Deep Sleep of Foreigner's Flagon
For twenty years,
Tears in-between,
Rain and rust
And gray-beard dust.
A flooded flagon,
Empty-dry. Laid aside.
A spook to his wolf,
savior to the squirrels.
A languid man snores
While robins lay eggs
In his briery beard.
Blue and yellow eyes
Startle awake.
Oh what trouble
To sleep all night!
The Kaatskills mock,
In torment
Of bygone years,
This stinking man and
his tangled long beard.
Dame Van Winkle’s
Not dead from grief,
But from restless lips
Of donnybrook.
Like all ages, past to future,
Politics ticks and tocks.
Rip hangs upon the pendulum,
Not knowing which side he’s on.
His daughter’s his savior.
His namesake’s his doppelgänger.
The old man rises from the hills,
Baffled and half-moon shy.
Kim Rodrigues © 2017
This might amuse those who know the story of Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving.
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