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Best Poems Written by James Friske

Below are the all-time best James Friske poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

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The Dusty Trail

A glacier like a cowboy sat
Upon the foothills. And just like that 
The climate changed from hope
To glad. And just like that a bar of soap
Was drawn from the rhinestone-clad holster.
With pink and orange stones it did stir
The emotions pride and reverence 
But didn’t make sense 
With its raven claw and bunny paw.
That type of injustice should be against the law.

To bathe with soap upon the skin
With water warm and a glass of gin,
Made cold with glacial ice, those are nice
Experiences to have. And then to roll the dice
Into the saloon and pollute the soul
With games of chance. Such a toll
Does pleasure take upon the Puritan
[for those believers, anyway]. A ban
Would ameliorate, if self-imposed.
Unfeeling cowboys are never so disposed.

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Burnt Toast

At some point you are going to need to impress more than a few friends with some burnt toast. I used to have an old, heavy-gauge chrome-plated toaster with a dial to adjust doneness from 1-5. I took a Sharpie and scribed a 6 at the extreme. The pointer doesn’t actually go there, but it is useful for indicating my intent. It works better than the 5 setting which merely chars the surface. But 6 chars it darn near all the way through, enlarging the pore structure to retain even more melted butter. You gotta be cautious not to overuse that feature because it’ll burn the toaster, as in overheating the thermostat and melting the whispy wires. No more toast for you. Back at the store they were quick to figure out your attempt to exceed the capacity and the clearly worded statement in the ownership contract will be pointed out to you, that glamorous document with the curly-Q decorations making it supremely authentic like a stock certificate from the 1960’s. They replaced my toaster once, but the second and third times I only got a stern look of reproach. The manufacturer has black listed me through my credit card so now all my toaster purchases are cash only.

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Sestina Title 1a

Often after the fallen snow is swept, glory
Is found when the treading surface is clear.
A light dusting is a breeze to remove. For heavy slush I trade
My broom for a shovel. It is foolhardy to pretend
That things with bristles can glide
Between and expand the substrate/snow interface.

Between the air and my skin there is no interface
Even my coon skin cap only provides small glory
Reminding me that menthol shaving cream enhances the glide
Of my razor and the sting of the cold air, but also makes clear
My ambition to clear the snow away and not pretend
To scatter dandruff from the icy landscape. It seems I must trade

My alter ego of a cosmetologist for that of a cosmologist. Such a trade
Will enable me to outgrow this climate. Then my interface
Communication skills will improve so I won’t use silence to pretend
I am a solid, deep thinking woodsman and I can just enjoy the glory
Of making small talk about the weather, thus allowing me to clear 
My conscience about past regrets and glide

Through interpersonal interactions moment by moment. Ah! To glide
Like snow from the blade of a shovel, I wouldn’t trade
That social grace for 10,000 driveways clear
Of snow or ice or volcanic ash. Interface--
That common boundary, the transition from disgrace to glory
As I become a cosmologist and no longer pretend

That people are stupid zoo animals and hopefully not pretend
That I am a stupid zoo animal. Seasons of the year glide
Together and glide apart. Midwinter ice in all its glory
Is dangerous and fun. Will you trade
Your cramp-ons for ice skates? The seasonal interface
From spring to summer is never clear.

The same is true for the other seasons, let’s be clear
About that. I have stressed this before and will again; to pretend
Is to deny. Everything solitary has an interface
With something else and therefore is not solitary. To glide
Is to not experience friction. At some point you may want to trade
Slip for grip. Never bask in glory

Unearned. The web interface has clear
Flaws, don’t be ignorant. Glory may never pretend
To glide toward despair, but neither of those would I be willing to trade.

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Stone Sculpture

The sculptor selects 
a mallet and a chisel, 
repositions the 
rock, creates the tailings to
pave the statue’s patron path.

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Society

From one to a mob a person becomes people
An idea becomes action
Results occur
Blame only sticks to individuals
Responsibility dissipates
Pride fuels greed
Exploitation is honorable
Benevolence is a weakness 
Restitution is regarded as unearned reward
Oppression does not mature

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I Smelled Trouble of a Fancy Rose

Petite sweet deception-free promises
Blurred the air
Trusting hope
Deep deliberate ingestion of my own fantasy
The air was cool and refreshing
But exhaling nothing but warm beer and salsa
I accepted the dare to believe
That the next glimpse would deepen the hope
That I had become more worthy of the beauty
That my eyes provided
That she was both the rose and the fragrance
But exhaling nothing but warm beer and salsa
I was returned to where I started from

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Diary of Sisyphus

I scale a mountain high
Sandals on feet propel me toward the sky.
Breathing thin air through thin nostrils I sweat and try
To minimize being battered by the razor winged fly
That scalps my beard and the lashes of each eye.
Honestly, with each heavenly step I try
But stumble, and am humbled to cry…
Not for lack of joy or for lack of sadness, but for my
hollow motive: deception is a lie.
And yet I persist to wonder why
This task is a punishment and a crime. I
Yearn to know, but through weariness, sigh.

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Haiku

Wind blown leaves above
create a shadowy sky
like night they too fall

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Scapegoat Mutiny

Scapegoat Mutiny

The perspicuous statements by The Man, meant to flatter,
Were maximally inurbane. In hindsight could only alienate 
The dozens of individuals who now gravitate to retaliate.
    
     The Scapegoat Mutiny must succeed!
     Woe to those who think it transitory,
         bountiful malignant repercussions shall befall them!
     Any actions to dissipate will fail!
    
Those are the claims of the mutineers.
The capricious results will be perceived as beneficial by some 
And detrimental by others.

15 September 2016

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Photography

I have a lens
Framing segments
Of a world
That moves me
Creating an artificial pause
As if to stop it