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Best Poems Written by Robert Grappel

Below are the all-time best Robert Grappel poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

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Illegal Immigrants

This poem was written after I took a tour of the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument in Wyoming, the site of Custer's Last Stand.

It was the year eighteen sixty-eight.
The U.S. government signed the Fort Laramie Treaty.
The Black Hills were to be closed to white settlements,
Preserved for the Lakota Indians
Forever, so long as the buffalo roamed.

'Forever' lasted less than eight years.
The eastern railroads needed meat for their track crews,
So professional hunters followed the rails westward.
Men like 'Buffalo Bill' made their living
Killing the buffalo for meat, hides, and sport.

It was the year eighteen seventy-two.
America celebrated its centennial.
Gold was discovered in the Black Hills,
And people in their thousands rushed to the west
Seeking fortunes and living space.
Most of them were immigrants to America
Fleeing depression and prejudice,
And ready to ignore the letter of the treaty law.

Towns quickly sprung up along the immigrant trails.
Towns like Deadwood - an illegal encampment
In the midst of Indian land.
People like Calamity Jane - an illegal immigrant.
Wild Bill Hickok - another illegal.

In the year eighteen seventy-six
The U.S. government sent the army to remove the Indians
From 'their land'.
Almost half of Custer's troops were immigrants themselves
From seventeen different countries
And two marked down as 'unknown'.

You already know the basic story.
The Lakota won the battle
But lost the war and their sacred Black Hills.
General Custer became a legend,
The Indian culture was 'civilized,
And U.S. history moved on.

History is full of ironies.
Custer, a hero for the North side
Winning battles against slavery in the Civil War,
Won greater fame by dying in a war to enslave the Lakota.
What's the lesson we should learn from all this?
Each of us standing here today is an 'illegal immigrant'.
We need to remember.

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Building a Wall

I'm writing this poem in the last days of 2018. The government of the United States is shut down in a fight over the building of a border wall. I am reminded of another border wall that was erected during my lifetime.

In 1961, East Germany built a wall
Of concrete, barbed wire, and steel
Ninety-six miles around East Berlin
At the cost of a bit less than four million dollars
And a bit more than 200 lives.
Intended to stem the flood of East Germans
Seeking freedom to prosper in the West.

A young and inexperienced President Kennedy
Didn't comprehend why East Germany
Needed a concrete wall
When it already had
An Iron Curtain.

In 1989 the Berlin wall was torn down in a frenzy
Of sledge hammers and bulldozers.
Only remnants of it now remain - mostly in museums.
East Germans celebrated and rebuilt their lives.
The reunited Germany flourished
And joined other nations in a united European future.

Why do we think that our wall will have a different legacy?

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My Coin Collection

When I was a boy I had a coin collection.
Each one a prime example of its type,
Worth well beyond the face value
Their small differences and minor flaws
Raising them in the eye of the collector.

In the beginning, God engraved a die with His image,
And stamped out Adam and Eve, the first ‘proof set’.
Thousands of generations later
We’re still made from that same original mold.
We each have the same face value – one human being,
But the Great Collector values us for our flaws,
And our differences.

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Bible Study

The earth was void and without form…
And the voice of the Lord was upon the waters…

	In the roll of a tsunami wave across the Pacific
	Born of a collapsing mountain deep in the sea
	And in the tidal surge bearing down on Mobile
	Miles ahead of an approaching storm.

You sweep away people as if they were but a dream.
In the morning they are like the new grass.

	It was no dream to those on board an oil platform in the Gulf
	Torn from its moorings by a raging sea.
	It was no dream to a family huddled in their attic
	Watching the flood waters rise.

But the voice of the Lord was not in the whirlwind.

	It was not in the flood waters from Lake Pontchartrain.
	It was not in the crashing tidal waves or the leaking levees.
	It was not in the spinning devastation of the hurricanes.
	Or the incessant pounding of torrential rains.

God gave Noah the “rainbow sign”.
Never again will I destroy the world.

	Already life returns, bit by bit, to New Orleans.
	Trash-filled streets are cleared, tattered storefronts mended.
	Flooded homes pumped clear and families reunited.
	Alligators return to their normal homes
	While the people rebuild theirs along the waterfront.

I will gather the exiles from the four corners of the Earth.

	From the Astrodome and Air Force bases,
	From Red Cross shelters and tent cities,
	And from the homes of strangers.

And they shall rebuild the waste cities and inhabit them.
They shall plant vineyards and drink of their wine.

	The tourist hotels on the beaches of Phuket,
	Fishing villages on the shores of Indonesia,
	And the bars on Bourbon Street.
	
The sound of music and rejoicing shall be heard once more in the land.

	They will celebrate Mardi Gras again on the streets of New Orleans
	With the sounds of sweet jazz drifting from the “French Quarter”.
	Boats shall sail once more from the port of Jakarta
	And sailors will look out upon a tranquil sea.

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The Binding

Abraham wrapped his robe about him,
Laced his sandals upon his feet,
Took his staff in his hand,
And started off down the path
To the place of which God had told him.

A young man rises early one cool morning
Washes himself and says the prayers,
Stuffs bricks of plastique inside his down vest,
Takes the detonator in his hand,
And walks off toward the border checkpoint.

Isaac said to his father Abraham,
“I see the wood and the fire,
But where is the lamb for our sacrifice?”

A pretty young girl with a smiling face
Her spirit fierce as the desert sun
Puts on a girdle of dynamite sticks
Wraps colored wires about her
Like an embroidered shawl
And stands waiting for a crowded bus.

And Abraham stretched forth his hand
And took the knife to slay his son

An aged man goes every day to the local mosque
To teach the children how bombs are made.
How a timer is set, how a charge is wired.
How a grenade is launched, how a machine gun fired.
Who to hate and who to kill,
And why “the cause” is worth the dying.

But the angel of God called out to Abraham,
And Abraham responded, “Here am I”.
“Do not lay your hand on Isaac, your son,
For I can see that your faith is strong.
I will make of you a great nation.
Through you all the world shall be blessed.”

God calls us too, from beyond the centuries.
Do not kill your children to prove your faith in Me.
Do not take away the lives I have given you.
Use your time on Earth for nurturing, 
Creating, and growing.
Hearken to My voice!

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Bookends

The very first words of the Ten Commandments are: “I am”. 
What could be more definite?
God exists,
And, thereby, the entire universe came into being.
The ‘big question’ is answered,
We exist in a world that was created for a purpose. 
What is that purpose?
Read on, dear friends.

The very last words of the Ten Commandments are: “your neighbor”. 
Nothing high and lofty here,
But quite close to home.
We are each to be neighbors -- to God and to each other.
As Hillel taught, “What is hateful to you, do not do unto others. 
All the rest is commentary.
Go now, and study it!”

Details | Robert Grappel Poem

Eleven Questions

When a person reaches that ‘certain age’ (this poet already has), he starts to think about the time when his mental and physical abilities will start to wane. This poem was inspired by the “Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE)” administered to detect the early stages of dementia.

What is the season?
What is today’s date, day, month, year?
If your reply is “who cares!”
That’s depression, not dementia.
Give yourself five points if you get all the answers right
And an extra point if you add
“And it’s another lovely day”.

Where are we now?
State? County? Town? 
Hospital? Floor?
Thankfully, I can’t answer those last two questions.

“Take the paper in your right hand, fold it in half,
And put it on the floor.”
What if I’m left-handed?
Do I lose a point?

“Please count backward from 100 by sevens.”
For this I got a PhD in physics!

“Make up and write a sentence about anything.
The sentence must contain a noun and a verb.”
“Life is a death sentence” qualifies.

“Show the patient two simple objects,
Such as a wristwatch and a pencil.
Ask the patient to name them.”
Do I lose points when I reply
“Casio” and “Papermate”?
Or, am I just being too literal?

So, for now, I pass the test of sanity.
And you do too, by reading this.

Details | Robert Grappel Poem

The Divine Ledger

I was born with a number of handicaps:
My mother’s myopia, and Dad’s hairline,
Mom’s high blood pressure, 
My father’s sleep apnea,
And a human being’s mortality.

Surgery has improved my sight.
One pill each day keeps my blood pressure down.
A CPAP machine cured my snoring.
I’ll just live with the baldness,
But nothing cures the mortality.

So I will try to get more exercise,
And watch my diet better.
I will reduce my stress level,
And take more walks in the sun.
I will love my wife and the times we share.
I will be more attentive to others’ needs
And seek to help whenever I can.

It won’t cure the mortality,
But it can’t hurt!

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Getting Off the Train

When I was a child I sat between my parents on the train.
Dad was on my right next to the window,
And my mother was on the aisle, holding my hand. 
They were my whole world
And everything I knew ended at the next seat back.

The years passed, and my world enlarged
To include my aunt three rows ahead in her flowered hat,
And the conductor with his brass buttons and shiny ticket punch.
I could see the whole car now
And glimpse the world rushing along outside the window.

Now I’m older still and we walk through the station, 
With crowds of people from other trains.
There are sights and sounds, languages and smells 
That do not remind me of home.
Where are all these people going?
What do they see outside their train windows?

Today I walk along a city street
Full of tall buildings and green parks.
Bustling sidewalks in a world that teems with life. 
And I remember when I thought the whole world 
Was contained in a single row of seats
In a single car
On a single train.

How small our worlds would be
If we did not recognize that we are all connected. 
Life doesn’t end with our seat row (family),
Or our train car (tribe),
Or our train itself (nation).
No, not even at the central station,
Or that one city that is my personal destination.

We must see that all the trains reach their stops, 
That every family gets home safely,
That every child sharing a seat with his parents 
Is just one of us on the train.

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Why I Don'T Get Jackson Pollock

When he starts a new painting,
Canvas stretched taut against the defining frame,
Gesso-coated smooth and even,
Pure and uniform…
How does he begin?

Are his tubes of paint arrayed in careful rows,
Summer colors first – winter colors last?
Is the final result already in his mind,
Or, does it grow organically,
Layer upon layer?

Does he paint all the reds at once,
The blooming roses and spurting blood?
Are the blacks a backdrop for stars
Or a prayer against the coming night?
Is the smear of green a leafy tree?
The blue streaks a sky?
How can he tell?

And, after all the colors are piled up,
And the canvas is awash in paint,
Leaping from the edges of the frame
Ready to crawl across the wall…
All this I can understand in my engineer’s heart
But… how does he know when it’s done?

This is why I prefer nature to modern art.
God knows we’re not finished yet!