Best 1963 Poems

A handsome man, a valiant son,
John Kennedy was he.
A man who rose to President
with civil rights the key.

Who can forget the many days
like Camelot they seemed,
when all eyes were on Washington,
they passed just like a dream.

Ah, we remember Jacqueline
a Vassar deb was she,
who walked with...

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Number 22 in 1963


The prior season and many seasons past had been great for our school. However, the ‘62-’63 season was to prove disastrous for our school. I had been looking forward to the 63-64 season when I knew that I would be ready and...

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A common-born child
was changed by the death
of a man one day.
Back in the 60's,
(I remember.)
when barefoot kids
were called in,
from carefree play.
A rowdy, raucous group,
(Tag, you're 'it' No! Tag,
I got you back.)
tumbling into the backdoor,
in answer to Momma's call.
I, being first inside,
pulled up short,
knowing something
just wasn't...

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I wear a veil of iron mesh,
it sheilds me from sensation,
it's like the one that Jackie wore
after Jack's assassination.

I was just a youngster then,
but, deep inside, I knew,
that with that act of violence
came the end of Xanadu.

My childhood innocense was gone
along with Camelot,
Pandora's box had...

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I stood and cried in The Magazine Bus,
Deep in New Orleans, in the city rush, 
as it plowed and choked along
like a curved-back dinosaur
wheezing through the swampy ways, 
rattling electric wires in a maze
of strangling city vines,
stamping the earth with oil and pugmarks,
straddling, shifting, sliding...

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EYES OF A MONTAGNARD GIRL 1963
Eyes without reason,
never having an end
searching forever,
never finding a friend.

Eyes without mercy,
stealing all that was you,
changing forever
what you thought love could do.

You will love her forever.
as she'll love you the same,
But it stays in the Highlands
as if we never came.

©...

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Men of November (1963 - 2008 )

Today, forty-five years ago, we heaved
this weight to our shoulders,
not seeing, knowing its complete meaning,
yet beckoning to ask why not?
 
You are now asked to carry this light's great intent:
to find, explore the fiber and nerve of essential need.
Define...

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Funeral in 1963


Beveled dusty cracked glass shielding Mother Mary enthroned,
Amidst flying angelic devotions atop whipped clouds of icy air,
Enslaved by an antique miracle made manifest in stained blood,
With silent invisible memorized prayers uttered in ancient Latin refrains, 
Bowed before upright holy statues and a gold-encrusted...

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I would like to tell you
About Todd, our brother
He was one of a kind
Unlike any other

Todd played a mean banjo
He could sing like a pro
The group that he played in
Would put on a good show

Todd knew all about cars
Fixed their faults everytime
He bought them, he...

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Today, forty-five years ago, we heaved
this weight to our shoulders,
not seeing, knowing its complete meaning,
yet beckoning to ask why not?
 
You are now asked to carry this light's great intent:
to find, explore the fiber and nerve of essential need.
Define ways, delicate means.
Yes, leverage our dexterous...

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Those long bus rides 
between Urbana, Illinois and Wheaton, Maryland 
were all in the interspace,  
hours of smooth nothingness punctuated 
by jangly nothingness 
at change points like Cincinnati and Pittsburg. 
Blurs in memory, dreamy, 
taste of intensly needed sandwiches 
and the desperate need to...

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we were tired
after the long march for freedom hundred
miles of trekking hurting knees sweating skin
too hot a day for the mid autumn may be the pain
fever in the big city after the cherries have blossomed 
n gone like an endemic influenza
sea of people like the...

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Remembrance of « Creation » 1963 (MM)
(Marcel Marceau 1963)

Face white-clown-painted 
hands crossing invisibility
in a white-gloved glissade

a soft, silent shifting, 
a step-slide 
over non-existent windows, walls and doors

a glide into gesture

into signing
a seeking

into a stirring
a knowing 
a genesis 

the stage, his staging
the spotlight on 
in a...

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Every fragile flower
Weaves a different sense of power
But the old gardener 
His hands and fingers soil stained
Wears the same disguise
Over his disdain for the poor and trodden mass
The beleagured hair in relentless hands
The squirming bodies bruised and broken
The trying cross of love despised
They gathered the...

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a blue chevy impala basks in a suburban driveway
like a beached whale it oozes gases and black oils 
its seeping white walls beg for rubber movements
little boy inside the house sits on a pleated couch
he watches the setting sun through a screen door
fat mother stirs...

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