Best Cart Poems
Be thou kindness, ruler in my heart!
Shake any evil from my quill.
No harsh words to depart,
To soil another poets will.
Let rays of sunshine beam from every line,
To brighten another poets heart.
My humble heart with theirs entwined,
In a gardenia scented poetic cart.
Oh, let me be humble at my best.
And see their talent in all its fine glory.
Put me to the Muses hardest test!
That I pen a poem, never to be sorry.
Above all, save me from my own pomposity.
For 'tis too easy, with pride to be bent.
Save me from thoughts of my own grandiosity.
Sitting alone in pride's lonesome tent.
February 24, 2020
11 am PST
WHEN MOTHER PULLS THE CART
Way back my classmate of middle school
Lost early on his father in the clutch of cancer
Destitute family cart mother was forced to pull
Clouds of trying times in the void sky he saw gather.
The study expenses weren’t easy to meet
He thought from the school he would drop out
But his mother said he needn’t, should never do it
She would soon find the way out, without any doubt.
He had no idea what that way could be
He was so assured, didn’t lose sleep over it
For he knew mother would do her best to see
Her bright son finished the school study with credit.
He woke up in the middle of a winter night
Found his mother’s bed empty, not slept on
When this happened routinely night after night
He decided to find out where she could’ve gone.
In the dead of cold night he went out to explore
Saw from the antique room a streak of light seep
He peeked through the keyhole of the closed door
She was stitching cloth bags, eyes half-closed in sleep.
January 23, 2019
Contest : All Yours (Feb 19)
Sponsor : Brian Strand
Snow flakes
Tapping glass
One by one,
Scraping silence
From the pane of autumn’s stare
Where they gather
In mute reflections,
Like moths to a flame
Blustering into chaotic rhythm
White upon light,
Cart-wheeling crystals
Frozen in free
Falling eddies now
Gathering upon a wind,
In violent whiteout
As a fire stares
Back from beyond the hearth
A sentinel
Of warmth bearing
Witness to fair warning
From an army of
Snow
Zooming, zooming, zooming fast,
I'm racing by in my billy cart,
Had to swerve to miss my dog,
Smashing into a fallen log,
Now I have to wear a plaster cast.
Gonna start using a golf cart to get around
Till they finally read me my last rights
Feeling a bit under par
In golf terms, that's really good
In health terms... hmmm not so good
Don't be alarmed though
Just the normal aches and pains
Of old age creeping up on me
Whatever happened to my golden years
They were supposed be filled with
Happiness, joy and laughter
More like a double bogey for yours truly
Definitely need a handicap... no wait
I already have one, it's called old age!
© Jack Ellison 2014>center>
I'm driving down the street
Taking in the sight & sounds.
I see a disturbing sight
A family pushing a shopping cart around.
Their clothes are dirty
They look like they haven't eaten in days.
But somehow it doesn't bother them
They don't seemed to be fazed.
People walked & drove past them
As if they weren't there.
They acted like, it isn't my problem
Why should I care?
I wanted to get out my car
& offer this family some encouragement.
Give them a few bucks
So their kids could have some nourishment.
I didn't, I kept driving
& stopped looking their way.
I was like everyone else
I didn't care anyway.
I started thinking of my own children
Could I put them through this?
Could we fit all we own in a shopping cart
& still live in bliss?
Would our pride allow us
To ask strangers for change?
Would we suffer from culture shock
If our lives were that much rearranged.
Would we be able to deal with
The weather, the hunger, shame?
To be amongst the nameless
Where no one knows your name.
I started to feel bad for this family
So I turned my car around.
I went to look for them
But they were nowhere to be found.
I got home & got on my knees
& began to pray.
I asked God to shine his light on them
& give this family better days.
I prayed for those 3 children
Who looked tired & worn out.
I prayed for their mother too
Her eyes were so filled with doubt.
I prayed for their father
Who felt like he failed his family.
Who am i to judge them
Hell, that could of been me.
For some reason that family
Stays on my mind.
I never saw them again
They're just a memory in time.
I often wonder what became of them.
Did they ever get through this?
They are stronger than my family
There's no way we could ever do this.
When I start thinking life is hard
& my world's coming apart.
I just think of that family
Pushing that Wal-Mart shopping cart.
In car seats sitting in a parking lot, grocery store
We witnessed a most ghastly gore
An out of control shopping cart
On a path toward my car door
I yelled, “WHAT DO I DO?!”
When in a panic
One often has no clue
I panicked and raced
To get keys into place
But they landed
Jingling to the floor
You said, “HURRY!!!!”
I tried my best to scurry
Relieved when the key and ignition
Made love
I threw it in reverse
For the cart wasn’t to be coerced
When we escaped
Feeling like heroes, caped
We put the groceries on the counter
And made love for an hour
Modern day charioteer
Segways are easy to steer
No emissions here
soon all that will be left is a jar with
a vertibrae and rubbing alcohol.
methusela growing long exo-sceletal fingernails
in his seven hundreth year steers crookedly.
soon all that will be left is grocery isles filled
with bleached teflon he says.
rows of miraculous white wonder bread.
methusela tells how in the 80's outside of
berlin he used the psudeneum
sir diedrich chronograph.
apparently he was a well known grafetti artist
along the ribs of the autobahn.
methusela smiles a little dodging children down the
isle playing with plastic sabre swords.
Joyous rapture awoke sleeping animalistic giant:
carnal, feral, gonadal horniness in deed, when defiant
this primate crossed figurative
paths with a stunning woman
older than a spring chicken freed
via ma hen nah paws van
jealous (of casual suitors),
when I figuratively crossed urban
paths with delectable dame.
This hedonistic mwm veritable tan
tin nab buell lay shun caged in rein
mister experienced euphoric San
ta Claus gifted encounter merely
approached a female stranger ran
king as absolutely beautiful asper
Samson recounted Delilah, Qan
i.e. qualification assurance notification
within this poetic blurb. Pan
dum money yum (does not come close)
upon entering a nan
oh meter times a gazillion equals
scope of super sized ALDI's, every man
woman, and child could be housed.
This supermarket (anchored lan
did at one end of a string of bungle
low slung businesses conveniently kan
struck ted adjacent to popular stores,
which aligned buildings a haven come Jan
ewe weary, these newly constructed
bricks and mortal portals along Ian
eyesed, seen as primary corridor
i.e. Ridge Pike (linkedin with Han
sill and Gretel recently rural gingerbread
cookie cutter communities). Gan
a mead by Jove, said affordably priced
food store noticed as a fan
tass tick location along the driver side
heading towards Limerick, ean
at dark hours within Pennsylvania).
This patron (me) of aforementioned Dan
dee nofrills modestly priced franchise
espied an available card soon after Can
Nudda entered this outsize place
to buy groceries. Another shopper (a bon ban
Joe plucky strung string apetite
slip sans attractive gracefully aged gal) anan
This poem was inspired by the interviews by Earl K. Pollon and S. S. Matheson conducted with native Sekanni peoples who were negatively effected by the flooding of their communal homelands by the building of the W.A.C. Bennett Dam. “This Was Our Valley” tells that story of injustice. 640 square miles of riverfront and hunting territory would be flooded to form Williston Lake. The Sekanni peoples were driven from their ancestral homeland in northeastern British Columbia, Canada and dispersed.
The Shopping Cart Injustice
People, place and spirit
All were our relations
Biopeds, quadrupeds, winged or finned -
River language told us so.
Fishing rocks spoke the run
Where the riffles and the rapids talked.
Ancestors, dead and alive, told living stories where
Running the river banks, the children played.
The land was a book written in forms.
We made our mark with love, community
Fishing weirs, aspen dugout canoes,
Hunting trails, camps and sacred sites.
Always traders, we traded furs with
White settlers when they arrived
On the rivers Parsnip, Finlay and Peace at
Finlay Forks, Fort Grahame, Fort McLeod.
We added pack trains, teams of pack horses
River freighters, flat bottom ‘longboats’
For supplies and for mail delivery.
It seemed that we could live together.
Then one day a government agent said
That shopping carts were coming
They would flood our world
Water rising everywhere
Shopping carts with electric can openers
Full, fast to check out,
Shopping carts with electric hair blowers,
Full, faster to check out,
Shopping carts with electric air conditioners,
Full, fastest to check out
Shopping carts with electric stoves.
Check out, check out, check out.
They would make our rivers into a lake
We would move or drown.
Our elders did not believe it.
That was the only consultations!
Soon Saskatoon berries all under water
Next, the banks sloughed back to graveyards
Next, cliffs crumbled, and banks fell into rising lake
Houses of the villages slipped and floated
Coffins, bones and bodies strewed the shore
Where tangled trees, debris and more
Eddied with flotsam in the wind.
We wept for our ancestors!
We weep for our children.
We had to flee the destruction
Caused by tree grinders, D-9 bull dozers
The dam construction.
Now they want to take more
Another dam for more shopping carts.
Please stop Site ‘C’.
Behold today your name
engraves my sky
Indeed my eyes your face
alone espy
You own my mind no matter
how I try
To stay alive to issues
lurking by.
Alone my world was empty
and a gloom
With you my life compares
to August bloom
Alone I only craved a
peaceful tomb
With you my fortunes wallow
now in boom.
A vow I make to live within
your heart
A sword or speech can
never pull apart
My hand in yours together
we depart
To paradise on lovely
lovers' cart.
Most of my time is spent in a Piggly Wiggly line
So you know the Hollywood rags I have seen
Scouring them inside out, top to bottom, back to front
I know all the skinny on all the skinny stars in-between
This day Mona in a Moo Moo says from behind me
Something about this must be done
So with the east in our rear (That doesn't sound right does it!)
Look out Hollywood California here we come
Not long after landing in Los Angeles
Before we even barely had time
We set up what "THEY" think is an organic juice hand squeezed by Virgin's
and Himalayan soy Sushi bar
Out of our Hot Dog cart on the corner of Hollywood and Vine
And yes, we've added a little secret ingredient
Something to fatten those Hollywood types up
So they'll look like the rest of us in America
With the line around the block it looks like they can't get enough
With a little dab here and a little sprinkle there (wink,wink)
Our food has become the talk of the town
You'd think they would have figured it out by now
As each delicious bite adds a few extra pounds
And menu items with names like
-Add Another Roll Sushi-
Or the...
-Don't Look Behind You Sushi Surprise-
Then there's our most popular item
The -California Your Butt SuperSize-
Now that we've fattened up most of the Movie Stars and then some
California's so heavy it may soon slide into the sea
With a new concoction we've developed to stimulate brain juice's
We're now taking our Hot Dog Cart to Washington D.C.
In an old farmhouse high on the cliffs of Dingli
surrounded by archaeology and mystery
lives Mary, guiding visitors to explore and find
caves and cart ruts, deep tracks seeming mined
that criss cross at Clapham Junction
it’s not easy to guess their function.
Talk to Mary and she will tell you
of times gone by, when there was so few
people who wanted to know and understand
what it was that remains so strange in this land.
Perhaps it will always remain unknown,
since archaeologists have come and gone,
not enough with perseverance and finance,
they come and go and lose allegiance.
Maybe one day an answer will appear
and all will suddenly be clear,
why the cart ruts run under, the house,
where Mary lived with her mother.
Tribute To A Grocery Cart
I see it outside the store
Wait for me
Calling to me
Offering to help my aching feet
Making it easier to walk the aisles
But, I know it is evil
It knows just how much money I have
Not a penny less or a penny more
It leads me past the cookies
Past the candy
And past all the things I shouldn’t eat
Then it takes me to the register
Carrying all the junk I didn’t need
To a girl with the sweetest smile
She knows its power
She counts up my items
Dollar by dollar she adds to the total
I know it is laughing at me
I know I have spent every last cent
Then it follows me to the car like an old friend
Helps me by waiting until I unload
Then it laughs again as I realize
That I had forgotten the milk I went in to buy
And it gets taken back into the store
To wait calmly for another victim
While I sit and curse that lonely grocery cart
The demon of the supermarket