Black Tambourine by Rick Richardson

Death is a dark knife
that cuts the light
through the window.
A black car in the night.
A burning cigarette
bursting on the highway.
A fire going out.
A gypsy with whiskey
breath shaking
a black tambourine.

~~~~~

Black Tambourine Rebuttal by NM Lipstadt

Death is a lit light,
sundering the slowing,
defeating the resistance,
accepting with gratitude the surrendering of labored breathing,
tallying as complete the summation of
all the trials of errors
these accumulations,
accompanied
fittingly,
by an 1812 overture music spectacular,
with fireworks and cannons
pronouncing
victory, at long last!

a V-D Day,
over the onerous blackness
of too many soleless nights,
instead it offers a comforter
of Where Shelter?
Here!

in  our starry be-Knighted,
our jointed  crowning neath tapestry blanket of transport to
our immortality sheltering.

do not doubt its
peculiar nourishing
is
bountiful certainty

May Cold

the tablet weather says 57 Fahrenheit
my ****** p.j.’s ******* say who the fk ya kidding?
May cold is different when it is chilled by ocean’s
known associates, cloudy and looking like it’s gonna rain anytime

May cold I think and the Lord laughs,
two weeks of snotty lungs ugliest congestion so bad,
the fancy people won’t sit next to you
in fancy place seats you paid for with last years loot

Your lungs looks ***** sound like a WWI trenches battlefield,
you’re sitting up at 6:00am, wearing
heavy bathrobe, hoodie, sweater and t-shirt,
but your sock-less feet scream whataboutme?

the pile of questions grow and the silence piano accompaniment
teasingly says you’ll never write again, what’s the point, so you write
for the one or two who will, maybe, wince along side of ya,
hoping first coffee delivered by a passing EMT will salve a declining body for an hour

May cold body and soul, left for to see waves, when human traffickers
who work regular jobs not-like-you, you who can’t get hired to spit in the subway,
yeah yeah everything is fine though I know the big D is coming for me,
tingling in the places where the tingling ain’t exactly next to normal

now that time’s only question is the priority of what to read first,
and first thought is of the list of reading things is so big, who knew,
it’s easier to go to pretend-work and waiting for calls that don’t come,
and the home quietude is a welcoming envelopment maneuver but the list chokes

S is fine though my slow slipping under is dragging her down invisibly
to no one but me, and only the grandkids of the crazy parents
make her light up like as only a woman can, carrying three on her horsey back
at age 72, while their couch bound mother scans Facebook thinking she’s crazy

somehow I get trapped in pictures others take and my gross weight
says delete this photo, leave no evidence that the slow killers and his minions
are coming for you, and every advantage you possess is a weight around
the skull that says, you see, I’ll still embrace you if no one else will

worlds insanity trumps the little joy I get when studying birthday photos,
knowing they will be surrendered up for sacrifice someday to a world,
where fresh running water is a past thing, and their DNA will determine what
line and place they are permitted to stand on, the antisemitism roaring its head

took a two day dump finally, which is better than gastric pain sudden,
which comes so stealthily that twice, **** my pants, just avoiding
public embarrassment, “barely,”  he writes smiling, but the credit card bill
always is due, when you get no credit for ******* up a body for68 years

otherwise I am fine, though few read my poems without a caffeine jolt,
and months went by with nothing to add, and then they hauntingly come
as often as I blowout my phlegmatic guts, and write them down to expel them
from a mind that cannot remember words for the thing that changes tv channels

so you ask, and now, maybe you will worry too, the last thing I wanted,
so hard to understand that silence was my gift to you, and every email you send,
makes weep from the idea that someone cares how I fair, and how unfair
that is to the one who cares, and I took 60 minutes to type this, and,

I love you man in ways so deep, I could fertilize you lands soil and your soul

and there could be a poem in that last line but my pointer finger is busy
wiping away tears but don’t worry the tissue box is always nearby

~

shelter,

*two arms,
a human lean-to,
a pup tent,
all with a
welcome mat,
for you,
awaits

with graceful patience
simpatico smiling,
always avail,
awaiting,
no life clock countdown
prematurely pushing,
come when
there is
no other place

all,
on offer,
shelter places
that become
your home,
if you so
honor them thus,
your choice,
your decision
when to come n' go

shelter you,
no questions asked,
cloak you, us, even me, all, with human warmth,
easy silences, no unforced errors of pressures

for when my arms
bear your load,
mine, halved