"illinois" poems
I'm a simple man
A country boy north of the Mason Dixon
I don't look for much
There's only the little things I that I yearn
Like the love of a good woman and a smooth whiskey
Maybe a reliable old truck and some folks that would miss me
I'm comfortable anywhere I go
From the corn fields of Illinois, to the mountains of Tennessee
I travel light, some blue jeans and some shirts
Perhaps with a few bucks for a little fun
I listen to some old country every day
Like No Show, Hank and Mr. Conway
I'm cut from old school cloth
Just like my folks before me
Yeah, I'm not fancy
I just am who I am
A lover and a fighter
A son, brother, uncle, and lover
Oct 30, 2014
Oct 30, 2014 at 8:43 PM UTC
One perfect autumn day,
you stood under maples
in Northern Illinois, and there
was this kind of yellowness.
With compassion and technology,
you captured the light,
gave us an image,
gave us peace.
Aug 17, 2015
Aug 17, 2015 at 7:18 PM UTC
BURY this old Illinois farmer with respect.
He slept the Illinois nights of his life after days of work in Illinois cornfields.
Now he goes on a long sleep.
The wind he listened to in the cornsilk and the tassels, the wind that combed his red beard zero mornings when the snow lay white on the yellow ears in the bushel basket at the corncrib,
The same wind will now blow over the place here where his hands must dream of Illinois corn.
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The invitation had arrived and I was over the moon
It is really quite a mouthful, and it is coming soon
The Second International Gender Non-Specific
Inter-Denominational, from Atlantic to Pacific
Freshwater Synchronized Swimming Competition
It's been eight years since the first was won by China
It was held in Illinois in a place known as Medinah
Turns out the swimmers used were just not what they seemed
The chinese had a total of nine atheists on their team
So, the time has come to try again and bring it to fruition
The I.G.N.I.D Freshwater Synchronized Swimming Competition
No date has been decided yet, due to issues with each church
So, even though the invitations out, we're still left in the lurch
Saturday is out because the Jews are all at temple
Sunday, the Christians all must set a good example
Friday, cuts the muslims out for they are at Mosque praying
So we've four days to hold this meet, is what I am now saying
The Chinese team is back again, but the Atheists are out
The team's made up of Christians and two Jews who are devout
Their working on a movement that involves making a cross
The Christian swimmers get it but the Jews don't give a toss
The team from Israel's withdrawn because they are all sitting Shivah
They had a coach drown last week, he hit his head while in the River
The Arabs won't be back, you see they're not interested in the least
They get confused while under water and don't know which way is east
The I.G.N.I.D Freshwater Synchronized Swimming Competition
Will take place in the New Year, we just need to get permission
The Jews won't swim with Muslims, and the Sikhs are up in arms
Because swimming with their daggers may cause other swimmers harm
But, we've got a great location at the lake up at the park
We can use it when we want to , but it must be after dark
Remember keep an eye out for a poster where you pray
We don't know just when we'll hold it, it may just be today
This is your invitation and the event is coming soon
It is really quite a mouthful, and it'll be held beneath the moon
The Second International Gender Non-Specific
Inter-Denominational, from Atlantic to Pacific
Freshwater Synchronized Swimming Competition
See you there...
Sep 20, 2012
Sep 20, 2012 at 4:46 PM UTC
It's Wednesday, April 2, 1997, at 12:00 PM
I took a Greyhound bus to Des Moines, Iowa
It was a six-hour profanity demon hellride
At 6:00 PM, the Greyhound bus arrived at the Des Moines bus station
Two of my music fans picked me up and drove me to Fort Dodge, Iowa
Hell Greyhound bus ride
Hell Greyhound bus ride
Hell Greyhound bus ride
Hell Greyhound bus ride
At 2:00 PM on Friday, April 4, 1997, I went on a radio show joyride
I whipped out my Technics KN3000 keyboard and sung four rock songs on 88.1 KICB
At 6:30 PM, I rode with my friends to Knights of Columbus for sound checking
At 9:30 PM, I got up on stage and sung twenty rock songs in front of 200 rock fans
Hell Greyhound bus ride
Hell Greyhound bus ride
Hell Greyhound bus ride
Hell Greyhound bus ride
At 11:20 AM on Saturday, April 5, 1997, I caught the Greyhound bus to Chicago, Illinois
The Greyhound bus left Des Moines, Iowa at 11:30 AM
It was an eight-hour profanity demon hellride without music
At 7:30 PM, the Greyhound bus arrived at the Chicago bus station
I then got off the intercity bus and yelled like a stupid fool
Hell Greyhound bus ride
Hell Greyhound bus ride
Hell Greyhound bus ride
Hell Greyhound bus ride
Kinkos, it's the new way to office
Jan 23, 2014
Jan 23, 2014 at 10:27 PM UTC
What does a black kid who wants to rap write about well if he's from the suburbs he'll probably leave the pages white like the folks that where out.
Since there is no poverty, gangs, or death to report on. I guess he'll sit in his two parent household and be put down cause that's his home, and try to figure out that why in order to be black does he have go through struggle, live on 64th and Sangamon Chicago that's just asking for trouble.
Why aren't happiness and good times associated with the black culture, instead we like it when we're known for stealing, killing and getting over. I guess it's why light skinned people want to claim different races, why dark skinned woman aren't beautiful because we don't like the color of there faces.
I guess that's why Mike wanted to be white, why every black man woman and child believe that they have to fight, but naw not injustice and poverty, one another the same person you grew up calling your brother.
But what does it matter cause you don't hear my words. I'm just another black man from Richton Park Illinois so I remain unheard.
Dec 19, 2013
Dec 19, 2013 at 6:13 PM UTC
has anyone ever heard of a historical place
it is in Alton Illinois
and been known as a scary place
it was built in the 18 hundreds
back in the Civil War days
back when there was slavery
which is now a disgrace to the human race
there's been some odd things happen
that I cannot explain
lights flashing on and off
And stereos that does the same
back where that I am sleeping
there is a slave that enters
but he is very harmless
oh what a weird adventure
I've tried and tried to communicate
but nothing has been said
but I feel a presence very close
next to my sleeping bed
Mitchell mansion I've been told
that there are many spirits
ready to unfold
many people believe in spirits
and so many that denies
but I am a firm believer
because I seen it with my very eyes
Mitchell Mansion has its secrets
that many will never know
but tell me friend would you come here
to spend a night alone
May 31, 2015
May 31, 2015 at 4:16 PM UTC
the folded man
sat creasing the edges of his wallet sized heart
and stared off into the romantic night
full of lovers embracing
and others who silently wished for a hand to hold
he waited for her soft footsteps
but she just sat in her bedroom mirror brushing her hair
thinking of some boy from long ago
sundown was just that kind of girl
trade your temptations today for the empty promise of yesterday
she will stay here another season
maybe he will pass this way
maybe the storm clouds gathering will go away
the harlots all dance with unacquainted tenderness
not all embraces are done with joy
call it a sundown's choice cause its a bad one
and the gambler brushes dust off his neat appearances
each detail of his solitude lie must be cared for
lest it crumble and expose hes just a green kid
from illinois
we all put the best face we can
some just take it too far
she went to the picture show
and looked for familiar faces in the crowded hall
but the folded man had already slipped away
with one of the harlots
who will make a pretty bride someday
everybody gets a second chance
they just may not want it once they get it
she brushed the ashes from her clothes
they fell like thin snowfall on spring day
a last taste of winters hand
out of the burnt shell of the dancehall at dawn we came
the thick smoke splayed out on the thin wind
wound its way past catching the dust and
making the sunlight a dull brown
she looked at me with tears for eyes
asked me to take her from this place
everybody gets a second chance
they just may not want it once they get it
Jun 1, 2014
Jun 1, 2014 at 3:44 PM UTC
(Bergen)SEVEN days all fog, all mist, and the turbines pounding through high seas.
I was a plaything, a rat's neck in the teeth of a scuffling mastiff.
Fog and fog and no stars, sun, moon.
Then an afternoon in fjords, low-lying lands scrawled in granite languages on a gray sky,
A night harbor, blue dusk mountain shoulders against a night sky,
And a circle of lights blinking: Ninety thousand people here.
Among the Wednesday night thousands in goloshes and coats slickered for rain,
I learned how hungry I was for streets and people.
I would rather be water than anything else.
I saw a drive of salt fog and mist in the North Atlantic and an iceberg dusky as a cloud in the gray of morning.
And I saw the dream pools of fjords in Norway ... and the scarf of dancing water on the rocks and over the edges of mountain shelves.
Bury me in a mountain graveyard in Norway.
Three tongues of water sing around it with snow from the mountains.
Bury me in the North Atlantic.
A fog there from Iceland will be a murmur in gray over me and a long deep wind sob always.
Bury me in an Illinois cornfield.
The blizzards loosen their pipe ***** voluntaries in winter stubble and the spring rains and the fall rains bring letters from the sea.
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Hope is the morning sun
Peering in through my kitchen window
As I sip fresh steaming coffee alone.
Hope is the last workday before
My next day off, when I’m happy
For once, to wish away the hours.
Hope is awkward like a high school dance,
Like two virgins kissing
Beneath the gymnasium bleachers.
Hope is a grocery list fastened
To my refrigerator with a free magnet
Advertising a divorce lawyer.
Hope is a cracked wine glass, packed away
In a moving box that traveled from Kentucky to Illinois –
Just another casualty of the long journey.
Jul 1, 2015
Jul 1, 2015 at 11:24 PM UTC
The Chicago Tribune called it,
“The Affair of the Decade!”
Everyone’s mothers called it,
“Another tragic heartbreak”.
When the coroner wiped his hands,
He predicted a sensation,
And so did every uniformed man
Sitting in the po-lice station.
In a cold Illinois motel,
A man in a suit smiles.
He was twenty years in,
A detective for the city.
Oh, that smile he’ll smile,
But gone is his laughter,
Along with his pity,
For tonight, tonight,
He would shoot up the city.
Regina combed her blonde hair,
And took the lift down to the lobby.
The pale-skinned princess,
That woman’s body…
How many fell for her
Remains quite a mystery.
We watch,
Ladies and gentlemen,
We watch,
As her dress moves in the breeze.
Like a dandelion in the dark,
She rides the carriage
Into the park.
The detective stood alone,
A cut-out cornerstone.
He was no longer nervous,
He looked like a statue,
And the virgin-white snow
Fell quietly to his shoes.
In the moonlight, she came.
He spoke her name.
In the moonlight, she walked.
But when he spoke, she stopped.
“Regina, Regina,
Please reconsider.
Without you,
The nighttime is darker,
The cold air much thinner.
Without you,
The wind becomes sour,
The daylight so bitter.
Regina, Regina,
It’s just a few days…
Say yes,
And in the morning,
We’ll be far from this place!”
But that Regina, Regina,
She let him down easy:
“Your job is to spy,
To live in the quiet.
You’re a prowler,
You were born to sneak,
And I will proceed,
But do not follow me.”
And we watch,
Ladies and gentlemen,
We watch,
As she turns on a dime,
Leaving our detective behind.
A poor, tortured soul,
He smiles that smile,
And in an act of desperation,
Pulls out his frosted .45.
For Regina,
He aimed, and
For Regina,
He fired.
In the heart of Chicago,
Be it snowfall or in heat,
No one can be spared
When a man is in defeat.
T’will be the foggy air,
The hot metal, and
The echo of the gun
That will help us remember
The night that we watched,
Ladies and gentlemen,
We watched…
We watched...
The snow, and how
It lost its innocence that night.
And poor Regina, and how
Her yellow dress blended into the sight.
The detective, and how
He would step into the street,
Killing everyone he’d meet.
Twenty men dead,
Now the asphalt is sticky,
And the blood spilled is gritty-
For tonight, tonight,
The detective shot up the city.
The coroner wiped his hands,
And predicted a sensation,
And so did every uniformed man
Sitting in the po-lice station.
Oct 18, 2012
Oct 18, 2012 at 5:11 PM UTC
It ain’t too bad to be from there
Just ask my family and friends
But it’s too flat, ain’t no way out
The roads are all dead ends.
Sometime soon I’ll find a place
Where the music I’ll enjoy
But for now I keep on tryin’
To escape from Illinois!
There’s a river on the border west
That moves a lot of dirt
Mighty Muddy Mississipp
Drowns the pain and covers hurt
Yeah, I’m movin’ south to New Orleans
Maybe I can find employ
In a blues bar down on Bourbon Street
Escape from Illinois!
Well I stopped a week along the way
When I saw the Gateway Arch.
But the folks out by the airport
Were stagin’ up a march.
Seems a white cop fired a shot that killed
An unarmed teenage boy
Oh yeah, the teenage boy was black,
Escape from Illinois.
Kept walkin’ to the Landing
(Named for Pierre Laclede)
It has most every thing you want
But nothing that you need
Some travelin’ folk told me some news
That made me jump for joy
Memphis maybe had some work
Escape from Illinois!
Found the haunted house called Graceland
And the grave where Elvis lay
Where half a million go each year
(Fifteen thousand every day)
They all want to pay respects
To the rockin’ – rollin’ boy
Put their finger in the bullet holes
Escape from Illinois.
Went downtown, knocked on some doors
Once or twice I went inside
But Beale Street was broken
The travelin’ folks had lied.
‘Cuz there ain’t no jobs in Memphis,
Or maybe I’m too coy
So I hitched a ride to Nashville
Escape from Illinois.
Nashville’s a big old meltin’ ***
Lots of great ones started here
But most end up as tourists
Getting’ ****** and drinkin’ beer
So money’s at a premium
And fame’s a fake decoy
End up workin’ in a record store
Escape from Illinois?
From Asheville to Atlanta
From Austin to LA
From Biloxi back to Baton Rouge
Need a place where I can play
I’ll follow all the buskers,
Form a musical convoy
Livin’ day by day and town by town
Escape from Illinois!
I’m a minstrel, like a rubber band
I keep on snappin’ back
I’m gonna make it somewhere
Singing somewhere, that’s a fact
Got my guitar and my music
Gotta do what I enjoy
Find a place to sing my songs for you,
Hell, it may be Illinois!
Phil Lindsey 6/4/15
Jun 4, 2015
Jun 4, 2015 at 1:46 PM UTC
(Chirstmas Day, 1917)THE FIVE O'CLOCK prairie sunset is a strong man going to sleep after a long day in a cornfield.
The red dust of a rusty crimson is fixed with two fingers of lavender. A hook of smoke, a woman's nose in charcoal and ... nothing.
The timberline turns in a cover of purple. A grain elevator humps a shoulder. One steel star whisks out a pointed fire. Moonlight comes on the stubble.
"Jesus in an Illinois barn early this morning, the baby Jesus ... in flannels ..."
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The Isle of Print
What a place it can take you anyplace you can meet anyone I met Sandra Locke when she wrote about
Her relationship then her break up with Clint she told about as a child how she sold pop bottles at a
General store that was one that took me back but even more exciting was where she was at a place
Called Shelbyville Tennessee I know it firsthand one reason it is seventy miles from Nashville and is the
Tennessee walking horse capital and all so my wife was born and raised there until she was six we would
Take trips there quiet often until two trips we carried her parents to the family cemetery on horse
Mountain we have my wife’s brother fighting Leukemia he said thats where he wants to be buried but for
Now God’s mercy is preventing that I met a guy and I’m sure you have met him many times also his
Name is Samuel Clemens he got a little more famous name when he had one of his many jobs as a Mississippi
River boat captain they called him just like when they measured the rivers depth mark twain he was a
News paper editor in Calaveras County he brought a simple frog leaping contest national notoriety for
Ever after known as the Calaveras bull frog jumping contest I bought three acres for retirement
Unfortunately I made like a bull frog and jumped off the property I drove a truck several times into
Hannibal Missouri you got a quick leap in your heart and head as you thought about the great river
Running by and all of the characters Twain created two losses are recorded there of course twain met
A fiery personage that was even greater than him a space traveler with a glory all together wondrous went by
The name of Haley the other less known but my heart slows when I think of her eight years old blond
Blue eyed her father’s and mother’s pride and joy he was a pastor in northern Illinois she lays in her
Sacred rest in Hannibal until that great waking up day as time goes on I get less and less patient if it
Weren’t for so many precious ones in danger I would be tempted to pray come Lord Jesus. Well not done
By any means just going to stop for now plan on going and doing some hard thinking
Jan 9, 2012
Jan 9, 2012 at 6:27 PM UTC
Music
Running out of time, nothing left to rhyme,
no longer in my prime, listening to Sublime.
Used to smoke **** slaves I have freed,
red I still bleed, listening to Creed.
I'm all that, I have kicked my cat,
my girl is a brat, listening to Ratt.
Invented a love potion, makes girls frozen,
many things I've broken, listening to Poison.
Buried in the sand, not what I planned,
I need a helping hand, listening to The Steve Miller Band.
Too many cell phones, can never get any loans,
love the show Bones, listening to The Rolling Stones.
Confessing all my sins, playing some violins,
dizzy from the spins, listening to The Thompson Twins.
Standing in the cold, my life is uncontrolled,
just got paroled, listening to Avenged Sevenfold.
Sprayed with mace, kicked in the face,
stuck in this rat race, listening to Three Days Grace.
Working the graveyard shift, lots of sand I must sift,
my life needs a lift, listening to Taylor Swift.
Living in Illinois, tired of hearing noise,
losing all my poise, listening to The Beach Boys.
No hands on the clock, it's me people mock,
dryer stole another sock, listening to Kid Rock.
Music has made me what I am,
loving the hairbands and the glam.
Hard rock is all I know,
how could you not like Ugly Kid Joe.
Heavy metal is where it's at,
all the older bands are bald and fat.
Top forty isn't half bad,
every year it's a different fad.
Disco and grunge had a short stay,
Nirvana and Pearl Jam, get too much air play.
Hip hop and rap has been around to long,
can they even sing a real song.
Nothing will ever beat the eighties,
spandex, hair and all the ***** ladies.
My two favorite songs are Sister Christian,
and Here I go Again,
those songs remind me of way back when.
Country, well that will always ****
rednecks, Nascar, hunting and a giant truck.
Oct 18, 2013
Oct 18, 2013 at 1:58 AM UTC
I drank musty ale at the Illinois Athletic Club with
the millionaire manufacturer of Green River butter
one night
And his face had the shining light of an old-time Quaker,
he spoke of a beautiful daughter, and I knew he had
a peace and a happiness up his sleeve somewhere.
Then I heard Jim Kirch make a speech to the Advertising
Association on the trade resources of South America.
And the way he lighted a three-for-a-nickel stogie and
cocked it at an angle regardless of the manners of
our best people,
I knew he had a clutch on a real happiness even though
some of the reporters on his newspaper say he is
the living double of Jack London's Sea Wolf.
In the mayor's office the mayor himself told me he was
happy though it is a hard job to satisfy all the office-
seekers and eat all the dinners he is asked to eat.
Down in Gilpin Place, near Hull House, was a man with
his jaw wrapped for a bad toothache,
And he had it all over the butter millionaire, Jim Kirch
and the mayor when it came to happiness.
He is a maker of accordions and guitars and not only
makes them from start to finish, but plays them
after he makes them.
And he had a guitar of mahogany with a walnut bottom
he offered for seven dollars and a half if I wanted it,
And another just like it, only smaller, for six dollars,
though he never mentioned the price till I asked him,
And he stated the price in a sorry way, as though the
music and the make of an instrument count for a
million times more than the price in money.
I thought he had a real soul and knew a lot about God.
There was light in his eyes of one who has conquered
sorrow in so far as sorrow is conquerable or worth
conquering.
Anyway he is the only Chicago citizen I was jealous of
that day.
He played a dance they play in some parts of Italy
when the harvest of grapes is over and the wine
presses are ready for work.
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JIMMY WIMBLETON listened a first week in June.
Ditches along prairie roads of Northern Illinois
Filled the arch of night with young bullfrog songs.
Infinite mathematical metronomic croaks rose and spoke,
Rose and sang, rose in a choir of puzzles.
They made his head ache with riddles of music.
They rested his head with beaten cadence.
Jimmy Wimbledon listened.
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WAGON WHEEL GAP is a place I never saw
And Red Horse Gulch and the chutes of ******* Creek.
Red-shirted miners picking in the sluices,
Gamblers with red neckties in the night streets,
The fly-by-night towns of Bull Frog and Skiddoo,
The night-cool limestone white of Death Valley,
The straight drop of eight hundred feet
From a shelf road in the Hasiampa Valley:
Men and places they are I never saw.
I have seen three White Horse taverns,
One in Illinois, one in Pennsylvania,
One in a timber-hid road of Wisconsin.
I bought cheese and crackers
Between sun showers in a place called White Pigeon
Nestling with a blacksmith shop, a post-office,
And a berry-crate factory, where four roads cross.
On the Pecatonica River near Freeport
I have seen boys run barefoot in the leaves
Throwing clubs at the walnut trees
In the yellow-and-gold of autumn,
And there was a brown mash dry on the inside of their hands.
On the Cedar Fork Creek of Knox County
I know how the fingers of late October
Loosen the hazel nuts.
I know the brown eyes of half-open hulls.
I know boys named Lindquist, Swanson, Hildebrand.
I remember their cries when the nuts were ripe.
And some are in machine shops; some are in the navy;
And some are not on payrolls anywhere.
Their mothers are through waiting for them to come home.
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CLOWNS DYINGFIVE circus clowns dying this year, morning newspapers told their lives, how each one horizontal in a last gesture of hands arranged by an undertaker, shook thousands into convulsions of laughter from behind rouge-red lips and powder-white face.
STEAMBOAT BILLWhen the boilers of the Robert E. Lee exploded, a steamboat winner of many races on the Mississippi went to the bottom of the river and never again saw the wharves of Natchez and New Orleans.
And a legend lives on that two gamblers were blown toward the sky and during their journey laid bets on which of the two would go higher and which would be first to set foot on the turf of the earth again.
FOOT AND MOUTH PLAGUEWhen the mysterious foot and mouth epidemic ravaged the cattle of Illinois, Mrs. Hector Smith wept bitterly over the government killing forty of her soft-eyed Jersey cows; through the newspapers she wept over her loss for millions of readers in the Great Northwest.
SEVENSThe lady who has had seven lawful husbands has written seven years for a famous newspaper telling how to find love and keep it: seven thousand hungry girls in the Mississippi Valley have read the instructions seven years and found neither illicit loves nor lawful husbands.
PROFITEERI who saw ten strong young men die anonymously, I who saw ten old mothers hand over their sons to the nation anonymously, I who saw ten thousand touch the sunlit silver finalities of undistinguished human glory-why do I sneeze sardonically at a bronze drinking fountain named after one who participated in the war vicariously and bought ten farms?
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THE MARE Alix breaks the world's trotting record one day. I see her heels flash down the dust of an Illinois race track on a summer afternoon. I see the timekeepers put their heads together over stopwatches, and call to the grand stand a split second is clipped off the old world's record and a new world's record fixed.
I see the mare Alix led away by men in undershirts and streaked faces. Dripping Alix in foam of white on the harness and shafts. And the men in undershirts kiss her ears and rub her nose, and tie blankets on her, and take her away to have the sweat sponged.
I see the grand stand jammed with prairie people yelling themselves hoarse. Almost the grand stand and the crowd of thousands are one pair of legs and one voice standing up and yelling hurrah.
I see the driver of Alix and the owner smothered in a fury of handshakes, a mob of caresses. I see the wives of the driver and owner smothered in a crush of white summer dresses and parasols.
Hours later, at sundown, gray dew creeping on the sod and sheds, I see Alix again:
Dark, shining-velvet Alix,
Night-sky Alix in a gray blanket,
Led back and forth by a ******
Velvet and night-eyed Alix
With slim legs of steel.
And I want to rub my nose against the nose of the mare Alix.
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The strapping young boys
Will play with their toys
And cause harm to er'one around.
They'll make lots of noise,
Colluded with poise,
Among them not a soul to be found.
It wasn't too long
Before they were turned on
To firm over in Illinois,
Where collusion has proven
A blooming conclusion
For all whom they choose to employ.
"Is this an illusion?"
Said one in confusion.
"I'm successful and happy and paid.
"I'm a millionaire
With brilliant hair,
And a beautiful dame of a maid!"
"Pardon my intrusion,
You've chosen profusion
O'er doing the world some good.
"Prepare for seclusion-
A lonely conclusion
Is knocking beneath your hood."
Aug 27, 2012
Aug 27, 2012 at 5:54 PM UTC
I
The road flies past underneath the tires of the car
and there's a hazy blur as the trees fly by
as fast as the regrets flitting across her mind
like so many white lines falling beneath the left wheels
She's never been to Chicago alone before
Yet she's felt alone in so many places
It was time for a new environment and new faces
and to drink greedily from Illinois skies
She plans to drink more air than alcohol for once
To be drunken in lust or contentment at a push
To feel and experience fully without substance
To be intoxicated on some profound emotion
She pulls up to the curb and kills the engine
so that time ceases to exist
Heart pounding, mouth dry, she steps onto the hot pavement
Every movement magnified in a Midwest summer meeting
Her ankles wobble over 3-inch heels with each step
stumbling like so many times before, but different this time
She takes a deep breath of her new-found independence
and takes the first steps into the welcoming light of the sun
II
It's funny how philosophical eyes can interpret the mundane
Every step an existential crisis under the surface
But even so, the days continue to come and go
as sure as the sun, blocked by clouds occasionally, but still there
like figures in the city, obscured by passing buses
You slash tires and try to blow the clouds away
because even big bad wolves run out of breath
Aug 11, 2014
Aug 11, 2014 at 5:37 PM UTC
WRITE your wishes
on the door
and come in.
Stand outside
in the pools of the harvest moon.
Bring in
the handshake of the pumpkins.
There's a wish
for every hazel nut?
There's a hope
for every corn shock?
There's a kiss
for every clumsy climbing shadow?
Clover and the bumblebees once,
high winds and November rain now.
Buy shoes
for rough weather in November.
Buy shirts
to sleep outdoors when May comes.
Buy me
something useless to remember you by.
Send me
a sumach leaf from an Illinois hill.
In the faces marching in the firelog flickers,
In the fire music of wood singing to winter,
Make my face march through the purple and ashes.
Make me one of the fire singers to winter.
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