I travel incognito, using a name I once found
in a book of minor sorrows.
I have a longing for the sea, yet languish here
behind the wheel of a rental,
crisscrossing arid lands with many miles ahead.
A white plastic bag flaps on a thorn bush
it could act as a windsock but turns listlessly
in the breathless air.
A GPS guides my mind over a flickering map
toward an ocean that is too far away to reach today,
a place where silver fish leap in the aqueous air,
only to pause as still as stone in an ice-marbled sky.
That shore for now, is bereft of place and time
it can only be imagined through gaps in
rising walls of dust.
The hatchback seems to trundle slowly over
dinosaur bones, dry axles groan under
tired springs.
A hundred miles ahead a fish-restaurant
is getting ready to close its doors for the night.
A Motel 8’s neon lights flicker in a sea spray.
On an unseen shore, snow crab dance and sing
like sirens in the rolling surf.
Electric cars
I have always liked cars and like driving often for pleasure
I like the many styles of cars, from Mercedes to Lada,
I have driven both, and apart from the hard seat
I do have a soft
for the Lada; as for Mercedes, it doesn't need my write-up
to know apart from being stylish, it also has a used car value
the misunderstood Lada had.
Lately, cars tend to look like one another, hatchback and small
4 wheel drives pretending to be muscular
of the many cars, few are made in the USA, until recently
now we have Tesla, big, smooth, and artless, designed by
a computer and a hundred technicians in white coats
it is said:" Too many cooks spoil the broth."
I stop with my small Mercedes that has a high seat and clear
View at a roundabout waiting to go, Tesla inches forward
looking like an elegant lady who has paid for her beauty
by sacrificing her womb, no one will remember her when
something new appears, and it will!
I have had many cars, bought for their charm sometimes
they broke down, but they had what Tesla did not
Personality!!!
Electric cars
I have always liked cars and like driving often for pleasure
I like the many styles of cars, from Mercedes to Lada,
I have driven both, and apart from the hard seat
I do have a soft
for the Lada; as for Mercedes, it doesn't need my write-up
to know apart from being stylish, it also has a used car value
the misunderstood Lada had.
Lately, cars tend to look like one another, hatchback and small
4 wheel drives pretending to be muscular
of the many cars, few are made in the USA, until recently
now we have Tesla, big, smooth, and artless, designed by
a computer and a hundred technicians in white coats
it is said:" Too many cooks spoil the broth."
I stop with my small Mercedes that has a high seat and clear
View at a roundabout waiting to go, Tesla inches forward
looking like an elegant lady who has paid for her beauty
by sacrificing her womb, no one will remember her when
something new appears, and it will!
I have had many cars, bought for their charm sometimes
they broke down, but they had what Tesla did not
Personality!!!
I have to let it go.
It's not a workingman's truck, too pretty
but it is still a sweet ride.
Pain at the pump,
not getting any richer just older.
I got to bite the bullet,
squeeze into a squeezer.
I see a small hatchback in my future.
My wife puts on that face,
you know the one
"gloom and doom." She mouths silently,
and of course, I can see
she don't mean it.
He would lay me flat on the forest floor
among the leaves and the moss
In a pasture or a farmer's field
In the hatchback of his car
parked behind an abandoned cabin
along the river road
Outside his room in the hall
Upstairs upon the bitingly brumal
bare tiles of the bathroom floor
was where I lost my virginity
Any of those places he would take me
Never in his bed
Anywhere but there
It was too intimate he said
i saw circles
being drawn
in the sky
most folks
call them
buzzards
but others
like myself
prefer turkey
vultures
no fault of
theirs as
they fly over
a joni mitchell
parking lot
where there
in the lonely
is my first
road tripping
yellow chevy
chevette
hatchback
of course
not quasi
modo
hunchback
or even once
thought to
be a certain
musical sub
marine
but what
does this
sight
this vision
of visions mean
these birds
circle only
the dead or
dying
so it
might
seem that
my life that
has passed
is exactly
just that
though
even though
i liked my
past i'm
loving the
possabilaties
of my future
Based on my consulting this year’s almanac
June 30th being the best possible day for a BBQ out back
I sent out invitations to everyone, I didn’t hold back
There was the lumberjack, the nymphomaniac
The humpback, the hunchback and the hypochondriac
The kleptomaniac, the hemophiliac and the insomniac
No reason to leave out the egomaniac and the pyromaniac
Ooops and how could I almost forget our local amnesiac
I proposed a neighbourly exchange of paperback
I asked them all to contribute, call back or at least provide feedback
Eve of June 30th, gotta prepare my shack
Start to clean vigorously with ammoniac
Wash my floors and dust that miscellaneous bric-a-brac
To make room for guests, park my hatchback in the cul-de-sac
Find bowls for every possible sweet and snack
Think of various games including kayak and piggyback
Think I might serve some type of aphrodisiac
Put together a musical playlist of 60’s to 70’s flashback
Get all set for a promising night of banter and wisecrack
I think I’ve thought of everything and I’m right on track
O gotta go… I think I hear the doorbell- must be Jack
AP: Honorable Mention 2020
11/14/16
To be honest across this Earth's soils
Conflict and turmoil
That dates way back
Far before spacecrafts, state maps
Or being able to make cash
Opportunity don't waste that
Take a chance
Get on that A.S.A.P.
Before it goes down the drain fast
A long forgotten stash sat
By an abandoned hatchback
With broken and cracked glass
Cults and rituals, one of which is a black mass
Test conducted with lab rats
Some ships at a half-mast
I'm not affiliated with Aflac
Or Nasdaq
On social media, so much sad crap
And backlash
Like a toy dog some just want to yap yap
Even though there softer than a flap jack
Better watch yourself and bag back
Before we really see who has the last laugh
Went out in the wilderness to backpack
With a knapsack
Set up camp at an open grass flat (patch)
In specific things time and or money was invested
As far as recollected
The objective
Changed perspective
And all method within a second
During a time that was festive
It turned out to be effective
Yet unexpected
Certain areas and locations infested
Individual organisms infected
By: Dalton Ogletree
I'm on the path to a massive collapse like the NASDAQ
I never asked for your lack of compassion so you can have it back
and love is just a mask that we wear when we act tragedies
just as fast as it happens you're snapped back to reality
trapped by your past as you battle morality
it was bad while it lasted
always in the aftermath of disaster
like back when I smashed the gas and crashed through that house with the hatchback
and after that, if only to add to the excitement
I was snatched by a task force and slapped with a stack of indictments
I've basked in my doubts and the shadows it casts
on the reality of happily ever after,
if or when exactly it's supposed to happen
and after I've passed into ashes, my name scratched in epitaph
if, in fact, there's an afterlife- will it have me?
if this all an elaborate test did I pass, though I acted badly?
My dad was always this mystery
A shadow from the past I never knew
My mom rarely talked about him
And I never begged for another clue
I met him as I turned eighteen
We went to a Rolling Stones concert
And it seemed somewhat surreal
To be as dried as the vacant desert
He gave the keys to my Mustang
A brown, little hatchback from 1980
It was wheels for a little bit
Even if it could barely go above 80
I was in Nebraska for one week
With him as he worked as a handyman
We talked and were catching up
But I know not what makes him a man
I met my half-brother in Omaha
When I went to visit many years ago
He clung to me like the memory
Of being a brother I may never know
(Both my dad and brother are named Daniel.)
(This is a fictional poem)
Life is so hard because I'm short and ugly too.
I have big pimples and I smell worse than the animals at the zoo.
I drive a hatchback that has no torque.
Cool people always beat me up because I'm a dork.
When people learn that I'm president of the chess club, they give me the bird.
They make me miserable because I give new meaning to the word nerd.
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