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L B Jul 2018
For my cousin, Chris Goldrick

Lacing my skates
after walking two miles
in girl-strictured delight
Mom's stories of Sonja Henie--
No, not ever

Lacing my skates
with  snow-ball pompoms
felt skirt
and nylon tights
Cute little hat with matching scarf
My thighs and fingers
already freezing
icy burn
from miles on foot

to get there
the lake where--

I must get out
I must get OUT!

Knowing what
to expect from my body
the quick-twitch of muscle
Could always sense
specific--
gravity of water    
at 22 degrees

Desiring to feel
the motion between ice and steel
Read speed's vibrations through my body
The brain registers relation
to weather's effect
Tell of velocity
possibility of fall
Feel the slash of the blades beneath me
Throw my weight sideways, sudden
to hear that furious hiss
An object in motion tending, dire
to stay in motion

Threatening to stay there
always
in its heights-- of speed
away--

from the crowds of skaters
swirling distant in the lights

Seeking instead
the farthest reaches of Porter Lake
speed and speed and more
to overcome
inertia
of what it is to become
undone

at the outer edges, of humanity
A force  
centrifugal unto myself

Avoiding

Pregnant and slow
with years and babes....

The best
must be broken and tamed
of what it takes to stay free

catching the edges with every stride
catching my toe in the quick
180
spray of frost
to the sudden still

Listen to the frigid chill

and the heave of my breath
tumbling into evidence

Gliding
Once

Forever--

on, into darkness
of woods on frozen water

The wildness of it all

So infatuated with flight
so full of grace

I forgot Sonja

The moon rose
from her seat in the treetops
and applauded
Wrote this immediately from a dream a couple months ago.  With all the heat and humidity, it sounded good to go today.

This dream was an actual relived memory of being 12 years old and skating at Porter Lake in Forest Park of Springfield, Massachusetts.  22 degrees F is minus 5.5 C --Just a reference
Leone Lamp May 2021
She looks so cute
In her shiny new skates
She grins so big
Tying up the laces
She's so happy
Going circles round our room
Her little *****'s hangin' out
As she goes zoom zoom zoom
Happy birthday babe!
(A month early, at least it's not late)
I love you so much and I'm sorry
You hurt your **** falling off your skates.
A happy early birthday to my love. She is so adorable in her sparkly gold roller skates!
Mateuš Conrad Jan 2023
when was the last time i went ice skating?
at the old Romford ice rink,
it was one of my high school friend's birthday
party... i was perhaps... 13...
today was my second time on ice...
well... this time round i managed to walk
upright on the skates...
the skates didn't fold in on me
                        like i might be a *******
walking with the aftermath of polio...
i.e. my feet didn't buckle, and the skates didn't
push into my ankle bones...
giving my excruciating pain...

ice-skating is unlike the other gravity found
in either cycling or swimming...
one can look the complete fool when ice skating...
it's so simple: it's so simple the more adept
skaters say... i asked for clarification:
so which part of the legs does most of the work?

the top part... for a 2nd timer i advanced pretty fast
upon doing a second round, round the ice rink...
self-taught magic... fear of letting go
of the railing...
but that's not the point...
i was on a "date": or rather i "think" i was...
it wasn't a date...
          it was... gelling together of coworkers...
i've worked with some of these people for almost
a year...
it took a year for something remotely socially
related to be "established": i know:
calculative, frigid tongue of formality is my
go-to release, jargon: i know...

        outside of the realm of the brothel
where we are immediately imitate and touching
each other to this almost grotesque spectacle
of timid, lonely people, playing "chess" over pints
of beer, talking,
i'm more used to: nakedness and *** comes
a priori, all the other nuances of talk and mingling
come a posteriori... hell...
the world of interaction was standing on its head...
i had to remember:

as a man i'm not to talk about myself,
i have to ask the girl all the questions...
i can't revel in any details of me:
even though she might be a "cage-fighter" looking
woman... that she might be a lesbian
i still have to keep some contorts of manhood
in this interaction: i wasn't even overthinking
anything, there were no awkward pauses just
details of awaiting prompt...

first she asked me whether she put her right foot
into the equivalent right of the skate...
i told her: i see an aligning curvature...
she had them on the right way... took them off...
ridiculous: they were right of right the whole time!
so i told her: and you asked me to go ice skating
a second time in my life while you can't
even put on your skates on the right feet!
ugh...

walking on skates was fine... until i stepped
onto the ice... ugh oh... like i told her...
i'm going to make a fool of myself...
i'll be like that Harry Potter scene in the Prisoner
of Azkaban... were Wesley imagines
that cupboard demon Ridiculous emerging as a spider
made pointlessly scary by having
skates attached to its legs...

that was me...
    1h on ice... three or four more sessions and i'll
get a hang of it...
but there's an authenticity on ice...
unlike when swimming or cycling...
self-taught... well: i don't expect a grown man
to be endeared by getting skating sessions...
can't imagine that... it's not out of pride...
it's out of: i taught myself how to swim:
even for all the dearest of things in the world
my father wanted to teach me...
peer pressure got the better of me...
i'm guessing peer pressure is going to kick in once
more...

but she filmed me pretending to fly on ice...
sent the video to a few people... from 8 people...
400+ views... now she wants me facebook details...
i don't think it's such a good idea...
i internalise my experiences and i...
i don't mind talking to strangers... in a pub...
even today after the ice-skating she wanted
to go for a pint... we had three...
she noticed a Fred who works in the metal-scrap
industry near Rainham: has to wake up
at 6am get to Walthamstow for 8am... pick up
a tonne of copper... drive back... blah blah...
works an imaginary 80h week...
even train drivers... hell... surgeons can't work
the legal hourly limit of 60h per week:
fatigue... you can't work tired:
might as well allow work to be done by drunkards...

no... it wasn't a date... i was 14 and she was 13...
we went ice skating...
**** me: might as well have been a cinema "date":
but it wasn't reading each other's CVs
over food i'd end up paying for...
in the pub i realised i was going to be 37 in May...
i noticed all the young girls...
they spotted me with my "date": it wasn't a date...
she's a lesbian and i'm a brothel frequenter...
from one end of the pub.... we sat beside
Fred the scrap-metal-mogul and disappeared from
view... what happened?
three of them with one beta-buckle-buck sat near us...
suddenly an older lady... with artistic inclinations
of dress started hovering near the bar...
walking past her to the toilet she sort of excused
herself for being in my line of sight...
i'm just here to go to the bathroom...

        being human, like so, is weird to me...
i'm not used to it...
  i'm used to being alone,
not in a solipsistic / autistic sort of way...
  it's just weird that i can pretend to be a clown
without putting on any clown make-up...
i'd rather put on some clown-make-up
and disappear into: a film best not made...

has it really been that long? it had to be a lesbian
to (do i need to stress the fact that she is?
most people these days stress their little somethings
of identity politics, for example...
clinically "schizophrenic": in a Lingua Inglese world
of commerce... bilingualism is a quadratic /
a "clear" disability... two tongues too many!)
ask me to go ice skating and then have a pint of beer
with her? no... able bodied, no able minded female
had the stomach or the courage to ask for
something pretty and simple as, this?!

let's go ice skating! let's go cycling!
let's have a picnic in Hyde Park!

i came home, said sorry for being late... i was only expecting
to go ice skating...
gave revelations of my lateness...
spoke to mother (dear)... waited for my father
to finish watching Match of the Day 2...
saddled myself in the chair before a computer
and started writing out my father's invoice...
tomorrow i'll be working on his VAT and sending it off
to a new accountant...
my mother started sobbing...
why? i'm already the freak i was supposed to have
become...
    base: closeness with others?!
is that, even, remotely, possible?
if all the world is a stage... i'm playing the role of actor
pretty **** well...
i'm not going to allow myself the frivolity
and the escapade of not entering the arena of intra-personal
relationships with... former, youthful... hopes...
naive feelings off of: FUZZY-THRILLS...
what once was mammalian has become
lizard... cool, cold, calculative...
that's how you adapt to the environment presented
for you to digest...
everyone is playing some sort of game...
the Thespian intrusion into all expressions
of art... hell! beyond mere art...
this... Thespian Dictatorial Reign makes all other
expressions of art obsolete...
no wonder painting suffers the most...
why has painting suffered the most under the Thespian
Dictatorship of appealing to the masses
while poetry is... a hiding demon in a dank, drab...
petty 3 x 3 x 3 cubic expression of cut-out yet still waggling
like a decapitated head of a chicken sort of:
magic act?!

no amount of Paul Celan
in the mouth of a Norwegian super-star of literature
could ever fathom-dim
this fabrication of close-relation-ship? ahoy!
ah... **** it...
                      tiles and count the loaded bullets...

this ordeal of the everyday lived:
from the tumultuous ordeal of the body:
thus, summoned to give presence-count
of the "grieving" grave...
my own told woe being unaware...
of the woes of others...
such the price: of a life short-lived...

prior to the said engagement...
rereading some snippets of Spinoza's
Theological-Political Treaties...
because... i own a copy of the Ethics...
but not in English...
i like to imagine myself gloating
on what's readily read contra what' readily
available: and not...
      
i'm not dating material.. trying to imagine, thinking
might have curated me better...
she gives me ice skating...
i want to give her... a Walter Sickert exhibition...
we're not going to match...
over a pint i tell her: i was never
into these DATNG APP matching...
these window-dressing exhibitions:
and how many have you met, face to face?
2?!

i didn't tell her but i was sort of going to:
there's me and this gall from Hawaii...
she sent me honey and dried pineapple...
i didn't... we're mismatched...
she's lesbian and i'm a brothel frequenter...
life since my idea of teenager dating has
become, serious, ugly...
i don't want to have anything to do with it...
for almost half an hour i felt like...
a lion bound to a cage...
impossible to conjure up a lion
without a cage... classifying it as: pet-worthy...
something to make people pretend....
a wound for a heartbeat...
this beast better perform...
  prior to the details of boys
sending girl their ****-pictures:
oh no, no prior to the hard-on...
some variation of a p.s.:
when the blood runs dry...

                  they send their ****-pics after having
*******, when the blood is "drying up"...
not prior, shrivel, limp, lacklustre, prawn-curl whittle 'ichard...
I can make the earth stop in
its tracks. I made the
blue cars go away.

I can make myself invisible or small.
I can become gigantic & reach the
farthest things. I can change
the course of nature.
I can place myself anywhere in
space or time.
I can summon the dead.
I can perceive events on other worlds,
in my deepest inner mind,
& in the minds of others.

I can

I am
~~~

People need Connectors
Writers, heroes, stars,
leaders
To give life form.
A child’s sand boat facing
the sun.
Plastic soldiers in the miniature
dirt war.  Forts.
Garage Rocket Ships

Ceremonies, theatre, dances
To reassert Tribal needs & memories
a call to worship, uniting
above all, a reversion,
a longing for family & the
safety magic of childhood.
~~~

The grand highway
is crowded
w/
lovers
&
searchers
&
leavers
so
eager
to
please
&
forget

Wilderness
~~~

Now is blessed
The rest
remembered
~~~

A man rakes leaves into
a heap in his yard, a pile,
& leans on his rake &
burns them utterly.
The fragrance fills the forest
children pause & heed the
smell, which will become
nostalgia in several years
~~~

Sirens
Water
Rain & Thunder
Jet from the base
Hot searing insect cry
The frogs & crickets
Doors open & close
The smash of glass
The Soft Parade
An accident
Rustle of silk, nylon
Watering the dry grass
Fire
Bells
Rattlesnake, whistles, castanets
Lawn mower
Good Humor man
Skates & wagons
Bikes
~~~

Where’d you learn about
Satan- out of a book
Love?- out of a box
~~~

night of sin (The Fall)
-1st ***, a feeling of having
done this same act in time before
O No, not again
~~~

Between childhood, boyhood,
adolescence
& manhood (maturity) there
should be sharp lines drawn w/
Tests, deaths, feats, rites
stories, songs, & judgements
~~~

Men who go out on ships
To escape sin & the mire of cities
watch the placenta of evening stars
from the deck, on their backs
& cross the equator
& perform rituals to exhume the dead
dangerous initiations
To mark passage to new levels

To feel on the verge of an exorcism
a rite of passage
To wait, or seek manhood
enlightenment in a gun

To **** childhood, innocence
in an instant
gd Mar 2014
He held my hand today in the most delicate way,     
as if my fingers resembled flower petals and my     
palm reenacted butterfly wings. My hand felt          
fragile in his grip, which mimicked my feelings        
towards him because his heart did not belong           
in the spaces between my touch - his heart                 
belonged in something as light as air; something      
as delicate as cotton. And my heart was tattered      
with thorns, assured to shred his into pieces. All      
the more treacherous, he traced my fingers be           
tween my mittens, and it still felt like fabric -            
contrary to your inevitable static. And that is           
when I knew that even though he did everything    
right, he made it that much worse. As much as he    
tried, my frost-coated lips challenged the warmth    
in his voice, and it wasn't me he needed. It was I      
that needeth not deserve him.

gd
Judy Ponceby Oct 2010
Hippos in crates
On rollerskates
Crashing through
the rickety gates.

Crashing and bashing.
Oooooooooooh, how Smashing!
Rolling about
Their teeth a-flashing!

Running amuck!
Watch out for the duck.
Open the doors!
Back up the truck!

Zipping up the ramp
Like any old champ.
There they go!
Don't forget the stamp.

Crates in the mail!
Delivered without fail.
Those Hippos on skates
Lurching down the trail.
For Charming, Fun and Fanciful.
rainydaysunday Nov 2014
My feelings had wheels that day.
they slid and fell and whizzed past
I tried keeping up with them
I laced my skates tight to hold my own

I cleared my head in crowds,
tossing myself forward so I could be on the same
track
And I still need more practice
I never caught up with them.

But you couldn't skate.
You were a baby giraffe and I felt unfair
You let me grab your hand.
And around we stumbled.
I told myself that if you fell it would be over
between us.
But I smiled as we rounded each corner
I smiled when I looked and saw our hands together.
I smiled when I knew you were right there
And I smiled when I held you up.
Held you steady.
I felt like an oak tree.

I didn't talk enough.
But you sure enough didn't fall on my watch.

maybe I wish you had.
Fiona Campbell Jan 2015
Barefoot, blistered and bleeding
She wanders in from the street
People stare, flabbergasted
Very odd, unheard of in fact

She doesn’t know her size
So like Cinderella, she tries them on
Randomly selecting pretty colours

Silvery, glittery heels
She twirls for the mirror
Sales assistant sighs
Wellingtons for the garden
If she had one!

Satin ice skates
She would glide on the icy pond
Pretty sandals
To feel the sand between her toes

Boring, black brogues
Perfect!
With no pennies in her pocket
She wanders back to the street
Barefoot, blistered and bleeding
Daan May 2014
I feel her grip fading, slowly is
she leaving, hopping off the ice.
She says it didn't go very well,
but I couldn't say.
Speechless,
because she was so pretty,
impressed,
because she was so talented,
touched,
because she looked divine.
It hurts to think about it,
to accept she'll never be mine.

Time will pass and she'll forget,
we'll drift apart like we never met,
to me it's more than sight,
I have dared to love her with all my might
and cried because it didn't work.

I don't know what to change this time,
choice, my appearance, my act,
my voice, my talks, my jokes or walks.
What did I do wrong, this time.
She's gone
Charlie Chirico May 2013
Home Depot: Aisle Four: Shelves & Brackets.

Screws should be in the toolbox at home.
Toolbox...yes, in the garage, next to the miter saw, and
my old skates, the four-wheeled skates, not the inline,
never in line because of a rebellious nature.
A leather jacket kind of resistance.
A motorbike brilliance.
Now riding lawnmower equipment.
Dad's don't walk, we're brazen.

The ancient toolbox next to
an ancient cardboard box.
Scribbled on the front, the marking of youth,
my name, my print. Such ugly handwriting.
For God's sake.

But as for keepsakes:
The only objects that hold more merit
have more and most accumulative dust.
Yearbooks, pictured peers, so many memories
and faces. So many faces in this book.

The trophies. Number three. MVP.
A wipe of the thumb revealed the number.
And the rhyme is new.
Wit came with later age, I suppose.

Sports in adolescence, the physicality, the egotism,
it clouds critical thinking, or maybe wry remarks, too.
"Gay" and "*******" become some of the favorites.
And now this leads to an obligatory pun.
Grass stained knees. Sacking. The loser is gay.

How paradoxical!

Other contents of the box are various marks.
Grades; graduations; girls.
Three G's that I've
always evaded because of laziness.
Because **** dignity, right?
At least at that age integrity is as foreign
as the idea of it even being instilled.

How can you know if you're being raised
in the wrong?

Well, you've come to the right place.

I'm sure two examples is sufficient.

It's usually the acquaintance my son
brings home that opens my refrigerator door
before saying hello.

Or sometimes it's his friend,
our neighbor's youngest son, who boasts about his parent's
material possessions, while his parents ask
my wife and I if he can stay at our home for the night,
as they argue in the dark because the electric bill
is overdue, and their credit is scored
by the proverbial scissors.  

Not ones used to cut red ribbons, but
the ones you're told not to run with.

"Of course he can. I'm sure they'll love a sleepover," I answer passively.

"Thanks, we owe you one," he responds abruptly before disconnecting.

I could have said that owing people one
got them into their predicament.
But, like they say in the Good Book,
(The book I've always let collect dust,
not to be confused with the dust
on the box in the garage.)
Love Thy Neighbor.

And sometimes you never know
when you'll need a cup of sugar.
Thankfully I know there is sugar in the cupboard.
Milk and eggs in the refrigerator.
But no shelves or brackets.

Aisle four, Home Depot, no help.
I figure any will do, and at home
I'm *******, I mean I have screws.
I'll ask my son to help me hang them,
somewhat for the company,
also because they're for his belongings.

The neighbor's son will talk about the
elaborate woodwork on the rare chestnut
shelves his dad owns.
Surely it's perception, something
mood lighting can fix,
which his parents are arguing over,
well the lack of  lighting,
seeing as how their mood is already set.

My boy and I will place his
trophies on the shelves,
as I tell my boy I was number three.
Once an MVP.
And the neighbor's son
will tell me
his father was
number four.
A Thomas Hawkins Apr 2010
I wish I was Canadian
so this could be my game
But here I stand in GM place
And scream and shout the same

I watch the puck, the stick the skates
and marvel at the skill
As gladiators prowl the ice
Hunting for the ****

Across the blue the offence moves
bearing down once more
A pass, a fake a sudden slap
it's in the goal we SCORE

The crowd goes wild and shouts with joy
our voices become one
And in that moment, I join their ranks
I am Canadian !!!
I wrote this during the final of the mens Ice Hockey in the 2010 Winter Olympics.

©A Thomas Hawkins 2010
http://poetryinprogress.com

The Community Poetry Project
The creation of a handwritten poetry compilation featuring poems from poets around the world. For full details visit http://cheaperthantherapy.net
Grace Mar 2014
My feet are disgusting and horrendous
Crooked toes and calluses tell my stories
the pitter patter of them on the kitchen floor, trying to be quit and not wake up my parents in the mornings when I was little
Always wishing they were bigger so I could get new shoes

Years wearing on my feet, scars from running into sharp corners

And yet they still hold me up

smushing them into my skates, getting calluses every week for eight years

running from one place another and are learning why every type of ground feels like between my toes

From the frozen pavement to the searing sand they have been through the harshest conditions

And yet they will never fail me
Ted Scheck Dec 2012
This one time,

12. or 13, when me
And a bunch of other kids
From a different neighborhood
Played. Outside. From about sunup
To 9:00 at night. I dimly remember
(This light-bulb memory is the barest bit of energy
In an ancient filament of thought:)

It was a nightmare come to life.
There was this one kid across the River
(Rock Island)
They found him naked and dead,
In a discarded pile of coal.
His life brutally taken from him.
But that was the only time
I'd ever heard of something so horrible. Happening.
It was as commonplace as school shootings.
Which is to say, it didn’t happen in the
World that was ‘As Far As I Knew’.
Outside, everywhere, as far as I knew;
Was just where you went. No matter what.
It’s just what we did. And we did a LOT.

We played. On a job application, I would have
Written that. “Player”. As in: “Hey, I’m a kid.
I mess around. I’m unhygienic and smelly and
My hair is long and arms sunburned and sweaty
And tired and about as happy as any kid
Could be in 1975.

This one time,
I go in this dumpster and grab a
Sandwich the Mgr. of the 7-11 mistakenly threw out
It smelled. Badly. I pretended to take a gigantic
Bite out of it. My buddies weren’t ROTFL.
That stupid phrase was pre-born.
They laughed so hard they fell off their bikes.
Probably painfully so.
I worshiped this praise. Ate it like
Seinfeld eats applause.
They were rolling
On hot Iowa summer pavement, laughing fit to split.
On top of that dumpster, that day, in that single moment,
I was the King of Whatever

The manager heard some kind of ruckus.
The sandwich was in my hand, a cheesy spoiled grenade.
Which I promptly threw at him. ‘Cause he was the Adult
And I obviously wasn't Victor Mature.
He waddled back inside and called the Cops.
Not amazingly,
They were literally right around the corner.
My buddies took off like scalded dogs
I got on my homemade trail bike, laughing so
Hard I pedaled into a sticker-tree.

I didn't know what "irony" was back then.
Back then, I was so inherently goofy, that funny
Hilarious crap was somehow attracted to me.
Ironically, when I tried being funny on purpose...
Fill in the blank. There's a lesson in there somewhere.
I'm pretty sure.

We met at that French word I still can't spell.
Ron Day View.
Cackling like
Loony loons. We laughed out little butts off.

And we rode bikes EVERYWHERE.
Through the trails. There were bike
Trails trailing everywhere, short-cuts from point
Hay to Tree. And oh yeah, I climbed trees.
Constantly. And ate apples and plums from
That mean lady’s yard. She stood in her
Kitchen and glared through cat-eyed glasses,
Daring us. Daring me.
GO AHEAD. PICK JUST ONE SINGLE PLUM.
THEN I'LL CALL YOUR MOTHER!
(Interestingly, we didn't hang out with the
plums which didn't fall too far from Mrs. Tree)

Ate whatever was edible. Wild clover.
Yeah. Grass. And
Crab-apples that held the promise of
Painful bowel movements squirting out of
Your ****. Not ‘***’ because cussing wasn’t
All that big of a deal. You heard it in R movies.
But it hadn’t permeated the marrow of
Our entire culture. Not yet. It wasn’t all over
TV after, say, 8:45.

Nothing about ***. Absolutely Nuttin' Honey.
'Cause I'd be making stuff up in 1975,
When I was 12. Kissing was just...
You know.

We messed around, got into and out of trouble.
We laughed. The future hung over us like
Those mean-sounding thunderclouds,
Miles away, but moving from the North-East,
Because severe weather in Iowa always came
In the same direction.

It’s what we did. It’s just about
All we did as kids. Man, we were crazy, and had
Crazy fun.

We built bikes out of spare parts. They were low-
Slung and cool. Mine was always breaking.
I did a lot of stupid things, and somehow,
Somehow I got away with doing a lot of
Stupid things.

I believe in God. Now.
Way back then, I was Catholic. I don’t
Know if that sufficiently explains it
Or not. We ate fishsticks on Fridays during
Lent. We went to church sometimes
On Wednesday nights, the Guitar Mass,
And on Sundays. The Mass felt like it
Lasted 93 minutes, like our services do
Now. But it seemed to go on forever.
It as about 45 minutes, and we would always
“Leave Early” which meant, we’d take
Our Communion, solemnly, eyes
Downcast and humble, but I would slow,
Then stop, lost in the visage:
I looked up at the Man on the Cross and
Wondered when the Priest would ever
Get around to explaining why He
Died for my sins.
Someone would wake me from my
Reverie, and whisper, “Please move ahead.”
Shamefaced, I would say, truthfully,
“I’m sorry, Ma’am.” Because, in 1975,
When I was 12, I really was.
Sorry.

Then an hour
Later I was dressed in
Salvation Army rags (today)
And I would jump in the creek with my
Jean-shorts and off-color shirt on.
Sometimes, the bikes weren’t in the picture.
So we hiked. Never ‘walked’ but “hiked” which
Was moving with a greater purpose.
Great distances. The distances weren’t the great
Part. I forget what the great part was, because
This was when I was a kid. When I was 12.

The things you did
As a kid
You store them in a secret kid-locker
In your heart
And your heart, it grows, along with the rest of
You, like a quarter pounded into the meat of
A young tree. The tree envelops the quarter,
Taking it in to itself, swallowing time
That you only try to clumsily relive
(Like I’m trying right now)

It used to be cold, icy, and snowy in Iowa.
I know this; I was out in it most of the time.
Does anyone sled anymore? Toboggan?
Round-saucer spinning uncontrollably at
About 12 mph? Metal sleds with runners
And power steering? Down crazy-steep
Barreling down frozen white hills, crashing
Into copses of thin pliable young trees.
You only see this kind of stuff on Youtube
In somebody’s ‘All-time Epic Fail List
The failure is epic, alright. We’ve moved on.
And not necessarily to a bigger, brighter future.

Ice! I skated on long-bladed racer skates.
I could stop on a dollar’s worth of
Dimes.

And this one time
I
Fell right on my knee hard enough to
Grind a hole in my jeans. It looked like a ******
Meteor crater. A pretty girl named Tina
Felt sorry for me and sat right next to me
She wore pink pom-poms and I fell in
Puppy with her for about three hours.
Then she smiled and hugged me and
I was more frozen than the ice outside
And she left, her Mom picking her up
And eying me balefully as I stood
Pink-faced and flushed and utterly
Confused about the randomness of
What had just happened to me.
Girls from my town all knew
More about myself than myself knew
About me. They had me PEGGED, brothers
And sisters. But not this girl. She was from
The next town over.
That was a good day, if I’m remembering
It correctly. If. I’m pretty sure I am.
Or, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t matter.

We played a game called ‘Blackman’
Like a tag game in Gym, where
One kid is “IT” and a mass of skaters
Goes from one end of the ice pond
To the other, and the people you capture
(I couldn’t catch an old man in front-wheel
Drive figure skates and I got so frustrated
I gave up to jeers and yells and found the
Trees were good listeners to kids
Who couldn’t skate as coordinated as
They wanted to.

So ten minutes later
I would go into the Warming House, and
Listen to am radio. All the Hits! KSTT! Davenport,
Iowa. On ******* Blvd., which was really
River Drive, because the Hostess Plant stood
Sentinel on top of the hill, pushing out
Sponge-cake filling and HoHos and Cupcakes
And those awful coconut snowballs, and
This one time, in high school, I shoved one
Inside my mouth and tried to swallow it
And about choked to death.

I walked to Mark Twain Elementary School
And ran home for lunch, and was usually
Late because I was easily distracted
And when the school day ended,
I walked or ran home, hurrying, because
Captain Ernie and Bugs Bunny Cartoons were on,
And then Gilligan’s Island from about 4:00 to
5:30, when the news would come on,
And then Dinner,
And I couldn’t stand to sit still
To save my life. I have ADD. I
Know this now. I didn’t know it
(Nobody knew what it was)
I knew something was wrong with me
Or not-right. It was just the way
The World Turned.

Back then. I had no sense of ‘self’.
I was a changeling. I tried to fit into
Whatever people expected of me, which
Was very often extremely difficult, because
These people I emulated and thought were
So **** cool were just as messed up
As I was, maybe more; But I
Didn’t have the emotional maturity
(Or I couldn’t face the awful responsibility
That went with that awful truth)
To deal with it, so under the rug it went.

I was moody and happy and singing
One moment and crying in the shower
The next.

This one time, I was stuck
In the borderlands of childhood
And the beginning of a man
It was safe, for awhile
This one time.
Coop Lee Apr 2014
son spreads knee blood into ******* &/or
sidewalk chalk.
mixes reds to pinks with head cracking asphalt.
of god & country.
of soggy bread in a lunch-bag; snackpack readied.
he skates.

the concussed ****** of booming youth.

omega he:
to the wolf pack outers.
breathing love of summer, he
is the son drunk on hi-c
& burping.
watching teenaged supersoakers yodel
on a bridge.
florida.

son sneaks out late to rationalize
the city’s features
under strange light & love of nightly people.
boy sculpts body out of beast,
turned dark corners.
arrives swollen.

his father erects a roofed flattop in the backyard slab
with flood light electronics taught to worship
the shred.
mother rattles the blender
on the kitchen outskirts, ***** breathed
& nearing with hugs.

blister-itched.
glossed folds of scar tissue.
those days on summer-beyond when the neighborhood pulsates.
with satellite dishes tuneforking high-frequency vibrations
from outerspace & pigeons explode.

son’s ears bleed, &
the television goes unwatched.
he snaps plank & ankle protein, refurbishing
his legs into iron-rods
or wands of summer anthem.
cold war.

he empties sugar-sweat & toxins
into the storm-drain.
essence of wet heat, skin pinched, & friend
of ghosts.
a three legged dog lay in the shade
leisurely watching the boy skate
on endless.
previously published in Stymie Magazine
http://www.stymiemag.com/2013/08/coop-lee-skateboard-gothic-poetry.html
Ken Pepiton Nov 2018
How we start is only part of what we eventually do.

Physically that's easy to see. Being human, adamkind,
we see weak starts often in life.
Colts or pups born a week too soon can be loved to lives as pampered pets,
Siring toys for the enjoyment of those who can afford to fuel them,
For generations, with never a single care,
Past that initial trauma and subsequent subjugation to the will of man.

I don't tell horse stories, dog stories or war stories, if I can keep from it.

But when you want to demonstrate the purest of payback,
revenge getting the bad guy in the end,
having a horse be the hero makes behaving like an animal
more noble to the mind of vengeful man.
It's not true, revenge being noble.
That's a very old lie.

Law is to prevent error by disallowing failure. Law.

Relative to the rest of God's creatures, we, adamkind, seem dependent, weak and vulnerable next to bears being weak
a way-less long time
Than we.
We come into this world weak as a baby anything and we stay that way longer
Than any living creature.

I am an American, by birth.
I was not born to a political party or a family with political roots,
"I ain't no Senator's son."
Still,
I was reared drinking mythic cherry wine
sprung from George's failure to lie
Regarding his woodman's knack with a hatchet.

Sitting on the fence rail Abe split,
town fathers where I lived
were said to have decided the most harmonious of towns
have only gainfully employed darker folks,
while white
trash was allowed to loll around because they was
some employer's kin by marriage.

It all seemed pretty normal, as a child.
The loller-arounders let kids listen when they told
Their friends, who could not read, what the newspapers said.

One block from my house there was a vet's and hobo's flop-house clad in corrugated tin, rusted-round the nail-holes all the way to the ground and the rust had spread, so at sunset,...
I only recall the single story shed having one door.
There were always old white men sittin' on the southside of the shed. At sunset, those old men's whispy white hair

appeared as white flowing mare's tale clouds under
a scab-red wall held up by old men with sunset shining faces...

It was a big shed, a low barn, a bunkhouse,
eight or ten 4-foot tin-sheets long on the north and south
Windowless walls.
The one door was on the south side.
Once I saw an old man selling red paper buddy poppies.
He was missing both legs about half-way up his thighs.
The poppy seller rode a square board that had what I think were
Roller-skates, the key-kind, with metal wheels about a 1/2 inch wide.
Nailed to it's bottom. He had handles made from a carpenter's saw
Without it's blade. He pushed himself with those handles.

That looked fun, to a four-year old.
It looks different now-a-days. Knowing
Those red poppies symbolized
The after math automatics of the war to end war.

Who knows the poppy-sellers son? He would be old.
Does he know how his father lost his legs, but lived?
Does he bear the curse of the curse that lost his father's legs?
Does he honor his father's cause or weep at the thought?

Enough is enough.
My family tree branched in America, but only one great grand-parent,
Three generations back from me, was rooted in this land.
My gran'ma's ma, a Choctaw squaw,
That rhymed fine,
But it's not true. My grandma did not know her parents. She was born an orphan,
And her father and mother were likely strangers.

1910 in southwest Arkansas or southeast Oklahoma or northeast Texas or northwest Louisiana
And the color of her skin is all that proved my American heritage.

My grandma was born poor as poor can be,
she never told me how she survived

To survive a 1925 or so car wreck
in eastern Arizona's white mountains.
I never asked what my grandmother knew,
nor how she came to know.

This is my point.
After you and I have gone into forever more,
Our great grand children may wonder
what we did or did not, since we
Are no longer around to give our account.

These days we can leave our story to our great grand children.
Our own children
And our grand children follow us on facebook back to before they were born.
Shall they judge us idlers wielding idle words for laughs,
or  think us knowers of all we found while seeking first the Kingdom of Heaven
In the place Jesus says it is. You know where Jesus said the Kingdom of our kind lies?

The double minded man is unstable in all his ways,
hence Eve and her broader bandwidth corpus colostrum
Come back later, there is a breath system upgrade evolving.

Such changes to the courage of the mind rolls out more slowly
to the root ideas, labouring to find sustenance,
it is a struggle being a radical idea,
we agree, but we have our part,
as do the flowers
and the spore.
Leaven the whole lump, like it or lump it.

The now we live in grew from far deeper roots than
the roots claimed by the
Self-identified nation through it's cartoons/representations of national desires to rally 'round the flag as if it were the fire,
those desires to herd beneath any shelter from the storm,
Your country, your incorporated allegiance
to the inventor and creator and counter of the money under
the protection of the sword and crown representative
of the flame that burns,
The namers of patriot, the rankeers of ideas
who, by their existence,
naturally, over rule you.
Such powers are granted by the individual, not the mob.
You get that?

The desires of the nation over rule the desires of the individuals who
Com-prize the nation.
Whose side are you on, dear reader?

Is the idea we believed believable?
Ex Nihilo, I don't think so because
I can't imagine how now could be
Accidental-ly.

When my hero wore spurs as he went from the jail office to
Miss Kitty's place, (Gunsmoke on A.M. radio)

What did Miss Kitty do?
I had no clue.
In my hero's world people never
Did the wrong thing
While Marshal Dillon was in Dodge.

So did you think Miss Kitty's place was anything other
than a culturally acceptable
reference to professional social ******* workers
under a strong, smart female CEO
with top-level links to the local cops?

All these are rhetorical questions, this being
Rhetorical if you are hearing me say this.
That means, don't nod or raise your hand or shout Amen, kin!

I see your answer my answer and
I know my answer, so you know my answer.

Step-back, 1961, USA Snapshot
Unitas, Benny Kid Perett, Mantlenmarris, the Guns of Navarone.

Why I recall those things, I know not.
Why I did not say I do not know, I do not know.

Though, pausing to think,
knowing contains the doing of it within it, you know.
What's to do?

Outlaws were more my heroes than cowboys, and marshals, and such
Especially the ones that had been forced out by law.

I grew up in a 1950's junkyard with no fence, one mile north of route 66
On the Al-Can highway to Las Vegas, 103 miles away.
My Grandpa was a blacksmith's son,
who rode a horse he broke and his pa had shod
From Texas to Arizona in 1917, at the age of 18.

by the time I knew him,
He was fifty, settled down, nearly, from the war.
Momma had to work, so, daytime, Granddaddy raised me.

Horses weren't, wrecked cars were,
the toys of my childhood.

Grandpa built a junkyard from cars left steam blown
on the old stage road, from before
the railroad.
The Abo Highway hain't been Route 66 for some time yet…
Hoping…


Hoping sometime to polish this bit of this book, I left myself re-minders
Hoping memory of mental realms might rewind or unwind sequentially
When trigger
Neighed.
That worked, Roy Autry and Gene Rogers were names Sue Snow's
Mormon Bishop granddaddy called me,
back when I first recall My Grandpa Caleb,
a baptist by confession,
who was,
as I recall a *****-drinkin' jolly drunk.
While Grandma made beds in some motel,
granddaddy built boats and horse trailers
and hot rod 34 Chevies,
and he fixed this one red Indian, I could read the word on the gas tank, I knew the word Indian
and this motor cycle was proud to wear the name. I was 4.

A stout-strong man, no fat near any working muscle system,
he could and would
repair any broken thing,
for anybody. People called him Pop.
Pop and Mr. Levi-next-door at the Loma Vista Motel, shared a listing in the Green Book,
so broke down ******* knew where help could be found
after dark in that town.
There was a warnin'ag'in
let'n sunset there
on darker than grandma's skin.

My Gran'daddy's shop had two gas pumps
that were reset to begin pumping with the turn of a crank.
As soon as I could turn that crank,
I could pump gas.
I could fill up that red Indian
Motorcycle.
But "m'spokes was too short
to kick the starter."
I told my eleven year old uncle
and he told
how he would always remember learning
that saddles have no linkage
to horse brakes.
"Not knowing what you cain't do
kin *** ye kilt."

He grew up in the junk yard, too.
My first outlaw hero.

Likely, I am alive today, because
On the day I discovered I could pump gas as good as any man,
I also discovered that real motorcycles were not built for little boys.
This is an earlier voice which I wrote a series of thought experiments. The book is finished, most parts, some reader feedback as to interest in more, will be high value gifts from you to me, and counted so.
jeffrey robin Sep 2013
Written in blood

Footprints in concrete the barefoot boy

We stagger under false dreams

The truth is dead


San Francisco dawn awaits

The homeless hidden honeymoon

The child has no one to greet his
Search for goodness in your eye

Below the drone airplane

POOR LITTLE POOR BOY!

While high school girls with razor blades

Demanding  to get laid!

Strip the world of dignity


Wander the earth forever

You end at Fukushima

Eating radiation

Dying so hurtfully

••

I am here

I and a few friends of mine


What to do?

Soon you really must decide

Perhaps yesterday
Holland Feb 2018
My body spun
From one side of my garage
to the other.

In between the pillars of poles
creating space between the cars
parked in the two car garage

perfect family, right?
not even close

I unlaced my skates
tossing them in a case,
unorganized as my chaotic brain

I leaned down to pick up
a mess of what looked
like plastic

like a broken water container
crushed by the weight
of a basketball tossed without looking

being the good girl I was
I picked up the charred plastic
placing it in my hand to
throw it in the trash

I dropped it in the can
letting the pieces fall
one
by
one.

As I wiped my hands
I found a piece I had forgotten
it had the label of Prego on the side
I realized then
It was a broken spaghetti jar

I ran upstairs
to help with dinner.

I asked my mom
what I could do to
She said
"You can run that blood
under a cold water faucet"

I looked at her confused, saying
"Where am I bleeding?"

She turned my arm over
showing me the cut
glazed over my forearm
I hadn't even felt it

I didn't know
that was the moment
I would find an advantage
to not feeling pain

and an interest
in the impure
realization
that bleeding
wasn't scary...

that it couldn't hurt me
as much as the rest
of my life could.
Cait May 2012
My legs are shaking as I step
Onto a frozen lake
In skates that are not my own.

He grabs my hands
and whirls me in a wide circle
I scream and beg for him to stop.

He leaves me for a while
to wobble slowly
on my own.

Then he returns with a shopping cart
And dumps me in it
To push me across the lake

At an alarming rate.

With tears in my eyes
I beg him to stop.

I know I am being jettisoned
Towards my death.
John F McCullagh Dec 2011
He wore a purple knitted cap.
He had a carrot nose
This snowman figurine wore skates
with black buttons on his clothes.
His cheeks were daubed a cherry red
His bootless feet looked cold.
His smiling was perpetual
His was a hopeful soul.

Yet now he lay out near the curb
He was destined for the trash
His mistress found a figurine
that had a bit more flash.
He looked back sadly at the house.
The only home he'd known
His colleagues, perched on windowsills
looked out at him alone.

The trash-men came
and grabbed the bags
hydraulics crushed and smashed
One trash man took the figurine
and put it with his stash
The trash man and his little girl
since Spring had lived alone.
It was hard since Emma's mother died
but he tried to make a home.

With no insurance and one salary
his house this year looked bare
Where once they'd had a festive Spruce
now a pitiful fake stood there.
Such decorations as they had
were pilfered from the trash
of folks with little sentiment
and too much spending cash.

In his workshop in the basement
He made the snowman shine
His silver skates were polished
He repainted every line.

Little Emma loved the snowman
When she saw him near the tree
He is no longer called unwanted
since he found a new family.
on your beautiful angel feet
would you teach me how
to do that
that
one
thing
you can just
show me in your mind
we could never get our feet
into those ice skates
wait
an
minute
are those ice skates
?



















...
..
.
she don't know it
she will find out
next time
...
..
.
No matter what life you lead
the ****** is a lovely number:
cheeks as fragile as cigarette paper,
arms and legs made of Limoges,
lips like Vin Du Rhone,
rolling her china-blue doll eyes
open and shut.
Open to say,
Good Day Mama,
and shut for the ******
of the unicorn.
She is unsoiled.
She is as white as a bonefish.

Once there was a lovely ******
called Snow White.
Say she was thirteen.
Her stepmother,
a beauty in her own right,
though eaten, of course, by age,
would hear of no beauty surpassing her own.
Beauty is a simple passion,
but, oh my friends, in the end
you will dance the fire dance in iron shoes.
The stepmother had a mirror to which she referred--
something like the weather forecast--
a mirror that proclaimed
the one beauty of the land.
She would ask,
Looking glass upon the wall,
who is fairest of us all?
And the mirror would reply,
You are the fairest of us all.
Pride pumped in her like poison.

Suddenly one day the mirror replied,
Queen, you are full fair, 'tis true,
but Snow White is fairer than you.
Until that moment Snow White
had been no more important
than a dust mouse under the bed.
But now the queen saw brown spots on her hand
and four whiskers over her lip
so she condemned Snow White
to be hacked to death.
Bring me her heart, she said to the hunter,
and I will salt it and eat it.
The hunter, however, let his prisoner go
and brought a boar's heart back to the castle.
The queen chewed it up like a cube steak.
Now I am fairest, she said,
lapping her slim white fingers.

Snow White walked in the wildwood
for weeks and weeks.
At each turn there were twenty doorways
and at each stood a hungry wolf,
his tongue lolling out like a worm.
The birds called out lewdly,
talking like pink parrots,
and the snakes hung down in loops,
each a noose for her sweet white neck.
On the seventh week
she came to the seventh mountain
and there she found the dwarf house.
It was as droll as a honeymoon cottage
and completely equipped with
seven beds, seven chairs, seven forks
and seven chamber pots.
Snow White ate seven chicken livers
and lay down, at last, to sleep.

The dwarfs, those little hot dogs,
walked three times around Snow White,
the sleeping ******.  They were wise
and wattled like small czars.
Yes.  It's a good omen,
they said, and will bring us luck.
They stood on tiptoes to watch
Snow White wake up.  She told them
about the mirror and the killer-queen
and they asked her to stay and keep house.
Beware of your stepmother,
they said.
Soon she will know you are here.
While we are away in the mines
during the day, you must not
open the door.

Looking glass upon the wall . . .
The mirror told
and so the queen dressed herself in rags
and went out like a peddler to trap Snow White.
She went across seven mountains.
She came to the dwarf house
and Snow White opened the door
and bought a bit of lacing.
The queen fastened it tightly
around her bodice,
as tight as an Ace bandage,
so tight that Snow White swooned.
She lay on the floor, a plucked daisy.
When the dwarfs came home they undid the lace
and she revived miraculously.
She was as full of life as soda pop.
Beware of your stepmother,
they said.
She will try once more.

Snow White, the dumb bunny,
opened the door
and she bit into a poison apple
and fell down for the final time.
When the dwarfs returned
they undid her bodice,
they looked for a comb,
but it did no good.
Though they washed her with wine
and rubbed her with butter
it was to no avail.
She lay as still as a gold piece.

The seven dwarfs could not bring themselves
to bury her in the black ground
so they made a glass coffin
and set it upon the seventh mountain
so that all who passed by
could peek in upon her beauty.
A prince came one June day
and would not budge.
He stayed so long his hair turned green
and still he would not leave.
The dwarfs took pity upon him
and gave him the glass Snow White--
its doll's eyes shut forever--
to keep in his far-off castle.
As the prince's men carried the coffin
they stumbled and dropped it
and the chunk of apple flew out
of her throat and she woke up miraculously.

And thus Snow White became the prince's bride.
The wicked queen was invited to the wedding feast
and when she arrived there were
red-hot iron shoes,
in the manner of red-hot roller skates,
clamped upon her feet.
First your toes will smoke
and then your heels will turn black
and you will fry upward like a frog,
she was told.
And so she danced until she was dead,
a subterranean figure,
her tongue flicking in and out
like a gas jet.
Meanwhile Snow White held court,
rolling her china-blue doll eyes open and shut
and sometimes referring to her mirror
as women do.
John Stevens Jul 2010
When Mom died in June of 1991 Dad was rather lost,
like the rest of us. I started writing little letters in
big print so he could read them. He would not talk on
the phone so this was the only way to make contact.
I found out later that he carried them around in his
bib overall pocket and pulled them out from time to time.
Occasionally they would get washed and when Sharon
let me know I would run off another copy and mail it.
It became a means for me to remember the past and help
Dad at the same time. My kids loved to hear stories of
when I was a kid so I would recycle the stories between
the kids and Dad. Now as I read them it is a reminder of
things that have become a little fuzzy over the years,
also a reminder that I need to fill in the gaps of the stories
and leave them for my kids before it is too late. So here it is,
such as it is, if you are interested.

=======================================

    Letter­s to Dad

    Nov. 14, 1991

    Dear Dad,
    Your grandkiddies, as you call them,
    send you a big hug from Idaho. Sara is
    five and in Kindergarten this year and
    doing very well. Kristen is in the forth
    grade and made the Honor Roll list the
    first quarter of the year. We are very
    proud of both of our girls.

    Do you remember when toward late
    afternoon you and I would get in the car
    and “Drive around the block” as you
    always said? We would go up to Cliff’s
    and go east for a mile then down past
    Cleo Mae house and on back home. I
    remember you would stop at the junk
    piles and I would find neat stuff, like
    wheels from old toys, that I could make
    into my toys. I think of those times often.
    It was very enjoyable.

    I will be writing to you in the BIG PRINT
    so you can read it easier.

    It is snowing lightly here today. Supposed
    to be nasty weather for a while.

    Bye for now.

    John

    ——————————————————–

    Dec. 3, 1991

    Dear Dad,

    Just a note to say we love you. I miss very
    much talking to Mom on the phone and
    having you play Red Wing on your harmonica.

    I remember quite often when I was very
    young, 4 or 5, and we would go out to the
    field to change the water or something.
    The sand burrs would be so thick and you
    would pick me up on your back. I would
    put my feet into your back pockets and
    away we would go.

    These are the things childhood memories
    are supposed to be made of. Kristen and
    Sara love to hear the stories about when I
    was a kid and what you and I did
    together. I try with them to build the
    memories that they can tell their kids.
    Thanks Dad for a good childhood.

    Bye for now.
    Kristen and Sara send you a kiss and a
    hug.

    Your son, John

    —————————————————–

    Jan. 12, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    We went to Oregon for Christmas and
    had very good traveling weather. Do you
    remember when you and Mom went with
    us once to Oregon at Christmas and
    there were apples still hanging on the
    tree by the Williams house? We made
    apple pie from the apples that you
    picked. Turned out to be pretty good pie.
    There weren’t any apple on the tree this
    year. I thought of you picking the apples
    and bringing them into the kitchen in
    your hat if I remember right.

    We have had some pretty good times
    together. I was thinking the other day
    about a picture that I took of you about
    12 years ago. It captured you as I will
    always remember you. If I can locate it in
    all the stuff, I would like to get it blown
    up and submit it to the art section at the
    Twin Falls County Fair this year.

    I hope this finds you feeling well. I love
    you Dad. Kristen and Sara send you a
    kiss and a hug.

    Oh yes, I would like for you and Tracy to
    sit down sometime and talk about when
    you were a kid and record it on tape. I
    would like to put your remembrances
    down on paper.

    Bye for now.

    Your son, John

    ———————————————————

    Feb. 11, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    Happy Valentine’s Day!!

    Spring is on the way and soon you will be
    85. Just a spring chicken, right? I hope I
    can get around as well as you do by the
    time I am 85.

    Thanks for the letter. I will keep it for a
    very long time. It is the first letter I have
    received from my Father in 48 years.

    Talked to Ed the other day. He said he
    talked to you on the phone and that you
    were wearing your hearing aids and
    glasses. Great! Mom would be proud of
    you.

    Talked to a guy last week who is
    president of the John Deer tractor group
    here. He invited me to bring my “M”
    John Deer to the County Fair and
    participate in the tractor pull contest.
    Might just do that.

    Well the page is filling up using these big
    letters but if it makes it easier to read it is
    worth it.

    Bye for now Dad, I love you. Pennye,
    Kristen and Sara send their love too.

    Your son, John
    —————————————————-
    April 13, 1992

    Dad

    Though the years have past and you are now
    85, you are still the same as when I was a
    child. The memories of going with you to the
    field, when you were “riding the ditch”,
    surveying in a lateral, loading up the turkeys
    in the old Ford truck and taking them to the
    “Hoppers” - is just as if it were yesterday. I
    think of you playing Red Wing on the harp. I
    remember when during the looong cold
    winters we would play checkers. You would
    always beat me. I learned to play a good game.

    Not much has changed except we are both
    much older now. The values you did not speak
    but lived out in front of me has helped make
    me what I am today. I pray that I will be a
    good example before my children to help them
    on their way through life.

    On your 85th birthday, I want to wish you a
    Happy Birthday and thank you for being my
    Father.

    Love
    John

    April 13, 1992

    ————————————————–

    June 10, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    I hope this finds you well. The Stevens
    family in Twin Falls Idaho is having a
    busy summer. Kristen just finished the
    fourth grade and was on the Honor Roll
    for the entire year. Sara will now be a
    big First Grader next year.

    The other day we went out to eat and
    Kristen had chicken and noodles. She
    said, “This tastes just like Grandma
    Nellie’s noodles.” I hope they can keep
    these memories fresh and remember all
    the good times we had back in Nebraska.
    It is difficult to accept that things have
    changed and will never be the same again.
    We miss the weekly phone calls to Nebraska.

    It is clouding up and we might get rain
    this week. It is very dry around here.
    Some of the canals will be cut off in July.

    Bye for now.

    Your Son John

    Love you Dad. I think of you often.

    —————————————————-

    June 22, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    Hope you had a good “HAPPY PAPPY”
    day. This note is to wish you a late
    “HAPPY PAPPY” day.

    I was thinking the other day about the
    times you would take me roller skating
    out at the fair ground on Sunday
    afternoons. I really enjoyed those times. I
    remember how you could give a little hop
    and skate backwards. For me staying on
    my feet was a challenge.

    Sara will be 6 years old June 29. Seems
    like yesterday when she was born. Time
    has a way of passing very quickly.

    Love you lots Dad. The family sends their
    love too.

    Bye for now.
    John

    —————————————————

    Aug. 11, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    Just a note to let you know that your
    Idaho family love you. It was good to talk
    to you for a minute or two the other day.
    I miss the harmonica playing you would
    do over the phone.

    We are all well even though the place
    was covered with smoke from all the
    forest fires last week. It got a little hard
    on the lungs at times but the smoke has
    moved on now. Probably went over
    Nebraska.

    Talked to brother Ed the other day. He
    had just returned from from Nebraska.
    Ed said you looked good for 85.

    Bye for now.

    John

    —————————————————–

    Sept. 10, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    I am sending a copy of what Mom sent
    me a few years ago of what she
    remembered about growing up. I wish I
    had more. How about sitting down with
    Tracy and Sharon and telling them some
    of the things you remember about
    growing up? They can record it and I will
    put it on paper. I would really like that.

    We are ok here in Idaho. Summer had
    disappeared and it is school time again.
    Kristen is in the 5th grade and Sara is in
    the 1st grade. The family went to the
    County Fair today for the second time.
    One day is enough for me.

    I think of you often and love you Dad.
    Thinking of the good times we had
    together while I was growing up always
    makes me happy. You and Mom raised
    four pretty good kids.
    God Bless you Dad. We love you from
    Idaho.

    Bye for now.

    John

    —————————————————–

    Oct. 11, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    We are fine out in Idaho. We are having
    beautiful fall weather. It has not frozen
    enough to get our tomato plants yet.

    Kristen and Sara are doing very well in
    school. They brought home their mid
    term report cards and are getting A’s
    and a B or two.

    Remember when we would go out in the
    corn field and pick the corn by hand? I
    would drive the tractor and you and Ed
    and Wayne picked the corn and threw it
    in the trailer. You guys kept warm from
    the work and I was freezing on the
    tractor. Before that we used the horses
    named Brownie and - was it Blackie?
    The one that kept getting out up north by
    the ditch was Brownie. He figured out
    how to open the gate.

    I remember the times that you were
    hauling cane or sorghum from the field
    east of Mercers and I would ride behind
    the wagon on my sled.

    I had a very good childhood really.
    Thanks for being my Dad.

    God Bless you Dad. We love you from
    Idaho.

    Bye for now.

    John

    ——————————————————-

    Nov. 10, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    It is snowy here and cold. I have a hole in
    the back of the house I must get sealed up
    to keep the cold out. We are redoing this
    part for the kitchen.

    Kristen and Sara made the Honor Roll
    this quarter in school. Kristen’s teacher
    said he wished he had a whole room full
    of Kristens to teach.

    Sorry the phone connection was so bad
    when I called the other day. It was good
    to here you say “hello hello….” any way.
    Glad you are feeling better.

    Your account in the credit union is about
    $34,000 now.

    I was just thinking back when we were
    cultivating corn with that “crazy wheel
    cultivator”. The one that you drove the
    tractor and I rode on the cultivator and
    used the foot pedals to steer it down the
    rows. I remember sometimes it cleaned
    out some of the corn row. Cultivator
    blight, right? It was kind of hard to keep
    straight. Those were the days.

    I keep remembering little bits of things
    while growing up. Sometime I will put
    them all together for my kids to read
    about the “good ole days”.

    God Bless you Dad. We love you from
    Idaho.

    Bye for now.

    John

    ————————————————
    Dec. 17, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    The snow has fallen and the kids stayed
    home from school today. The wind is now
    blowing so it will begin drifting the road
    shut. Besides that the whole family is sick
    with a cold.

    We are putting together a Christmas gift
    to you but it won’t be ready for
    Christmas. It is something that you can
    watch over and over if you want. So
    Merry Christmas for now.

    Last night was the kids’ school Christmas
    program. Kristen started playing the
    flute this fall and played with a group for
    the first time this week. She did very well
    and I got it on video.

    Time to get this in the mail. Love you
    Dad.
    Bye for now.

    Kristen and Sara send you a kiss and a
    hug.
    Your son, John

    ——————————————————

    Jan. 11, 1993

    Dear Dad,

    We have a lot of snow on the ground
    now. I was telling the family about the
    winter of 49 where the snow covered the
    door and you had to scoop the snow into
    the house to dig a tunnel out then haul
    the snow out through the tunnel. That
    was a 15 foot drift wasn’t it? It sure
    looked big to this 6 year old. Then the
    plane flew over the house for a few days
    until we could get out and signal an OK.
    Those were the days! What I do not
    remember is how you took care of the
    cows and stuff during this time. I
    remember being sick and Wayne took the
    horse and rode into Broadwater to get
    oranges and something else. The big
    white dog we had went along and was hit
    by a car. Wayne had to use a fence post
    to finish him off. I remember feeling very
    sad about the old dog.
    We haven’t had this much snow in 8
    years.

    I trust you are feeling well. Our prayers
    are with you all.
    Bye for now. Love you Dad
    The family send a BIG Hi!!!!

    Your son, John

    —————————————————-

    Feb. 9, 1993

    Dear Dad,

    When the kids go to bed they say “Tell us
    a story about when you were a kid on the
    farm”. So I tell them things that I write
    to you and a LOT that I don’t write to
    you. The other day going to school we
    were talking about one of the first snow
    falls we had this year. I spun the van
    around in circles in the parking lot and
    they thought that was GREAT fun. Then
    I told them about the time that their
    Grandpa cut some circles in the Kelly
    School yard and hit a pole with the back
    fender. Do you remember that? I
    remember Mom bringing it up every now
    and then. Then there was the time you
    got a little close to the guard posts along
    the highway just west of Broadwater and
    ripped the spare tire and bracket off the
    old Jeep. Of course none of US ever did
    anything like that. HA.

    It is good to remember back and tell the
    kids about the things we did “in the old
    days”. They find it hard to believe there
    was no TV and I walked through rattle
    snake country to go to the neighbors to
    play. It WAS a good time for me and I
    had a GOOD Dad to help me grow up.
    Thanks again Dad. You and Mom did a
    very good job on us four kids. Sometimes
    we don’t show it often enough but I for
    one thank you and LOVE you.

    Soon you will have another birthday.
    Before you know it you will be 90. I
    should be so lucky.

    I trust you are feeling well. Our prayers
    are with you all. Bye for now. Love you
    Dad
    The family send a BIG Hi!!!!

    Your son, John

    —————————————————–

    Mar. 9, 1993

    Dear Dad,
    Time has a way of disappearing so
    rapidly. I was going to write you a note
    two weeks ago and now here we are.

    It looks like spring is just about to arrive.
    I am ready for it. I’ll bet you are ready to
    get out side and do something. Do you
    miss not farming? I think often about the
    farm and the things we used to do. The
    kids always ask for stories about being on
    the farm. I tell them about raising a
    garden, rattlesnakes, floods, the BIG
    ONE in 49, anything that comes to mind.

    The family went to Sun Valley about 70
    miles north of here Sat. with Kristen’s
    Girl Scout troop for a day of ice skating.
    Pennye used the VCR and played back
    their falls and no falls. It reminded me of
    the times you would get your old clamp-
    on skates on a cut a figure on the ice. I
    never was very good at it. You could hop
    up and turn around. I couldn’t stay of
    my back side and head. I still have a big
    dent in the back of my head from the last
    time I tried. Nearly killed me. So much
    for that.

    Next month you will have another
    birthday. 86 years! Before you know it
    you will be 90.

    I paid your insurance for another year
    I trust you are feeling well. Our prayers
    are w
Mary Torrez May 2012
We said not to wear
them inside, but now what I'd
give to hear their sound
life nomadic Jul 2013
A tomboy, naturally barefoot, gingerly walks the white painted line because the asphalt is just too burning hot.  Scrubby tufts of weedy grass are welcome respites on the way, briefly cooling her steps even if they are stickery.  The ***** soles of her now calloused feet were intentionally toughened just before school got out, with mincing steps across the roughest gravel she could find.  Her mother accommodates her preference, leaving a pan of water outside for her to scrub her feet before going in.  Even then, a black path has gradually appeared leading from the front door in the old orangish carpet.  Two months of summer barefoot every day when she had the choice. Keyed roller skates clamped onto last year’s school shoes were the exception.  She can flat out run anywhere.
  
This particular expedition began like every other thing they did, which was anything to fend off boredom.  She had been sitting on a cement step shaded by an open carport, just three oil-stained parking stalls for three small apartments on the tired poor side of town.  There is a little more dirt on the street here, and grass is a little neglected.  Just like the children, but these kids prefer that anyway.  Two scruffy friends stomp on aluminum cans, brothers sporting matching buzz cuts and cut-off shorts.  They are flattening them for the recycling money by the pound, so the carport smells vaguely of stale beer.  Another boy attempts to shoot a wandering fly with a home-made rubber band gun; rings cut from a bicycle tube made the best ammo.  “What do you want to do?” …”I don’t know, what do you want to do?”  Thwack…  The only requisite for friendship here is vicinity, yet it is still true.  The idea of choosing friends is about as odd as the concept that one could chose where one lives... Strengths and shortcomings are completely accepted because it is just what it is.  

Their amazing three-story tree fort with a side look-out had been heartlessly taken down by the disgruntled property owner last week.  Two months of accumulating pilfered and scrap two-by-fours, nails, and even a stack of plywood (gasp!) from area construction sites had yielded supplies for a growing fort.  A gang-plank style entry had crossed the ditch to the first level.  Nailed ladder steps to the second offered a little more vertigo and a prime spot to hurl acorns.  Another ladder up led up to the third floor retreat, with a couch-like seating area and shoulder high walls.  A breeze reached the leaves up there.   The next tree over was the look-out, with nothing but ladder steps all the way up to where the view opened up out of the ravine.  When the wind blew, it gave merciless lessons in facing any fear of heights.  But now that was all over, discovered gone overnight.

Someone says again, “What do you want to do?” …”I don’t know, what do you want to do?”  “ 7-11? ”  Good enough, so they head out.   Distance measures time.  Ten minutes is the end of the street past the cracked basketball court in the church parking lot.  Fifteen minutes and the lawns end at the edge of the sub-division.  Half-built homes rising from bare dirt and scattered foundations could offer treasures of construction scraps, (where she suspects the stack of plywood came from.) but they keep walking.  Twenty minutes is where industry has scraped away nature, and railroad tracks form an elevated levee.  But time is meaningless if there’s a wealth of it, so there’s no going further until an informal ritual is completed.  Wordlessly they each dig around their pockets searching for equal amounts of pennies.  Each of them carefully arrange them lined up on the rounded-surface rail, and they settle in for the wait.  It could be five minutes or it could be thirty.  They all understand it’s a crap-shoot of patience waiting for the next train. It’s an unspoken test; quitting too early means losing your coins to the one who stays, so that’s not an option.

Heat presses down and the breezeless air smells like telephone-pole creosote.  She sits in a dusty patch of shade found next to an overgrown ****.  She knows it tastes like licorice and breaks off a stem to chew, but doesn’t know what it is.  The boys throw rocks randomly until she finally stands up to join in, tempted by the challenge of flight and distance.  Then she stands in the center of the tracks, looking one way then the other, searching for the first random distant glimmer of the engine’s light at the horizon.   A flash, so she places her ear to the metal Indian-style, and the imminent approach is confirmed.  She calls out, “its here!” and double checks her pennies’ alignment.  Heads up or tails, but always aligned so the building might be stretched tall or wide, or Lincoln’s face made broad or thin.  That happened only rarely, since it could only be rolled by one wheel then bounced off.  If it stuck longer, the next wheels would surely smash it into a thin, elliptical, smooth misshapen disc of shiny copper.  Its only value becomes validation of a hint of delinquency, Destroying-Government-Property.  Once she splurged with a quarter, which became smashed to just a gleaming silver, bent wafer discolored at the edge.  Curiosity wasn’t worth 25 cents again though, so she had only one of those in her collection.

The approaching engine silently builds impending size and power, so she dashes back down the rocky embankment to safety because after all, she is not a fool, tempting fate with stupid danger. She knows a couple of those fools, but she finds no thrill from that and is not impressed by them either.  Suddenly the train is here, generating astounding noise and wind, occasional wheels screaming protest on their axels.  She intently watches exactly where she placed her coins, hoping to see the moment they fly off the rails that are rhythmically bending under the weight rolling by.  It becomes another game of patience, with such a long line of cars, and she gives up counting them at 80-ish.  Then suddenly it is done and quickly the noise recedes back to heat and cicadas.  The rails are hot.  Diligently they search for the shiny wafers.  Slowly pacing each wood beam, they could have landed in the gravel, or pressed against the rail, or even lodged straight up against the square black wood yards down the tracks.  They find most of them, give up on the rest, then continue on.

She has thirty cents and at last they reach the afternoon’s destination.  7-11’s parking lot becomes a genuine game of “Lava”, burning blacktop encourages leaps from cooler white lines, to painted tire stops, to grass island oasis, then three hot steps across black lava to the sidewalk, and automatic doors swoosh open to air conditioning.  She rarely has enough money for a coke icey; she is here for the bottom shelf candy, a couple pennies or a nickel each.  Off flavors but sweet enough.  She remembered when her older brother was passing out lunchbags of candy to the neighborhood kids for free, practically littering the cul-de-sac.  She had wondered where he got enough money for all that popularity, or could he have saved that much from trick-or-treat? She wondered until he got busted shoplifting at the grocery store.  The security guard decreed that he was never allowed in there again, forever, and the disgrace of sitting on the curb waiting for the mortified ride home was enough to keep him from doing it again.

Today she picks out a few root beer barrels, some Tootsie-rolls (the smaller ones for two cents, not the large ones that divide into cubes) a candy necklace and tiny wax coke bottles, and of course a freeze-pop.   Sitting on the curb, she bites off small pieces of the freeze pop, careful not to get tooth-freeze or brain-freeze, until the last melty chunk is squeezed out the top of the thin plastic tube.

“What do you want to do now?” …”I don’t know, what do you want to do?”
Adam Childs Nov 2014
I am a supreme
Light framed being
Who leaves ferrari's
In the dust
I am sorry for your
Jealousy as I am
Totally terrific
And love wearing
My fabulous coat
Fiercely independent I
Imprint the air with
My personal spots
My proud individuality

Nothing out of reach
I wait for something to inspire
As I hunt lightly
Positioning intelligently
And quickly
Pads on fire
I grab the ground
As I grip the world
With the sharpest claw
As evolving and revolving
Forces compel me with desire

My vibrant cells flicker
Waiting for the right trigger
Spinning and twisting
They collapse into air
As I rush and rush
chasing and chasing
My focus still like stone
Lands lightly like a feather
As I am clear as
Diamond or glass
Empty of thoughts I am a tunnel
The wind blows through
As I run and run

Soft and agile
I can quickly change
Direction or pace
Perfect balance my
Tail acts as a fulcrum
It is as though a
Silver thread was attached
From high up in heaven
Moving on an electric circuit
I am lightning through the air

Stretching like elastic
Expanding into spaces
I become a mile long
Reaching and Reaching
Into proud new places
Slipping through the air
As though someone
Had oiled my hair
I slide weightless
Air born on ice skates
As I catch my hare

With her swiftness
We find she lifts us
With her fire we catch desire
Chase Graham Dec 2014
I have nothing better to do
when it rains so I go to the pier
on vacation with my pole and chicken necks
and rusted traps, drive down

to where the kayaks wait
in the mud, stop to smell
where fresh fish float through
brackish waters and tie a knot

at the end of my string, attach a bob
and minnow and cast
out towards the bay spotting
dead skates and hope

for mackerel and striper,
how my father taught me be gentle
I tie the necks to string and let the meat sink
below the surface and wait to be caught

up with delicious ****** poultry
to feed on and get trapped behind
the jailed walls. I hope the blue
crab knows I had to drive over

the county line in my shoddy white
pickup to the quiet co-op
when she bites into the chicken
for our dinner.
Itunu Nov 2020
Not an impulsive interest,
But a gradual love.

In the midst of this stress and uncertainty,
One thing I know for sure.

I crave the freedom of skating.
The mental release it has to offer.

Like releasing myself from this cage,
I’m locked in.

A brief solace,
From my over worked brain.

To feel the wind in between my hair
Fresh air filling my lungs.

My strong legs supporting my body,
Knees bent ready to take off.

The taste of victory in my mouth,
Sweaty adrenaline palms.

I want roller skates,
So very badly.

- a broke struggling student
If you’re feeling generous or benevolent lately, Hey:)
By A Foreigner

I like Canadians.
They are so unlike Americans.
They go home at night.
Their cigarettes don't smell bad.
Their hats fit.
They really believe that they won the war.
They don't believe in Literature.
They think Art has been exaggerated.
But they are wonderful on ice skates.
A few of them are very rich.
But when they are rich they buy more horses
Than motor cars.
Chicago calls Toronto a puritan town.
But both boxing and horse-racing are illegal
In Chicago.
Nobody works on Sunday.
Nobody.
That doesn't make me mad.
There is only one Woodbine.
But were you ever at Blue Bonnets?
If you **** somebody with a motor car in Ontario
You are liable to go to jail.
So it isn't done.
There have been over 500 people killed by motor cars
In Chicago
So far this year.
It is hard to get rich in Canada.
But it is easy to make money.
There are too many tea rooms.
But, then, there are no cabarets.
If you tip a waiter a quarter
He says "Thank you."
Instead of calling the bouncer.
They let women stand up in the street cars.
Even if they are good-looking.
They are all in a hurry to get home to supper
And their radio sets.
They are a fine people.
I like them.
Emma Liang Oct 2011
falling in love with you was kind of like

putting on ice skates for the first time

even before I stepped on the ice, there was
all this tension coiling up in my stomach like a nesting cobra

there’s this momentary joy when put my foot into the rink
the unity, the coolness,
for a second I feel graceful, I feel poised
for a fleeting moment I am beautiful

I gain in confidence and I am gliding like I’ve been doing this my whole life (which I haven’t)
or at least pretending as though I know what I’m doing.

I leap in the air, like a black&white; photograph
I am suspended, a trapeze artist swinging through space
Time has stopped and there is nothing
but the beating of my heart,
and I laugh and laugh at the absurdity of it all.

but there’s always that moment
inevitable, inexorable
as gravity sends me crashing to my knees, wincing

each time, it gets a little harder to put the skates back on

and try again.
For every star that whispers against
The cold December sky, there’s a wandering
Soul that tiptoes like a ballerina skates across
An icy stage before losing control underneath
The only street lamp that glared a yellow light
Up and down a short distance on the empty street.
One lost and broken body, crawling over
Paved concrete, looking for a part that hadn’t
Had the time to dry in the lukewarm sunlight.
For each shattered heart, waiting to be buried in
The wet concrete, hoping to mend its cracks
And fill its craters from too many punches to
The center of ourselves that should
Receive nothing more than love,
Will find its peace within the outside flooring
Where nothing is no longer temporary.
Sitting in a café in mexico
Listening to French songs on the radio
Drinking a pacifico and trying to remember how I got here

I think I caught the ship in San Francisco
After I caught the blues in Tennessee
And then I got kicked off down here in southern mexico
Yea, I think its finally coming back to me
And im
Sitting in a café in mexico
Listening to French songs on the radio
Drinking a pacifico and trying to remember how I got here

Well I watched Singyn ride the rail
so I jumped on that train
had close calls and broke some laws
never even felt the pain
ran all over town that night red paintbrushes in hand
I cant explain no more cuz I don’t think you’d understand

Well the ‘One Stop Mariachi Shop’
Is where we bought our leather vests
Tried our luck at bullfighting and lost but did our best
Found out roller skates don’t work when you’re on cobblestone
All out of pesos and I just want to go home
(c)2008 CJG
amt Dec 2012
My mother used to tell me of her dreams of being a figure skater. She made sure to start my brother and I early, so as soon as I could walk, I was on the ice. I wasn't bad... Nothing special, but potential was all I needed. I remember watching the big girls in their pretty, sparkly costumes jump and twist. I remember saying to myself "I wanna be like that." Sunday mornings flew by, each one becoming harder and harder, and soon I was offered a private instructor. At this point my mother had given me the choice to continue. Ten years old and well aware of my strengths and weeknesses, I quit. I wanted to go shopping on Sundays. I wanted to have play dates and eat ice cream. I didn't want to spend it in that freezing cold arena, working on something that I may or may not be good at. So I quit. Gave up.
Occasionally I miss it and go back to that arena. I put on the bright, white 'big girl' skates that I used to look forward to growing into. Doing laps around the rink, I try to recall what I'd once known... Crossover, jump, spin, turn. Not as grand as they used to be...
I see the little girls in the middle, they look about ten. They wear pretty little costumes and shiny white skates as they hop, spin, crossover, jump, effortlessly.
I wonder about where I'd be if I'd continued...
One of the girls falls out of her spin and lays there helplessly on the ice. She looks as if she's going to try again, but her face reads: I want to quit.
She sighs and stands up. I skate over and tap her on the shoulder.
"Don't give up. I promise, you'll regret it."
I hop off of the ice and compare what I could've been to what I am.
Harold r Hunt Sr Feb 2016
The Last Skate
Many years ago, I went roller skating all the time.
We all had fun each we went.
The boys would race each other.
Around and around we would go till the bell sounded.
What fun it was.
Today my grandchildren wanted me to go skating with them.
I have not was on skates for 40 years.
My grandson said you can do it grandpa.
So I put skates on for the first time in that many long years.
My grandson said here grand pa I'll hold your hand.
I made it to the first table then headed to the floor.
15 steps I took with .pride. But that was not it.
Down I went to the floor.right on my ****.
My grandson with tears in his eyes he said to me grandpa I think this is your last skate
Shiane Watkins Oct 2014
I feel numb as the blade skates across my skin,
I thank God my pain is gone again,
and when I'm done I hide away,
in my room is where I wish  to stay,
I'm trapped in this room of darkness once more,
and all I have to do is walk through that door,
I want to get the help I need,
so to my mother I shall plead,
mom please take these razors away'
for home is where I wish to stay.
  #me    #razor-blades   #cuts     #scars
If anyone reads this poem, please don't leave rude comments. I posted this to inform everyone about me and my past.
Francie Lynch Nov 2016
BeforeTV

Before TV,
When we were together,
Before growing apart
From father and mother,
We entertained ourselves with song;
All the sisters and brothers.

We gambolled in the backyard,
The clothes line was our zip line,
We fell soft, then hard.

We somehow got a hold of skates,
Not knowing what they're for,
So we took turns,
Laced them on,
To skate on cement floors.

We raised a high jump,
Skipped on the driveway,
Double Dutch and Speed;
We strung a line for volleyball,
Nailed a hoop below the roof,
Played soccer in the hall.
We paddled ping-pong on the table;
Our household freedom
Made us as grateful
As animals in a well-kept stable.

Some winters we'd flood the back,
And shoot and slide until the cracks
Turned to puddles,
Then I'd sail popsiclestick boats
Over oceans,
To distant folks.

On the frontwalk we tossed our stones,
Landing on the moon,
And hopscotch til we went for soup
And soda bread and **** milk.

If we had a ball and bat,
Chances are we'd not come back
'til the sun went down;
And then,
When the stars came out,
We'd *Hide and Seek,

Til the last one'd shout,  Home Free.
With dirt and patchwork dungarees,
We went in
For good-night tea.

Weren't we the normal family?

Then we got our first T.V.

After T.V.

We were landed,
Not gentry,
And we started channelling
U.S. T.V.

We weren't polite like Cartwrights,
Nor guaranteed Lil' Joe's birthright.

The sisters locked on Patty Duke,
Then dressed the same
To get the look,
So they ditched their Wellie boots.


We'd lie on the floor,
Stuck like glue,
On Sundays watch Ed's Big Shoe.
We didn't know the sun had left,
Our eyes were on the TV set.

The Cleaver boys still got dessert,
Though leaving green beans on their plate,
Left ice-cream and sweet chocolate cake.
We'd stare confused, yet salivate;
Such treats and food we'd never waste.

The Douglas boys had single beds,
En suites, bathrobes,
Hair on their heads;
Pillows and open windows,
And locks on doors,
They weren't co-ed.
We slept, at least, two to a bed,
Four to a room, two bedspreads.
We slept on mattresses with stinging springs,
Torn and traced with stale *****.
In the hot and humid summer,
In bathing suits
We'd swim in slumber.
Our small window couldn't open,
We roasted in our four walled oven.

We watched Lassie and Gomer Pyle,
Green Acres' Arnold had us beguiled.
We didn't get Father Knows Best,
His gentleness raised our regrets.
Lucy and Ricky, an odd couple,
Were always getting into trouble,
Like Fred and best bud, Barney Rubble.

Were these the models to emulate,
To blend in North of the United States?

These families had open conversations,
Shared their thoughts without hesitation.
Mine were full of consternation,
And alien, like My Favourite Martian.

We grew in a foreign land,
Beached like the cast on Gilligan.

Surely, we were Lost in Space,
Separate from the human race.
No gyroscope to set direction,
To separate fact from fiction.

We weren't stupid,
We were astute;
We weren't the ones on our TV.
We were a singular family.

Post T.V.

We numbered ten at the start,
Then aged and drifted far apart;
We can't gather to watch TV,
As we were once wont to be.
But I remember Ernest T.,
Throwing rocks to win Charlene,
And arrested by Sheriff Andy.
We laughed at all the silly doings
Of Barney, and Thelma Lou's wooings.

I send e-mails and textual banter,
(One brother still likes writing letters),
Reminding me of our early days,
How TV censured our innocent ways.

We never were small screen.
We emigrated to Canada from Ireland in 1957. A brave new world.

— The End —