Where is death today?
Busily hiding the bodies,
Or hunched beside a car loosening wheel bolts,
Placing a dark hand over a traffic light,
Squeezing the shotgun trigger,
Or strapped in a wheelchair
Disguised as a patient and wheeling rapidly around the hospital wards,
Removing the soap.

Or maybe cycling down the motorway
The large black cloak neatly bundled into the waistband
Right trouser leg tucked into a black sock
A bone poking out the toe
The Reaper strapped to the bicycle crossbar
Blade hanging to the rear  
But not obscuring the red reflector
Wearing Kevlar gloves when handling the scythe
And Vis a Vest neatly tied with a bow
At the very least a reflective armband.

Or possibly fixing a puncture on his way to my home...Bad form then
On arrival should I greet with “Come in, you look perished! ”
Discuss the weather as a distraction
I could offer new socks
Like every interview this might not go well.

Fanatics fixed their eyes upon
The screen to cheer their team
The mood there in the air was tense
Tricolor seemed out of steam

The clock was counting down
The time was drawing nigh
Doomed to lose and head on home
Bid Russia their goodbye

An errant shot deflected out
Gave them one last chance
To score a goal and prance about
Show off their famous dance

From the corner, the ball soared in
A hero rose above
Mina smacked it with his head
And won his country's love

England shocked to see the win
Snatched right from their grasp
Colombia delirious
Successful at last gasp

And thus the game was sent along
Into the overtime
Two periods were played to nil
Two teams full in their prime

Penalties would now decide
Which team would advance
The locals glued to their tvs
The nation in a trance

Falcao scores! Kane as well!
Cuadrado, Rashford too!
Muriel then strikes one home
Tricolor up three to two!

Ospina blocks the next one
Hypes up the frenzied crowd
But Uribe hits the crossbar
And the silence echoes loud

Trippier knots it up again
We're down to final shots
Bacca fails to get his through
Past Pickford's valiant swat

Fate rests upon this final kick
Well placed with perfect spin
Just past Ospina's outstreched hands
Dier seals the win

The cafeteros reel from shock
No sign of jubilation
But still the crowd, crushed in defeat
Show their appreciation

Colombia eliminated
We give them all a hand
And though their World Cup here is done
I'm now their biggest fan

The back pass comes to me,
I look up and see their goal,
And spot a great opportunity.

Their keeper is off the line,
Tired after 88 minutes,
But he can't read my mind.

I consider taking a shot,
Then my conscience says no,
And I know I should not.

But the urge is too strong,
And I imagine the fans,
Singing my name in their songs.

I roll the ball from me,
Look up and pray,
For my name to be carved into football history.

I strike the ball cleanly,
It sails in the air,
I hope that it drops neatly.

Time stands still,
Please please I wish,
Let it be God's will.

The ball begins to drop,
And I imagine my jersey,
Flying out of the club shop.

Their keeper realises what's happening,
He sees the effect on his career,
Could be s h a t t e r i n g.

He runs and runs,
I feel the rays of hope,
Sent from the sun.

I can feel this is my day,
But then the ball hits the crossbar,
And rolls on out of play.

It's not an even playing field, my heart,
It's my arena,
But you've had the home court advantage from the start  

It's not an even playing field, my heart,
You score every goal,
And I barely hit the crossbar  

It's not an even playing field, my heart,
Its defence was always strong,
But your tackling skills are a different art  

It's not an even playing field, my heart,
It let's you foul,
And gives me your red card  

It's not an even playing field, my heart,
And you knew all along,
Your tactics have always been smart

It's not an even playing field, my heart,
It's my arena,
But you've had the home court advantage from the start

His angular head
Hung in glory
For the things he carried
Were not his own.
The cross he carried
Was his father’s story.
He hung upon the
crossbar of deaths row.
“Mother may I, go on and die?
There is nothing left for me.
Nothing!” He bowed his head—
He died.

CHINGACHGOOK SPEAKS

still see the saw
cutting through time
the small boy's mind

Da's spirit level
disappearing all the time
becomes my Star Ship Enterprise

the saw hums to itself
time eclipsed
with the smell of pine

the song of the saw
sunbeams & sawdust
dancing in time

and lo
wood becomes window
the small carpentry of miracles

a heart-shaped block of wood
becomes my saddle
on his crossbar

we fly through time
tame hills
the tick of bicycle wheels

lost in speed
down down Dobbin's Hill
we the bubble in the spirit level

we haunt the dumps
hunt for a wheel here...a frame there
Da creates a bike

new bikes from old
our "Frankenstein bicycles"
we the new masters of speed

"Look at me...lookame...no hands!"
the hill smiles to itself
"wheeeEEEEEEOOOOOOOOPS!!!!!"

trees breaking gently in our hands
become our bows and arrows
stolen from young plantations

I a nine year old Chingachgook
limp horribly home
an arrow in my left calf

my Da shaving wood
it curls
to his whistle

sawdust amongst his curls
my Da smiles
as the wood comes good

I still see the saw
pine
opens memory

There was another brother whom history forgets
And though born a fisherman, he preferred other nets.
The coterie of rink rats who lived on the Left Coast
Thought he was sine qua non, and they would often boast
He’s better than his brother Joe,
Es-ki-mo Di-mag-gi-o.

His slapper had heat to make a goalie wet himself;
His wrister was money either five-hole or top-shelf.
After the goaltender felt another puck **** by,
He’d curse and bang the crossbar as fans took up the cry
He’s better than his brother Joe,
Es-ki-mo Di-mag-gi-o.

He dominated rinks out West like no other man
From Calgary to Saskatoon, Fresno to Spokane.
He’d hat tricks in Winnipeg, six-point games in Moose Jaw
Moving scribes to hackneyed verse written in fits of awe.
He’s better than his brother Joe,
Es-ki-mo Di-mag-gi-o.

Though the man was a fine skater, strong, agile and fleet
The slightest flaw in the ice caused anguish to his feet
And he would scold arena crews—What’d you call this mush?
‘Tis nothing but chips and ruts; I’d rather skate on slush!
(More prickly than his brother Joe,
Es-ki-mo Di-mag-gio.)

After one match in Oakland on ice unduly rough
He stormed into the locker room, shouting ‘Nuff’s enough!
He didn’t change his sweater as he stormed out the door,
Hopping on a trolley car, to be seen never more
(He’s a bit loony, don’t you know.
Es-ki-mo Di-mag-gi-o.)

He was sighted in the Yukon, once or perhaps twice
Engaged in some mad mission to find the perfect ice.
Neither man nor beast can say what became of this fool,
Though bits of skate lace appear in petrified bear stool
(Tastes better than his brother Joe?
Es-ki-mo Di-mag-gi-o.)

*** & RED BULL

Out of our skull
on *** & Red Bull

we play football
with a grinning

plastic skull
(retrieved from a skip)  

using the Momento Mori
for a drunken kickabout.

You dribble
& drool it.

You shoot
I save it

tipping it over
an imaginary crossbar.


Spectacular!

I bathe
in an imaginary roar.

I clutch
the skull

to my chest
begin to spout:

'Toby
(or not)  
Toby

... that is the jug! '

'Oi...! ' you shout
'Me Lord Hamlet

...over here
on de head! '

I dropp kick
the skull

(grinning still)  

in your general
direction.

I can see
two of you

& don't know who
to pass it too.

You rise
beautifully to

the occasion
losing a stiletto
in the process

your body arched
like a sublime salmon

jumping
upstream

you head the skull home
past my groping outstretched fingertips

'GOALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLGOALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL! '
you scream

your blouse
over your head

in exultant
celebration.

A 'Now then...now then' police man
confiscates our skull.

Tells us
to ****** off.


'Awwww Ref! '
we argue but

he ain't
having any of it.

Hanging on
to each other

you ululating.

We stagger
down the street

look back
to see

P.C. Plod

mis-kick the skull
through someone's sleeping

window
crashtinkletinkle.

We wonder if
he'll have to

arrest
himself.

We scarper
in case he tries

to blame it
on innocent us.

*** & RED BULL

Out of our skull
on *** & Red Bull

we play football
with a grinning

plastic skull
(retrieved from a skip)  

using the Momento Mori
for a drunken kickabout.

You dribble
& drool it.

You shoot
I save it

tipping it over
an imaginary crossbar.

Spectacular!

I bathe
in an imaginary roar.

I clutch
the skull

to my chest
begin to spout:

'Toby
(or not)  
Toby

... that is the jug! '

'Oi...! ' you shout
'Me Lord Hamlet

...over here
on de head! '

I drop kick
the skull

(grinning still)  

in your general
direction.

I can see
two of you

& don't know who
to pass it too.

You rise
beautifully to

the occasion
losing a stiletto
in the process

your body arched
like a sublime salmon

jumping
upstream

you head the skull home
past my groping outstretched fingertips

'GOALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLGOALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL! '
you scream

your blouse
over your head

in exultant
celebration.

A 'Now then...now then' police man
confiscates our skull.

Tells us
to ****** off.

'Awwww Ref! '
we argue but

he ain't
having any of it.

Hanging on
to each other

you ululating.

We stagger
down the street

look back
to see

P.C. Plod

mis-kick the skull
through someone's sleeping

window
crashtinkletinkle.

We wonder if
he'll have to

arrest
himself.

We scarper
in case he tries

to blame it
on innocent us.

I died in bed
On a cold December evening in 1977
Screaming hatred for my father
Muffled by a goose down pillow
Damp with hot tears
Seventeen spoiled years
Was there even a Christmas in '77?
I got the coffee table bible
My mother left for me
(She got one for my brother too)
The good old arcane King James Version
With concordances and maps
And incredibly realistic engravings of
The heroes and saints of Christian history
Abraham with his knife to Isaac's neck
Jacob's ladder, wrestling with God
David slings a stone, throws it at the giant
Through Saul God made David king
Jonah surfing the whales back.
Then there were all the portraits of Jesus
There had to be a hundred of them
I liked the one where he was walking on the water
And he bore the stripes with such dignity and integrity
The stations of the cross
The portrait that showed him lying down on the crossbar
As a brutal Roman warrior used a sledgehammer to drive nails through his tender hands and feet
He seemed so out of place between the two wicked sinners he was sandwiched in between
With their laughing and obscene mocking
I'm sure my mom hoped we would make ourselves part of that family
In some way or another
But I was listening to the Clash and the *** Pistols
I could have paid closer attention to what my father was going through
If I didn't have so much coming down on me
**** falling from on high burying me
In even more misery
The process caused me to distrust love
It caused me to write off joy as fleeting, difident emotion
I died in that bed
It could have been '75
But somehow hope had grown
In the midst of uncomfortable confusion
It could have been '76
Might as well hold out for the Bicentennial
Those were the days
I turned seventeen
And that number took on special meaning
17 in '77
Dad had a few nervous breakdowns
He put his fist through the wall
He insisted,"My nerves are shot my nerves are shot
$100 do this for me
You re the only she will listen to"
But I'll take the cash and the car keys
Why does it still feel like you were doing it to me
Off to O.K.C.
Have a little talk
About what I have no memory
But NEVER mentioning the hope
That you would come back
Despite daddy's tear-filled begging
Why?
I don't feel too guilty
It was all relative to how I'd been treated the year before
When I came home I was condemned
By a man who'd gotten out of the habit of saying "I love you"
So I felt justified
Screaming "I HATE YOU!!!"
Deep into my poor pillow

It would be easy to say I didn't truly hate him
In December of '77 I genuinely did
Almost 40 years down the road
I know it's the powers that I despised
It was circumstances dancing so clumsily
Caught up in the inevitable vortex that
Tears things apart with ease
But fumbles when trying to replace and rearrange what's left
Few there are who can survive
I wasn't one
I died in bed
Empty inside
Brain drained
Still as the motionless mattress
I'll never love again
Years will teach me the foolish blasphemy
Of cursing my father
And when they buried him in the ground
I sensed he knew
How to play the scape goat
It wasn't him I really hated
But he bore that burden until I figured it out
Long before they lowered him down
I knew my love for him was eternal
That he would carry it with him wherever he went
And if I didn't die in bed that day
A good part of me did
Of this I'm certain
I won't say "the best part"
I still have strengths
But I'm always wondering
The kind of man I would be
With one less bible in the house
And my mother playing Farkle with me

*** & RED BULL

Out of our skull
on *** & Red Bull

we play football
with a grinning

plastic skull
(retrieved from a skip)  

using the Memento mori
for a drunken kickabout.

You dribble
& drool it.

You shoot
I save it

tipping it over
an imaginary crossbar.

Spectacular!

I bathe
in an imaginary roar.

I clutch
the skull

to my chest
begin to spout:

'Toby
(or not)  
Toby

... that is the jug! '

'Oi...! ' you shout
'Me Lord Hamlet

...over here
on de head! '

I dropp kick
the skull

(grinning still)  

in your general
direction.

I can see
two of you

& don't know who
to pass it too.

You rise
beautifully to

the occasion

losing a stiletto
in the process

your body arched
like a sublime salmon

jumping
upstream

you head the skull home
past my groping outstretched fingertips

'GOALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLGOALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL! '
you scream

your blouse
over your head

in exultant
celebration.

A 'Now then...now then' police man
confiscates our skull.

Tells us
to ****** off.

'Awwww Ref! '
we argue but

he ain't
having any of it.

Hanging on
to each other

you ululating.

We stagger
down the street

look back
to see

P.C. Plod

miskick the skull
through someone's sleeping

window
crashtinkletinkle.

We wonder if
he'll have to

arrest
himself.

We scarper
in case he tries

to blame it
on innocent us.

CHINGACHGOOK SPEAKS

still see the saw
cutting through time
the small boy's mind

Da's spirit level
disappearing all the time
becomes my Star Ship Enterprise

the saw hums to itself
time eclipsed
with the smell of pine

the song of the saw
sunbeams & sawdust
dancing in time

and lo
wood becomes window
the small carpentry of miracles

a heart-shaped block of wood
becomes my saddle
on his crossbar

we fly through time
tame hills
the tick of bicycle wheels

lost in speed
down down Dobbin's Hill
we the bubble in the spirit level

we haunt the dumps
hunt for a wheel here...a frame there
Da creates a bike

new bikes from old
our "Frankenstein bicycles"
we the new masters of speed

"Look at me...lookame...no hands!"
the hill smiles to itself
"wheeeEEEEEEOOOOOOOOPS!!!!!"

trees breaking gently in our hands
become our bows and arrows
stolen from young plantations

I a nine year old Chingachgook
limp horribly home
an arrow in my left calf

my Da shaving wood
it curls
to his whistle

sawdust amongst his curls
my Da smiles
as the wood comes good

I still see the saw
pine
opens memory


*

I, the Last of the Donalls...lost in my  Curragh childhood...caught up in the writing of Mr. J.F. Cooper.

Never wanted to be Natty Bumppo but one day I would be Chingachgook or Uncas as I wandered through the Curragh plantation or roamed its 5000 acres in search of adventure! And oh the tales I told to myself!

CHINGACHGOOK SPEAKS

still see the saw
cutting through time
the small boy's mind

Da's spirit level
disappearing all the time
becomes my Star Ship Enterprise

the saw hums to itself
time eclipsed
with the smell of pine

the song of the saw
sunbeams & sawdust
dancing in time

and lo
wood becomes window
the small carpentry of miracles

a heart-shaped block of wood
becomes my saddle
on his crossbar

we fly through time
tame hills
the tick of bicycle wheels

lost in speed
down down Dobbin's Hill
we the bubble in the spirit level

we haunt the dumps
hunt for a wheel here...a frame there
Da creates a bike

new bikes from old
our "Frankenstein bicycles"
we the new masters of speed

"Look at me...lookame...no hands!"
the hill smiles to itself
"wheeeEEEEEEOOOOOOOOPS!!!!!"

trees breaking gently in our hands
become our bows and arrows
stolen from young plantations

I a nine year old Chingachgook
limp horribly home
an arrow in my left calf

my Da shaving wood
it curls
to his whistle

sawdust amongst his curls
my Da smiles
as the wood comes good

I still see the saw
pine
opens memory

POOR POOR JESUS

"Jesus!" she shouts
"Jesus Christ!"

She runs over to the crucifix
gives it a huge hug

cries with all of her
three years of self.

"Poor Jesus!" she sobs
"Poor poor Jesus!"

Christ cries
a single painted tear

unable
to comfort her.

*

This poem is simply about my little daughter's innocence and compassion.

All crucifixes made her cry for she could only see the physicality of his suffering and not the symbol. And as always, if it was a bird with a broken wing, a cat with a limping front paw, or a baby crying she would always want to comfort it. All she had was her hugs and tears and her own little scrap of humanity and she would use these gifts fiercely to fight what she saw as an injustice that anything should have to suffer.

She befriended sticks and stones as if they too were living beings. All she knew was that these things were in the world at the same time as she and so must be allowed their moment. And the only way to combat the brokenness of this world was to love it all the more.

I had shaped her a little saddle which clipped onto the crossbar of my bike( just like my Dad had done for me)and we would cycle out into the country to find trees to adore and cows to amaze at and birds to marvel to! My body would form a protective cage around her and she would scream to me "Be the wind!" and we would flash by the scenery like a streak of green and gold praising the very leaves on the trees and the sunlight that ran through them.

We had stopped at a wayside shrine that some man who was good with wood had fashioned from his own hands. She ran forward to it with outstretched arms and it looked too as if this painted Christ carved with all his suffering was also running towards her. "The sad man on the tree" as she called him. He suffered her to come to him and she embraced him with all of her self. He shed a single painted tear that hung upon his check as if at any moment it would splash and fall in yellow.

She gave him all of herself to help heal his sadness, imbuing him with her tiny belief.

There's a hotel in Adare
it's a Manor

White and green it what
they call a banner

High up on their poles
needs no crossbar just goals

When they toss they always
spit on the tanner.

do you see the pattern so soon
do you see how we leave one set
of rules only to find another

this may have happened here
so we rest a while regroup move
forward slowly

like the metal soldiers
found in the button box
yesterday

bent, broken yet i straighten their
legs

and play again

i am real glad that your bike came
that it is all together and you are zooming
well

i imagine up over hills through the woods
you describe wind chasing your hair

can i come?

on the crossbar if there is one
or the handlebars
we did that as kids

or as tiny in your pocket james

i still dream of one james
yesterday the lane was busy

so i just walk along
moving to the nettles
as they pass

spurred on with your comment
i made another ladder james

while my neighbour tidied her lavender
edging

quietly

CHINGACHGOOK SPEAKS

still see the saw
cutting through time
the small boy's mind

Da's spirit level
disappearing all the time
becomes my Star Ship Enterprise

the saw hums to itself
time eclipsed
with the smell of pine

the song of the saw
sunbeams & sawdust
dancing in time

and lo
wood becomes window
the small carpentry of miracles

a heart-shaped block of wood
becomes my saddle
on his crossbar

we fly through time
tame hills
the tick of bicycle wheels

lost in speed
down down Dobbin's Hill
we the bubble in the spirit level

we haunt the dumps
hunt for a wheel here...a frame there
Da creates a bike

new bikes from old
our "Frankenstein bicycles"
we the new masters of speed

"Look at me...lookame...no hands!"
the hill smiles to itself
"wheeeEEEEEEOOOOOOOOPS!!!!!"

trees breaking gently in our hands
become our bows and arrows
stolen from young plantations

I a nine year old Chingachgook
limp horribly home
an arrow in my left calf

my Da shaving wood
it curls
to his whistle

sawdust amongst his curls
my Da smiles
as the wood comes good

I still see the saw
pine
opens memory

*

We had to look upon a loved object( as a poetry prompt )and not mentioning it...free associate 15 words and write the poem from this list. THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS is and still is a fav. book of my childhood( I have still not finished growing up )and it bleeds into the memory of helping( little help that I was )my Da making a window...making a bike...making a fretwork Arkle...whatever he turned his hand to...whether it be a crop of potatoes or a cuddle...his hands were the hands of a God creating my childhood for me.

I never got around to reading THE WEPT OF WISH-TON-WISH but loved the sound of it....Dobbin's Hill( which I cycled down as a child and ran up as a soldier )became the Great Snake( what Chingachgook means )and I indeed made myself a Chingachgook. The rest is just memories held in haiku and bursting in time like bubbles.
From 30/30 prompt. . . I was reading THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS and helping my da with his work...whether it be wood or bikes from different bits.It was that eternal summer of childhood and I desired to be Chingachgook. Out of this tale of time lost...time found is woven the present poem. Here be the words that helped in some way went to the making of the poem. My da worked in wood...I work in words.

THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS

MAGUA

UNCAS

WAH-TA-WAH

THE WEPT OF WISH-TON-WISH

HATCHET

NATIVE AMERICAN

LEATHER BOUND BOOK

PROUST

TIMBER

WOODEN JIGSAW

FRETWORK

TOOLS OF TRADE

SUMMER

HAIR