"bunches" poems
The word, defining, muzzles; the drawn line
Ousts mistier peers and thrives, murderous,
In establishments which imagined lines
Can only haunt. Sturdy as potatoes,
Stones, without conscience, word and line endure,
Given an inch. Not that they're gross (although
Afterthought often would have them alter
To delicacy, to poise) but that they
Shortchange me continuously: whether
More or other, they still dissatisfy.
Unpoemed, unpictured, the potato
Bunches its knobby browns on a vastly
Superior page; the blunt stone also.
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A coy fish in a pond with nowhere to swim nor splash. The clear water allowed him to see in all four directions, though there was nothing to catch the eye but four concrete walls and bunches of lily pads.
A tiny spectator circled the grass surrounding the pond. She looked as though she were only 5 years old. A second later she was hastily ripping a lily pad from its roots. Upon discovering no magic beneath its belly, she dropped it and began on her way.
The lifeless plant rested at the ponds edge for weeks before the wind carried it back to its place. It was somehow different now, wrinkled and stretched at the stem, though it floated uniform among the rest. The coy hid in the shadows created by the walls, and watched.
Sep 4, 2014
Sep 4, 2014 at 4:36 PM UTC
FOR WHAT ARE WORDS WORTH
I wandered lonely
through a crowd
lost to myself now
that I'd lost you
gathering even your footsteps
peeling your shadow from my wall
remembering that lost last kiss
did it have to end like this
"...beside the lake, beneath the trees....
...when all at once I saw a...."
host of saffroned monks
their robes " ...fluttering and dancing
in the breeze..." and behind them
bunches and bunches of daffodils
outside a florist
chanting Hare Krishna
in all their yellow voices
delighting in their day
and for a second I
forgot my pain
dancing across a zebra crossing
with an old old woman and
a little
yapping dog.
Aug 6, 2018
Aug 6, 2018 at 3:28 PM UTC
As the warm days of summer give way to chill, and shadows grow longer as days shed their hours.
High winds and rain storms scrub the tired landscape down.
Colours are changing from rich green to gold, from yellow to red and orange to brown.
The grain has been gathered, wheat, barley and oats, cut and collected, sifted and sorted and put into store.
Grown by God, and by man with machine and by effort of hand.
Poppies and stalks now mark the spot, of the return for their labour. The wealth of the land.
Birds follow the tractor, rising and falling, swirling and soaring they move like a cloud.
The farmer is out and turning the stubble into the ground.
Rooks and crows, gulls and wood pigeons, starlings and magpies follow him round.
Hay long since mown is now bailed and in barns, or rolled up and bagged, ferments now in high silage towers.
The countryside has yielded reward for all Adam’s toil.
Work done in rhythm with the seasons, sowing, growing, reaping, ploughing and tilling the soil.
Gathering goodness, from garden, and greenhouse, carrots and courgettes, tomatoes in bunches.
Fresher than any you can get in the shops.
Picking the bounty gleaned from the hedgerow. Rosehips and cobnuts, damsons and hops.
Elder and sorrel, mushrooms and puffballs, sour green crab apples, and brambles in tangles.
Sloes that were missed by the late winter frost.
Not all are pleasant and some really can hurt you, pick only those that you know and trust.
Take full advantage of God’s generosity, share it with gladness, with thanks, there is plenty for all.
Sticky syrups and cider, wines, cordial and beer.
Pies, puddings, sorbets and ice creams, jam, jelly, and chutney and enough pickles to last into next year.
As the warm days of summer give way to chill, and shadows grow longer as days shed their hours.
High winds and rain storms scrub the tired landscape down.
Colours are changing from rich green to gold, from yellow to red and orange to brown.
Oct 23, 2011
Oct 23, 2011 at 3:16 PM UTC
Little Red Riding Hood walked through the woods
Singing and swinging her bag of baked goods
When out of the brush leapt a wolf with a smile
And some florist’s advice for the innocent child.
So off went the girl, picking bunches of daisies
While Wolf raced ahead with a step none too lazy.
Then at Grandmother’s door he knocked and said
“Let me in dear Grandmother, it’s your little Red."
So with grandmother’s blessing he let himself in
And ate up the oldest of little Red’s kin.
Then Little Red Riding Hood came through the door
With nary a clue of what was in store.
After noting her “grandmother’s” ears, nose, and teeth
Into Wolf’s gullet she went with a shriek.
As the transvestite wolf began snoring like thunder,
Along came a huntsman, who cut his belly asunder.
Out came Red Riding Hood, Grandmother too
While Wolf, so oblivious, kept sleeping right through.
With a few heavy stones, a needle and thread
Wolf, far too full, finally woke then dropped dead.
After a party of baked goods and wine,
The huntsman gave Red a great wolf pelt so fine.
“Thank you, dear huntsman,” said our little Red,
“But I’d rather skin wolves on my lonesome instead.
I know things now, of these beasts and their wiles
I’ll give them a lesson, with blood and with style.
Teach me to stalk, to chase and to shoot
The best huntress I’ll be - and the cutest, to boot."
The huntsman, he roared with his big booming laughter.
In a voice that rose straight up to the rafters:
“Why little girl, have you a taste for the hunt?
You’re better off sewing, though I hate to be blunt.”
But little Red pouted, and threatened to cry
So the huntsman gave in, with a shrug and a sigh.
The huntsman- he was a formidable teacher.
Now Red lives in fear of no living creature.
Today, when Red Riding Hood walks through the woods
She carries bags of new, furry goods.
And when out of the brush leaps a wolf with a smile,
She smiles right back: “You’ve picked the wrong child."
Jan 24, 2015
Jan 24, 2015 at 3:35 PM UTC
Saturday afternoon
cycling up a 1in 6 hill
then along the road
toward the farmhouse
you dismounted
and laid your bike
against the fence
and waited
to get your breath back
the farmhouse door opened
and Mrs Putt came out
and said
Jim and Pete are out I’m afraid
her daughter Monica
appeared by her side
they’ve gone out
with their older brother
Monica said
ok
you said
tell them I called
sure I will
Mrs Putt said
I can go on a bike ride
with you if you like
Monica said
Benedict won’t want to have you
to drag along with him
Mrs Putt said
Monica pulled a face
and pouted her lips
I don’t mind
you said
better than riding alone
well if you don’t mind
Mrs Putt said
mind you behave
yourself young lady
she said
and went indoors
and closed the door
just get my bike
Monica said
and went back behind
the farmhouse
you looked around
the farmhouse
and the surrounding fields
and trees and waited
after a few moments
she was back
riding her bike toward you
where we going?
she asked
lets go see the peacocks
along Sedge lane
you said
and so you got on your bike
and off you both rode
she beside you
in her summery dress
and sandals with her
brown hair tied
in bunches
you in jeans
and open neck
white shirt
the sun bright
and hot above you
the birds flying
and calling
the clouds puffy
and white
I’ve always wanted to go
bike riding with you
Monica said
but the boys don’t let me
but I am now
you nodded and smiled
wondering Jim and Pete
would say if they knew
she’d got to go
bike riding with you
she chatted on about Elvis
and the film in town
and how she’d like to go
but no one would take her
and how her brothers
teased her
and her mother
nagged her
after a while
you came to the peacocks
in a wire cage
by a large house
just off the lane
aren’t they beautiful?
she said
peering through the wire
her fingers holding on to
the cage
standing beside you
yes they are
you said
but of course
the **** bird
has the beauty
the hen
is just dull
and ordinary
odd that
she said
wonder why?
don’t know
you said
I’m not dull
and ordinary am I?
she asked
looking at you
sideways on
no
you said
you have
your own beauty
do I?
yes you do
and she blushed
and looked away
and the peacock
called out
and moved off
opening its colourfulness
and Monica did a twirl
making the patterns
move
on her twirling dress.
Apr 7, 2013
Apr 7, 2013 at 2:42 PM UTC
plants do not require papers that state from where they came
they are caught and pulled by the bite of birds,
seduced by the between-legs of bees,
seized on the legs of the wind and animals by thistles and burrs
and the blessed are pollinated by the hummingbird
I do not know where I came from (really?) (really.)
or where nature and nurture intertwine within me, precarious balance from discipline and my genes
I twist bunches of grass between my fingers, feeling the good in a strain
racked on top of white bones, pushing sheets of freckled skin
out, spreading cancerous aluminums under my arms because
an artificial flower smells better during *** than human sweat,
what a pity, we are unable to reveal with the bursts of Walt Whitman (!) in
our own organic mechanism's ability to produce salt. The ultimate flavor.
I grin. Inhaling deeply while alone and unwashed, Whitman would've been into it.
Maybe I can find someone into it too. Someone who'll read me Henry Miller.
But instead I'll wear expensive perfume. I grin, again. Sardonically.
And I've been told I have a beautiful smile.
I should,
that smile cost blood and five grand for something cosmetic and quirky,
train-tracks over teeth, I now stain yellow with obsolete cigarettes.
I wait in the tropical heat, languishing while I bake, a freckle factory
and tan--adrift--awash with memories recalled by the smell of green
and the fearful hum of bees.
Why did I start smoking again?
I look at the red hummingbird feeder, and wish I could trade
standing still as a hummingbird, I lie and say I cannot wait.
Jun 23, 2013
Jun 23, 2013 at 5:16 PM UTC
“I Love You Bunches and Bunches”
In 2007, on Christmas Day, my brother told me “I love you bunches and bunches” and sent me on my way.
He died three days later of mesothelioma/cancer of the lung.
He was not very old at all, only 53 years young.
I was standing in his doorway and turned to say “good-bye”, as I had done so many times in the past.
He said “Hey”, looked at me over his glasses, smiled and said “I love you bunches and bunches”
I never thought those words to me would be his last.
I told him “I love you bunches and bunches too” trying to hold back my tears.
All the while, I was trying to hurry out the door before he saw in my eyes all my fears.
Eight years later when mom followed my brother, those words too were the last ones we spoke to one another.
Two days before she passed, she told me she was ready and that she “just wanted it to be over.”
All I could do was look at her lovingly, nod my understanding and tell her that I love her.
Even though the child in me wanted to scream “No God, please do not take my mother!”
I knew she wanted to go, as she was never the same after the death of my brother.
They say burying a child is the hardest thing to bear.
After my brother passed away, something in my mom was just no longer there.
My sister and I hoped that our mom would snap out of it and come back.
We never understood what it was our brother had that somehow we lacked.
I have always thought that when I lost my brother, I also lost my mom the same day.
She just never had any more interest in me or my sister’s lives in quite the same way.
Life had no meaning for our mother no matter what we said or tried.
It was like that for eight more years until the day she died.
She is with my brother now in Heaven and I am glad she is no longer in pain.
I guess with him she is basking in sunlight but down here with us, it was always just rain.
“I love you bunches and bunches” was the last thing I told my mom as I blew her a kiss from the door.
She smiled at me and said, “I love you bunches and bunches” and would never to me say anything more.
Feb 13, 2016
Feb 13, 2016 at 8:08 PM UTC
She's wrapped herself on the wall
With her fragrant pink flowers
In bunches of disheveled disarray
And when the summer wind blows
It sends a gentle floral shower
Of blossoms and scents my way
At night, under the moon and stars
I inhale her. With her I love to be
And though I dally and play with words
There can never be a poem as she.
Apr 23, 2018
Apr 23, 2018 at 11:39 AM UTC
BOX cars run by a mile long.
And I wonder what they say to each other
When they stop a mile long on a sidetrack.
Maybe their chatter goes:
I came from Fargo with a load of wheat up to the danger line.
I came from Omaha with a load of shorthorns and they splintered my boards.
I came from Detroit heavy with a load of flivvers.
I carried apples from the Hood river last year and this year bunches of bananas from Florida; they look for me with watermelons from Mississippi next year.
Hammers and shovels of work gangs sleep in shop corners
when the dark stars come on the sky and the night watchmen walk and look.
Then the hammer heads talk to the handles,
then the scoops of the shovels talk,
how the day's work nicked and trimmed them,
how they swung and lifted all day,
how the hands of the work gangs smelled of hope.
In the night of the dark stars
when the curve of the sky is a work gang handle,
in the night on the mile long sidetracks,
in the night where the hammers and shovels sleep in corners,
the night watchmen stuff their pipes with dreams-
and sometimes they doze and don't care for nothin',
and sometimes they search their heads for meanings, stories, stars.
The stuff of it runs like this:
A long way we come; a long way to go; long rests and long deep sniffs for our lungs on the way.
Sleep is a belonging of all; even if all songs are old songs and the singing heart is snuffed out like a switchman's lantern with the oil gone, even if we forget our names and houses in the finish, the secret of sleep is left us, sleep belongs to all, sleep is the first and last and best of all.
People singing; people with song mouths connecting with song hearts; people who must sing or die; people whose song hearts break if there is no song mouth; these are my people.
3.6k
ebony colored skin and chocolate eyes
hair like spirals and coils dripping down
a face so sculpted it seemed crafted by the gods themselves
her hips spread and attached to a thin waist
and lipids gathered in thick bunches below them
she eyes her features in a mirror and grows in a sense of loss
an innaccurate feeling, but she gets it anyway
why?
when she was 5 years old she went to school
with her hair out of braids, curls voluted
she was ecstatic to share it with her friends
but, they just laughed and pointed
and her teacher scolded her
and tried to tame it down with vicious twists
when she was 11 years old she went to school excited
she was ecstatic to see the boy with ivory skin that she liked
but, he whispered about her
and a girl told her that he didnt like her
because she was too “black”
on her 17th birthday she gathered up all of her courage
and stood up for herself
when another girl with eggshell colored skin
told her that she was inferior
and belonged as a slave
and people told her to stop overreacting
and her teacher kicked her out for being violent
so she went home
let a stream of tears loose
and finally told herself that they were all right
she lost every shred of self worth
that’s why.
Jan 24, 2018
Jan 24, 2018 at 7:37 PM UTC
My stomach turned upside down
and inside and out
It felt like toxins
but in a good way
see I burnt away a layer of my skin
it was itching me
it was dry
it made me fell disgusting
I looked at myself and all I could see was this skin
looked like it was dipped in toxic
But a cure came around
it came in bunches
or a single pack
its sizes ranged from big to small
the cure surrounded me
it held me tight
it kept telling me to let the skin go
but I didn't know who I was with out it
But the cure showed me who I was with it
and as I let the toxic skin fall
I felt toxins in the air
it was clean
it was fresh
and I was unaware
this was what it was like
to be free
Mar 19, 2015
Mar 19, 2015 at 7:50 PM UTC
The silver
Birch trees flaunt
Their glitz as I
Stroll through
Deep pearl
And sand
Pebbles
Gorgeous green
Mansions swirl
Around and
Blackbirds pick
Seeds from
The posy bunches
And sparkled
Grass.
I pass a
Pink butterfly house
With large Daisy
Heads protruding from
The diamond fencing.
The next house, a rather
Pretentious 'Cordillera',
Sounds like a disease.
A farm gate shields
4 by 4s and I'm
Now passing the weird
House with the crocodile
And gorilla and
Coloured Cow
And dog statues.
Coming to the
End of the lane
Of silver I pass
'Lane end'
Cottage with its viney
Stature and freshly
Manicured front lawn.
High cube hedges forming
A pathway to the porch.
In The final
Mansion if
Nosy passers
Have a peek you
Can see a
Swimming pool,
Fluffy Towels draped over
The Silver pool chairs.
Flitting to
The end of the
Dappled birches,
Approaches
A wide country green
Covered in bunting
Bathed in buttercups.
May 24, 2014
May 24, 2014 at 11:54 AM UTC
In early, or late spring
the daffodils appear, to enchant us
stems are firm, while
holding clusters of bloom.
they enhance our views...our spirits,
arraying our horizons, with fresh hope
fresh perspectives
never giving space to doom.
daffodils
are offered, not singly,
but in bunches,
just like the way a mother gives herself,
never just a piece,
she reaches out with her hand
when in fact, she has offered her whole body
always...with open arms.
Most times, she wears lively colors
of white, yellow, gold, and green,
whatever the season,
whatever circumstances she may face
her smile, her warmth,
are the most colorful parts of her being
There is a lilt in her eyes,
in her actions...in her songs...in her words
in her dance...as she does her chores
such a miracle, all these graces, she offers
On a sunny and windy day
a mother is like
those dancing daffodils
on the hills and wayside
staying strong enough, while
swaying...to the winds of life
not to fall down...or be blown away,
she may be silenced by frustration and worries
but never surrenders to ensuing hardships
just choosing to be quiet...seeming dormant.
She is both a bulb...and an all-season root crop,
stuffed with needed energy
quiet underneath when the cold season comes
but never dead...never fallen
always gathering, saving strength,
for when a storm in life comes
not one to mope...but one to ease
...like a healing balm.
A mother is a rare kind of a daffodil
one that gleams with bright lights, and bold colors
all year round...through all kinds of weather.
Sally
Copyright May 8, 2016
Rosalia Rosario A. Bayan
May 7, 2016
May 7, 2016 at 8:27 PM UTC
No clouds at all, winter, spring, summer or fall,
Tells the weather watcher no change at all,
Cirrus my friend with a fair weather bent,
Your swirls, streaks and curls, so very high,
when there are just a few of you, goodness is nigh,
but when you gaggle in bunches and take and
curl your lip to show your ornery sides and swirl in the cold,
I am told through the white and cold grey, BLIZZARD!
get in doors or receive a frosty reception.
Aug 19, 2013
Aug 19, 2013 at 10:47 PM UTC
This is the machine.
Tucked under necklaces, poppies and daffodils
calligraphic fingertip Xs
hurry across pockets.
Thursday morning job postings
markers on construction paper windows
exhausted by making parts.
Keep weddings in thunderstorms
to hide the sound of windmills in chests,
bittersweet directions to ticking clockwork.
Carbonated water can’t convince summer to stay,
musical breaths and tulip footsteps
remind me of the gears in my knees.
Always buy wallets used
daylily bank notes folded into stairwells,
the heels of my socks.
Blue collars in ochre wheelbarrows
soaking next to the white ones.
We are quiet machines.
With cogs in our wrists
battery powered bone and sinew.
Baby’s breath white in our hair,
tiny bunches piled into collar bones or concave stomachs.
You have stars in your hair
whispering in manufactured voices
to pull out your eyelashes.
Consumed by the concept of concepts
on ravine park benches,
marred with newspaper labyrinths
smelling of rolled up sleeves.
Hand held gummy bears
prompt me to check my fluid levels,
bubbly orchids in my left palm.
Sugar intakes and patterned pants
hide homemade pulses.
This is the machine.
Jun 1, 2013
Jun 1, 2013 at 12:14 PM UTC
bottlerocket,
ski click &
shoot.
[empress impressed.]
petrol souls drift the skin & aetherous
of our holy mother lake midday.
by alpine,
lymph node,
spine of glimmering fish;
i never truly thought that love could destroy.
[to display the paradise boon and boom salute.]
her knife atop the stump.
*
yon machines construct art-form of reservoir (yon being short for yonder),
knee-boarder-boy wake to wake, he wags his tail when he dreams.
[lakeside.]
tribal the beach: a family drunk on juiceboxes.
rolling rocks. tall boys
& boulders/ bountiful canyon kids
with their beautiful gasping dogs.
****** knee **** and gallop at the foot of a mountain/mound &
sugar ants stomped, longing to empire.
mom bunches her fists into sand
of stolen crag, listening closely for her childhood in the whistle
of a casio conch.
margaritaville will do.
[to **** or kiss beetles.]
kiss;
the bitty prince.
maintain a steady alliance with all lifeforms and flora.
life is programmed as thus;
algorithm of love.
bright honeydew soaked slabs of wood,
or plank, tabletop treatise.
wet pile of seeds.
young small birds hoard seeds for winter;
teeter into spring;
& upon summer find solace in swift slip-n-slide daylights.
Sep 27, 2015
Sep 27, 2015 at 7:35 AM UTC
My name is bill, no capitalization, required,
the Writer will be ill, soon, once he gets me,
or my friends in the mail, my cousin e bill.
Won’t be far behind, a marvel of technology!
I am famed and legendary, but be wary,
we attack in groups and bunches and
don’t rely on hunches that you settled with us.
We don’t make a fuss or a muss, we will cut
off your cable, and internet, see?
Hydro and Natural Gas you can ill afford
to miss, we do pay dates, instead of play dates.
So if you don’t pay up we are through
with you, hope you can find your self in
the dark, call us and we will talk until your
cell phone loses power or they drop your
call from their towering collection.
So with affection,
from us named bill,
make a plan and a will,
to pay us on time, after
all it is your dime, until it
is ours, all ours.
You can take that to the bank,
but we will do it for you too!
Save you the trip...
signed the
bills
P.S.(we were going to list a few,
but we don’t name names, we
just collect Presidents and Prime Ministers,
they may be dead or royalty, but they are
acceptable to faceless nameless ones,called
bill(s), Thanks!)
©DWE042013
Apr 23, 2013
Apr 23, 2013 at 10:41 PM UTC
Eskimos have a Gazillion
words for snow. We have
teraflop words for coffee.
Wikipedia it!
But don't get distracted
by the Tales.
Recounted stories of empires
held together by zeitgeist brand,
a belief, a set of ritual,
buying in bulk, a role of thumb,
opposable heuristics.
They've clustered history
in bunches like expanding
matter, as if it matters
who was king or Augustus.
Empires & civilization
held colloidal by the quirks
of geology and brand
feeding food-forward
with ritualistic sacrifice
in Megazillion iterations.
From Fertile crescent to Nile
Valley silicon, when we bind
ourselves to brand,
and move in belief,
secure in synchronized stability,
then comes the rubric cubes
miraculously built high
upon slave backs, holding
pyramidal server tombs.
Jul 24, 2013
Jul 24, 2013 at 9:14 PM UTC
Baby,
you are the nerd to my candy box
The Captain Crunch
to my honey bunches of oats
You are the Hawkeye
To my black widow
The chocolate
to my Vanilla
Together
we make the perfect swirly
Hehe
Arent we just
Cornier Then Kanas in August?
Jun 17, 2014
Jun 17, 2014 at 9:33 AM UTC
In a tiny allotment right next to the zoo
A miniature jungle was planted and grew
The flora was dense and the air became hot
But confined to a tidy rectangular plot
An unthinkable duo of creatures converged
And it's said that a spanking new species emerged
For a curious beast was reportedly seen
Roaming and munching on anything green
Make haste! Away! It's the Buffagorilla!
A shredder of lettuce and cereal killer
With hooves at the front and hands at the rear
The Buffagorilla is near!
It shambles about at the darkest of hours
On hedges it crunches and bunches of flowers
On daffolil bulbs and petunia petals
With hearty aplomb on a cluster of nettles
Covertly perusing with maximum hush
It can wander through gardens disguised as a bush
No carrot or parsnip is safe in its bed
And the marrows are quaking in vegetable dread
Depart! Retreat! It's the Buffagorilla!
The broccoli butcher and vegetable killer
With ape like features and horns of a steer
The Buffagorilla is near!
So if you hear a mention of butternut theft
Or notice a garden, all bare and bereft
Insure your potatoes for damage and loss
Give the salad a purely precautionary toss
For a creature is roaming the byway and track
With its legs at the front and its arms at the back
And it might be your gooseberries or chervil he spies
So I beg you take heed as I once more advise
Be gone! Take flight! It's the Buffagorilla!
The strawberry napper and cucumber killer
Just hide in your cellar and steer well clear
The Buffagorilla is near!
Nov 20, 2013
Nov 20, 2013 at 7:07 PM UTC
Oh Joy, Oh Great Heavens Above,
How I like to lingeringly slaver o'er
The fartleberries hanging humunguously
Out of your **** cleft like bunches of mouldering grapes,
And to gaze upon the lusciously stale shitstains
Decorating your hirsute **********
You so rarely wash and your dumps are omnipotent
And you are too mean to buy any **** wipes.
You moan quite loudly in colonic ecstacy
As I plumb the Stygian depths of your sit-upon place,
My nose diving daintily like a woodpecker's beak
Smeared with poo-bits, seeking Nirvana
In your ****** paradise, brown love-tunnel
Serenaded by the poets since Time began!
Nowhere in all the Hershey Universe can there be
A pongier rimmee than you, O unshaven beauty of mine!
My probing tongue is covered with nutty brown paste,
Your sweet excremental delight makes me drool
In joy, as I personhandle myself "down there";
Ignoring the most elemental rules of hygiene.
But sadly there is a fly in the ointment
Indeed a whole ******* barrelful of them:
Not only will I get a very nasty E-coli infection
But I'll have bad breath tomorrow at chapel.
Mar 11, 2015
Mar 11, 2015 at 1:45 PM UTC
our fruiterer is a riddling prankster
who jumps up from every corner
and tray and stacks, with any old silly riddle
(1)
“Looking at apples, eh?”
he approaches Sandy
*“What did the apple say to the bug?
Oh – stop bugging me!”*
And he laughs at his own humor
(or lack of it)
while severe Sandy rotates
an apple in her left palm
and he ventures to the next vulnerable customer,
who is me
“How, my dear man,” he proceeds to ask
“do you fix a broken tomato?”
I shake my head, bewildered
and he unpacks his own riddle:
“Tomato paste!”
And he roars with laughter
his chilli-sharp eyes pointed
at his next customer
(2)
And off he goes with his riddles –
with his booming voice, no pause
and wrapping his answers in cracking laughs
He jumps to an old man
and he says:
*“Why, do tell me, do bananas
never feel lonely?”*
“Cos they always come in bunches”
And the young couple he regales with:
*“Why did the tomato go out with the prune?
Oh, come on…simply cos he couldn’t find a date!”*
And to an old woman he says
in near-Oedipus style:
*“What did the Dad Tomato tell his Kid Tomato?
Ketchup!”*
And as in a light musical
he turns about and whoever he finds
he unleashes his final:
*“How do you fix a cracked pumpkin?
Easy peasy – you use a pumpkin patch!”*
Ah, our fruiterer is a riddling prankster
who jumps up from every corner
and tray and stacks, with any old silly riddle
Jul 11, 2013
Jul 11, 2013 at 7:44 AM UTC
as the bus pulls along the lazy river on Main,
a slouching mind and pressed cheek is a swimmer,
dipping toes
and meanwhile
the gentle murmur of pool-goers living inaudibly,
like hunched bunches
in shawls of shade
(interrupted only
by the occasional l-urch)
nodding, nodding
off and on and off and
into the water,
the swimmer slips in
...
Here, it is heaven on earth
an oasis
...
and the mind swims ever so far
ever so deep
...
i wonder...
...
and outside
a boy, barefoot
runs upstream
a shimmering second
an apparition of summer?
and out of sight
Aug 13, 2018
Aug 13, 2018 at 10:45 PM UTC
I ASKED the Mayor of Gary about the 12-hour day and the 7-day week.
And the Mayor of Gary answered more workmen steal time on the job in Gary than any other place in the United States.
"Go into the plants and you will see men sitting around doing nothing-machinery does everything," said the Mayor of Gary when I asked him about the 12-hour day and the 7-day week.
And he wore cool cream pants, the Mayor of Gary, and white shoes, and a barber had fixed him up with a shampoo and a shave and he was easy and imperturbable though the government weather bureau thermometer said 96 and children were soaking their heads at bubbling fountains on the street corners.
And I said good-by to the Mayor of Gary and I went out from the city hall and turned the corner into Broadway.
And I saw workmen wearing leather shoes scruffed with fire and cinders, and pitted with little holes from running molten steel,
And some had bunches of specialized muscles around their shoulder blades hard as pig iron, muscles of their fore-arms were sheet steel and they looked to me like men who had been somewhere.Gary, Indiana, 1915.
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