attached to a place,
A certain company, for a long time,
It’s no easy step to meet a new face.

Your quarter, nickel, and dime
Know well how change works;
It can be as sweet as sugar, or sour as lime.

A score of time somewhere one lurks
Withholds the power and experience
To accept seeing new folks, whether angels or jerks.

That’s the code of assimilating in an audience,
Where faces turn seat-to-seat
As if to survey an area of new and one-time presence.

There are small feet, but this is no small feat
To get to know and open ourselves.
Never doubt, though, you may find someone neat!

Stories about us, stories about themselves
In a community that has something to say;
We are books that need to be dusted and read from our shelves.

Leaving the home, mystified with each day,
Us travelers hunger for blood not yet acquainted,
There’s always a new somebody not too far away.

Community: has this a picture painted?

Guard the pawns,
Forward the rooks,
Center the knights,
Queen comes on a ‘coach,
Beware of the King [James]
Who can put you in check
With an ankle-breaker
You’ll not soon forget!

May God
Overflow love
Through you,
Hour after hour.
Every day,
Render love to a weeping-child world!

As chatter evaporates,
The poet first-up begins to read;
As poetry speaks,
Ears listen.

And, thus, the fight for total concentration begins,
Closed-lips the discipline,
Whether the piece of writing
Can be comprehended by all or not.

Though minds may wander,
Ears still listen.
The reading continues
And the listeners position and budge,
Reviving a fixed concentration.

One has eyes open
Staring at the burr-burr carpet.
Someone else shuts their eyes,
Wrinkling them with a thinker’s strain,
Or is it thinking going on in that brain?

Another listener with head bowed low
Prays through the reading,
Asking for what line
To walk away pondering
Or what poetical form “stands out.”

A sincere ending,
And the room harmonizes hums,
The best kind of response,
For its noise reminds the reader
That there was interest at all,
Yet no vocabulary in the responsorial hum,
For a listening poet should know better:
An author’s poem belongs to that author’s imagination.

Though coming from imagination,
I don’t wish to impede on any income regardless;
But wouldn’t it be nice,
Across all identifications and statuses
And beyond an average allowance cap,
If anyone and everyone
Could be compensated more largely for living?

Paid by the hour
Upon rising from slumber.
Or given a salary
For doing some laundry.

How about a Jackson
Every time the dishes are scrubbed?
Or a score of Lincolns
When through with the school day?

Waited in line?
A Benjamin’s just fine!
Picked up the dry-cleaning?
A Grant has a nice ring!

If dreams can come true,
Why not this one for me and you?