albeit modest word zealot

Writing prompts burst asunder
snap, crackle, and sweet Mary poppin
within me scrambled noggin
witnessing yours truly to blunder
blindly along this dark and stormy night
deafening soundcloud roared
with apocalyptic thunder
'course only audible to yours truly,
I did dumbfoundedly bred wonder...

At some o'clock
tick tocking hours brisk
(quite chilly temperatures)
April seventeenth -Easter Sunday
two thousand twenty two
when Church law
obliges Roman Catholics
to receive Holy Communion
simultaneous blinding fiery kindling
quickening xing risk
within winkin blinkin and nod,
I feared full light of day brainstorm

snatched away courtesy invisible whisk
broom all those potential
ideas sprung while
Messiah by George Frideric
Handel's never out of style
within cerebral nooks and
crannies (think Ohiopyle),
whereby Youghiogheny River
bubbles, gurgles, fuels river mile

after mile harnesses and doth generate
approximately twelve Megawatts
of electricity per hour, to alleviate
domestic counting eight
thousand homes necessitate
distributed across western
and central Pennsylvania
nearly pristine land
where many local legends
never go out of style.

Bigfoot looms large here,
but other cryptids, or animals
also believed to inhabit the state.

Featured prominently include:
the gigantic Broad Top Snake,
the bizarre Dogman
of Westmoreland County,
and Bessie, Lake Erie’s resident monster.

Reports of giant attacking thunderbirds,
bloodsucking wolfmen, and mischievous,
mine-dwelling Tommyknockers
round out the list.

Analogous catching
courtesy goo goo dolls barenaked
ladies hands spawning
salmon slippery as an eel
(if curious don't take my word,
which might not appeal)
though yours truly
offers no guarantee,
you could easily fall

overboard as ye kneel,
which subsequently offers
live human meal
to hungry sharks, impossible mission
to escape no matter
how loud you squeal,
bouquets delphiniums and daisies
designate watery grave site
dissolving blood amidst the color teal.

Aforementioned depiction, whereby
former commander in chief
(er scoundrel forty fifth president)
admittedly no gent
till man nor scholar, and
he cavalierly lent
and nearly fin hushed nearly
(possibly already) rent
asunder high crimes and
misdemeanors, he casually spent.

(just in time for end of summer reading...
recounting emotionally disastrous campy turbulence)
intended food for thought indulgence.

A boys' life aborted
miscarried golden opportunity
for adolescent romance to be courted.

Amidst a raft of fellow (Brandywine Valley
Y.M.C.A) resident campers
seething with hormonal secretion to canoodle
who, didst excitedly quiver
donning a "NON FAKE" lifejacket
coursing down swiftly
moving Youghiogheny river
(evidenced by small hairs along spine),
that caused me animatedly to shiver
snuffing out potential fortitude
gained late in mein kampf,
whereat yours truly a creaky giver
even scores of years later deliver
to sender nowhere to be found.

This predisposition prevailed despite
punishing revenge didst stamp excite
me inducing suppressed
giddiness to take flight
against self toward parents,
whose puny singular offspring
smallish in stature of height
who did light,
a conspiratorial idea
countered meek self spite
compared to their hefty might
forced me to attend ("dumb")
sleep away camp
for about a fortnight

whereupon, being dropped off "bright"
brainchild idea awoke around edge
of night bordering my consciousness,
where figurative dark shadows
courtesy Molly Hatchet cleft a wedge
vis a vis, an immediate
avowed personal pledge
sworn against experiencing even
one iota of fun (a ha...so there) ledge
er domain mental prestidigitation
could not dredge

countervailing loathsomeness naysaying fun
in any weigh, shape or form
pertaining to this sole son
but, matter of fact
adventuresome giddiness gave run
for metaphorical psychological money,
and much to my chagrin
gleefulness didst stun

into silence malevolent
anti yippee surge
crept into the noggin of this
chaim yankel and could not purge
this meta static Grinch,
who could not steal away
euphoria that inevitably didst emerge
unable to root out,

and suppress nemesis
flitting hither and yon to and fro
fomenting misery, but an inescapable glow
manifested when father
and mother end of Jeff session
came back, and said "hello"
when, and I immediately
replied with emphatic "NO"
in regard to having a good time oh
mitt ting like a lump pin pro

let tarry yet exerting will
power to asphyxiate
a faint bubbling of attraction
toward a darker skinned
slender cute teen age girl
though at that stage
oblivious how to create
friendship, thus aye
vividly recall to this date
hopscotched potential summer romance
which induces regret to emanate
cursing forsaken ill fate
now, feel deplorable
for stifling relationship
slid into behavioral sink (of this got
ham) fore'r tortured
within iron barred heaven's gate.

That summer
When you and I turn around
Many truths are sublimated
I came to the river of Youghiogheny
Accompanied by lost meteors and heron footprints
Half a century
a long dream
Your warm back such as a long song
As rain’s song paved the long alley
Your back is like a pair hand in the dark
Entrust me to the night dew
Breathing in the dark night
I put you on the Bible homepage
Daily in the window of the mind
Admonish the spirit with morality
what is love?
Is it an epic that remains of history and civilization?
Is a spiritual gemstone selected after animal and plant provenance?
I firmly believe in your back
Is a treasure of aesthetics and soul
Since you went to the hometown of the cloud
You have come gently
Come to the lover you have never loved
Hey, I am going to travel (We can’t find each other,
Therefore, your soul came)
I am sitting on the front bump of your bicycle.
Traveling with you in the past
Forgot the day and the night
You made me know another level of love.
a kind of love that my ordinary cognition has never experienced
If life and death must be lonely
Please hide your deep affection in the bottom of the ore.
After the growth of several generations
Back to roots

"A 60 year old drunk",

the bus driver who dialed 911 called him.

At that point the Youghiogheny is deep enough for a boat livery.

Over an empty, riverside park, the sky is overcaste.

I tighten my coat and pull up the collar.

Firemen stand on the shore, hands in their pockets.

A fire truck, a van, a long-hooked pole, and a stretcher wait.

A boat  trolls under the bridge. One man holds a line.

Down a hill at the end of a street,

below the City of Mckeesport,

at a 50 feet leap,

a homeless man inhaled the polluted water.

He may have heard his own cry,  

but not the bridge traffic, the laughing school boys crossing,

or the white goose honking,

above his last jump.

I watch the boat a long time,

then walk to my car with inconclusive thoughts,

respecting what I hadn’t seen,

aflop like a rag doll in cold, dark water,

unknowing fish eyes passing,

maybe a friend somewhere unaware of the event

under the bridge that hovers over the river.