ROYAL WEDDING
War and famine fade
it just takes one great dress
Kate and William wed
Monthly Archives: October 2011
REFRIGERATOR
REFRIGERATOR
Milk, eggs, cheese, meat
on the door the children’s art
bodies and souls are fed
SOUND THINKING
SOUND THINKING
If a group of crows is a murder
a group of grackles must be
a massacre
A HUNDRED YEARS AND ACCOUNTING
A HUNDRED YEARS AND COUNTING
Old roll top just keeps on rollin’
My father’s mentor
sold him the ranch
gave his name to his first
born son (that’s me)
and left him this desk
More than a rancher
he kept his day job too
as municipal secretary
Taxes, foreclosures,
roads and bridges built
and all the books balanced
During the 20’s people paid a lot for horses
he’d have had nice cash in the cubbies
During the 30’s mostly dust
Once it became my father’s
Roll it open, count the receipts
Roll it open, pay the bills
Roll it open there’s the letter
your brother dead at war
Roll it closed – still dead
I roll it open now
Mister Fisher and my father
looking over my shoulder
Here’s something
from my six year old assistant
Look at all those colors
in Katherine’s new picture
SPRING IN AUSTIN
SPRING IN AUSTIN
More rain than usual this year
Outside our screen porch
jungle green everywhere
boom boom boom redbuds appear
bombs bursting in air
SPRING IN SASKATCHEWAN
SPRING IN SASKATCHEWAN
In the city
retired farmers still watch the weather
In greening front yards
wooden ducks nailed to white posts
wings spinning backward
DEPARTMENT STORE BLUES
DEPARTMENT STORE BLUES
I run the long gauntlet of perfume counter aisles
Reaching men’s wear I dare
my first breath
since leaving the street
Take my time picking up
and fondly fondling
warm winter socks
Should I buy two pair or three
two browns and a black
or two blacks and a brown
In no hurry to begin the return journey
so recently reminded of why
I had been driven here
in the first place
The odor of the old pair
I’M READY FOR MY NEW HIP NOW
I’M READY FOR MY NEW HIP NOW
I think I have finally forgiven
My old hip for all those years of pain
My mother for her hesitation
to carry me in a time of war
My father for the crushings
between the baler and the shed
and between his will and mine
And have taken also
the first small steps toward gratitude
for how far all three have carried me
THE LADY WITH SIX FINGERS
THE LADY WITH SIX FINGERS
Old, black, and sweet as lasses
little house on the side of a hill
in the red dirt of East Texas
Someone in the kitchen was Dinah
best pies and anything that fries
Special in a million ways
but that extra finger on each hand
she sure was proud of that
Don’t think she’d have traded Liz
for five carats on her third
THE AUSTRIAN UNCLES
THE AUSTRIAN UNCLES
Already old when I was young
revered as I would hope to be when old
Two brothers married to
two sisters of my father’s father
Great aunts
always as they’ve always been
busily bustling round the house
while the uncles somehow stay
both present and out of the way
Little china cups in work-hard hands
black coffee and home-brew
sipping the day away