The Cook

Among pots and pans
the heat of an oil stove
Not a place for dreaming
He saw the glittering sea
That had a cooling breeze
On its surface
For years, the open door
Was his freedom
Where does the ocean begin
The sea life ended
Jamaica was his destiny
A youthful dream coming true
Love only comes once
But its ember continues
Will he find where the ocean
begins

Pressure, pressure

Why can’t they leave him alone
Today the bay window
Demonstrates a panorama of beauty
He longs to go there
Taste the salt sea
To sail away from all this
Back to Jamaica
To places he had been when young
When laughing in the rain
When there was a now
The future too far away to contemplate
Clouds are gathering
There will be rain in the afternoon
The bay window
Has tearstains from
Too many yesterdays

A childhood

Stony was the soil of my childhood
A tiny room above the stable
Cold was the night
A straw mattress and mice
Ice crystal on the roof
Dreaming of running somewhere
Anywhere but here
A pale dawn
The sun is white this morning
In the barn animals stir
No more time to dream
Tomorrow he will run away

we had it coming
looking at pictures of an empty Piccadilly Circus
or the Eifel Tower in Paris is empty of life except
for police cars cruising to fine anyone breaking the law.
The emptiness is enormous and frightening to think
how quickly humankind can disappear forever
When the pandemic is over, there might be another one.
Millions of people all over the world rotting in their homes
the disappearance of humans is a near reality.
The only hope is that we lived a tolerable good life.
The future will consist of animals hunting each other.
Cities will crumble art and culture of no value.
We had it coming, I despair.

A Horse and ale
The brewery had many horses to carry crates of beer
around to small shops,  each horse and its driver was assigned a route
The horse I liked was shiny black and had been used for
funerals before
over the years, they got a bit broad hipped and stomach-heavy.
The horse knew the route and stopped outside the grocer's and waited while
the driver unloaded crates of beer.
The horse sometimes had an ******* thinking of a favorite mare bit
strange animals only know one way and askew foreplay
The driver usually had a bottle of beer at each shop, and when
the round was done, he was in a merry mood and sometimes fell asleep. But the horse knew the way.
After unharnessing the beast, he brushed its coat, checked the hooves
for the horse, the highlight of the day, and gave it a big slice of bread.
So long ago, there had been a devastating war
Jews immigrated to Palestine
and got a piece of land they called Israel; we believed what the papers said
the persecuted people deserved a homeland, but we did not realize that it was.
A historic injustice had befallen the Palestine people and echo that will not
stop before the real Semites get their land back.

Greenland’s American future

In Nuuk everybody lives in festive houses made of wood, green, blue and red looks homily in the winter landscape
Thei are the people who speaks English, building
A dry dock for submarines, that will protect the sea from intruders, like the Russians and big code fish. The Greenlander will live in nice apartments
That have lifts, naturally the have to pay rent
There will be more shops selling imported food
Soft bread and, of course hamburgers for all
There will be bars with dancing girls included
The local can get drunk and been thrown into the snow
Some locals will lose their apartment leave in the street with dogs and the hapless will be wrapped in blanket given by the Danes, American tourist will come looking at the filthy streets and feel at home
The transformation will be complete, the local language forgotten, spoken only by the very old Innuits, naturally no one speaks Danish anymore
Except for the local doctor a despicable socialist
This is the future for people who become victim of super power, who believes in their exceptionalism

A brief visit

I sat trying to write
A poem of love
Yes, once Love hit me hard
I sensed someone
Standing beside my chair
Yes, it was her
Twenty years had gone
She looked the same
She smiled with eyes of love
Then, she faded away