Best Linoleum Poems
This bridge has arched the lake's narrows
for a century, flanked on either side
by Autumn trees shedding their faded leaves,
blowing with the first snowflakes
across worn gray stones of my spirit.
Six months ago you felt the first pain.
Now you lie in white sterility
of hospice care, continually exorcizing
the feeding tube, a final tether
binding you to earth,
where the morphine pump wheezes
every fifteen minutes
and missionaries advise prayer
to the strength-less living.
Your a**hole oncologist told me your suffering
was none of my business.
I told him to take his prognosis,
as suffocating as the pine cleaner
lingering like miasma
over hallway linoleum,
and get the f**k out.
From the corner of my eye
I spot a wild rose sprouting on the bank
at the base of a haggard maple,
an anomaly in bleak October,
glaring crimson as my resentment,
angry as the dream when I said,
I'll be your will when yours is gone.
Knowing full well it won't survive the winter,
I give fate the finger
from my dismal perch,
just as I gave you two dozen such blooms this Mother's Day.
I'll see you in Spring,
rises the phoenix from my Summer ashes.
The flurries thicken around me
like a gathering of angels.
With eyes stinging
I toss plucked petals of pennies
into the Judas lake
while wishing as hard as I can.
12/31/18
Summer lay lazily over the land.
The languid weight of wind and water
bowing tree limbs, chasing sand
squalls over sidewalks.
Cyclist meander down aisles
of Rose of Sharon shrubbery past
banks of day lilies and Pez-purple
hydrangeas.
Tourist, colorful as the flowers,
buzz through seaside shops in flip flops
the color of Necco wafers.
Their gummy soles making sucking
sounds upon the linoleum.
In gingerbread slumber like fairy-tale children,
they gather in pink, lime-green, and purple houses.
The poor of a Christian God have become
the rich of a capitalist nation.
They hoard their paper-lantern dream.
I tiptoe through empty rooms,
lest my footsteps evoke his presence.
I gaze at cracked linoleum,
still bearing marks
worn into it by the old table legs.
Mother's face floats through
the smoky windowpane,
her sorrowful eyes pleading.
Neil stares downward
at the uneaten food
congealed on his plate.
Sarah's face is buried
in a limp rag doll,
clutched to her breast.
I glance down the hall,
past the bedroom.
I will not go in there.
No need to visit old pain.
I turn my back
to the silent, cold house
and walk away from my past.
I. Noise in an empty hallway:
My old leather shoes protest as I hurry down the linoleum tiles
Like I'm wearing a little piece of history older than I am.
II. Headlights on a dark road:
Speeding down narrow country roads
windows rolled down and Autumn wind rushing through the car
Ripping my hair from its tie
My arm stretching out the window, numb in the night air.
III. Ephemeral beauty:
For a moment, life is endless and incredibly brief
Stretching before me like a dusty trail at sunset
Disappearing into the trees.
IV. Origin of life:
There is this vague, unnamable incomprehension in my chest
Like euphemisms, that is the easy way out
This is the hard way: I am alive, alive, alive
When one cell became thirty trillion, I gained consciousness.
V. I am not the sum of my parts:
I don't have the faith to believe
That all my thirty trillion cells are a fluke of nature
VI. Evidence:
I am the proof of divinity's existence
A signpost shouting "I am alive" thirty trillion times with all the power of my lungs
Designed for miracles
VII. Rene Descartes:
It is not
I think; therefore, I am
It is
I think; therefore, He is.
For the life of me I can't understand,
Why you can't fall in love.
I never bring roses on a first date,
Always opting for a live dove.
You hit the linoleum so quick,
Without even the slightest shove.
As the front door slammed,
off your feet you were knocked.
Almost fell off the chair,
As you drank whilst I talked
Tripped over my left foot,
As we danced interlocked.
Almost passed out with,
An allergic reaction to steak?
Jumped out of my car before,
I could even hit the brake.
Broke year heel running away,
Tumbling over the hidden rake.
You're lucky I caught you when,
You fell back from my first kiss.
This whole night has been,
Full of the 'falling' near miss.
Fall in love with me one more time, I know,
I will sweep you off you feet into eternal bliss.
Five stones
closing times
radiograms and
seventy-eights
school caps
sticklebacks
saturday flicks,pooh sticks
Charabancs
steam trains
linoleum
oil cloth
mangles
fish paste
sandwich spread
Hot towel shaves
cut-throat razor
shopping baskets
paper bags
braces,plimsoles
short,back
and sides
Wizard beano
and hotspur
lending libraries
picturegoer,
road to
Bridget Bardot
Marilyn Monroe
Dripping
coal fires
antimacassars
nylons,suspenders
crumpets
and toast
Brown and mild
barrelled beer
conkers,school milk
blackboard rubbers
and liftup desk lids
times-tabled
school-kids
Draughts
and allotments
rusty bikes
roller skates
satchels and scrumping
pounds,shillings
and pence
she liltingly spun smiling and singing
"You are my sunshine" waving for us
to join in
the pan dripped dancing tears on
the hot black stove where they sizzled and died
"My only sunshine" with a quick hug
her apron splattered with a thickening marinara -
summer's proud yield
the kitchen...was there another room?
dried curled wall paper near the stovepipe
exposed the decor carriages and princes of
yesterday Mom's childhood
"You make me happy"
the old black spaniel curled in the middle
nothing moving but eyes wary of
being tripped upon yet worth the risk
and perhaps a dropped meatball reward
"When skies are gray"
Worn linoleum exposed paths of time
the oak threshold proof
of welcomes and farewells
not really noticed by we in
our comfort of "now" not
thinking about our sunshine
being gone
"You'll never know dear how much I love you"
with a smile...always remembered
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In the kitchen at 3 a.m.,
dust motes hang suspended
in a wedge of streetlamp glow.
Grandmother's teacup
rests half-full on the counter,
steam still coiling upwards
though she left thirty years ago.
The linoleum remembers.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Each morning I count his breaths,
then the pills, then grocery lists,
then hypotheticals~
mornings brittle as eggshells
in a too-empty carton.
His breath, a slow tidal~
my lighthouse flickers nightly.
What shore waits for me
when the waves recede elsewhere,
barefoot on cold linoleum?
My skin is like tracing paper,
each crease a story no one reads~
who'll turn my frail pages
when my hands forget their alphabet?
Our pills rattle like dice
in the ceramic bowl.
I count his ribs through
the thinning cotton~
his breathing
the only clock I trust.
We planted oaks once~
roots deep, outlasting our bones.
Now their shade stretches,
but who will sit under them
when our names are just leaves?
Wintertime: snow fills the entry way.
Neighbors salt their own first.
I should've had sons~
or daughters who'd remember
how ice clings to old bones longest.
I imagine a future in which
the nurse’s smile stings.
Just ring if you need help, dear~
as if the button’s reach
isn’t the whole aching distance
between pride and the floor.
The dog's paw clawing on the linoleum,
Restless pacing while the kettle starts to
Activate steam. No, it's not a choir of a
Nimbus of gold, just the unmistakable,
Sudden realization that the sink is leaking
Cold tap water on a Monday morning -
Everything is heavy, until it isn't
Nobody told him that climbing out of
Despair felt like a wet, damp blanket
Eventually hung up to dry by the fire
Now, the prolonged static in the radio clears
Cutting through the kitchen grease
Exposing the manner in which dust settles.
There was a fire truck in my kitchen today! It was about two feet long and had the loudest siren. There were two men driving the truck and my grandson set atop. He was doing all the work as he keep yelling, “VROOOOOM!”
There was a fire truck in my kitchen today! All I could think of was my own son and all the times we played cars and trucks on the same floor. Then I looked up and remembered all the times he stood at the sink and splashed bubbles everywhere! The kitchen is the heart of my home and so I just sat there on the linoleum and reminisced with my coffee in my hand.
There was also a Lamborghini,
a Porsche,
a semi-truck,
and a cement mixer too!
These are the days to remember.
I hope I can relive this moment again next week!
Gwendolen Rix
1-19-15
This is you...
You're causing me to bleed.
And you have no apologies
for which you inflict fear into.
Seeing what isn't here.
I'm begging you to leave.
Can't you see I'm on my knees?
I've tried and tried so many times.
But you're still here...
Making me bleed...
All over the linoleum...
Thank God it's easy to clean.
Take this pain away from me
'Cause this Novocain
doesn’t work worth a damn.
And I'm just wasting my time
on my suicide lullaby...
I walk towards the light
as your soul replaces mine.
I reach out to feel
but then it all disappears again.
Just another figment
of my wild imagination.
I guess I need those pills again.
It's time to fulfill my addiction.
Take this pain away from me
'Cause this Novocain
doesn’t work worth a damn.
And I'm just wasting my time
on my suicide lullaby...
I try to stop the voices
from telling me what to do
in every situation.
But they are persistent.
And they can't hear my screams...
They don't hear my screams anymore...
Take this pain away from me
'Cause this Novocain
doesn’t work worth a damn.
And I'm just wasting my time
on my suicide lullaby...
And I'm committed to this crime...
With my suicide lullaby...
For the lack of spiked heels
The carpet endured,
The linoleum had no dents,
Women walked with confidence,
Maintaining balance.
For the lack of spiked heels
Mothers were more patient,
Children could tell the difference,
Husbands hugged their wives,
Cats no longer feared for their tails.
The world returned to normal,
Nations sought peace,
Wars ceased.
All for the lack of spiked heels.
We dragged the slopes to our feet.
On the summit, we burnt our clothes
for wood and there shuffled our feet
in the hush of the falling snow.
We had come out of the scuffed grass.
With one look back in unbelief
exhuming the long trek
the silent keen
puffing through blubbery fingers.
We pulled the hoofed trail through
the trapdoor of our unchained links
foisting for new heights.
Beyond the Appalachian Mountains
the hanging fern on pine dripped snow
on moles burrowing in gashed hollows.
We paused. In that doubtful moment
we rued the climb, succumbing to the assault
upon this stilled millennia’s eerie silence.
All that time the swivelling blizzards raged
shifting soil, eroding avalanches.
Below, burgeoning customs
unmaned the silent dignity of bisons.
All bore testimony to a familiar preparation.
And then, suddenly before our eyes
the solemn ground rose with the breeze
the spangled map changing to the quick:
Chicago Pittsburgh Kansas City
wild barnyards dry-coughing, pop-corning garages
horrent timber ribbed the coasting steamboats
the linoleum walls
the mild Indian piqued he was
by the mahogany cubism of our speech.
We wondered if coming so far
only mattered, we would be content
to build a fire, here and now
and unpack our horses.
We saw little need to go on.
One night the summit might open
up and swallow us all or old age
would come upon us like a lonely neighbour
on a pretext to the door.
© T.Wignesan 1964
London, U.K.
[from the collection: tell them i’m gone, 1983; published in Fire Readings (A Collection of Contemporary Writing from the Shakespeare & Company Fire Benefit Readings). Paris-Boston: Frank Books, 1991, pp. 36-37.]
The incredible superpower
of the aroma of bacon frying
And the pungent scent
of fresh brewed coffee…
To me, this shouts out
…“Sunday morning!”…
It has the power to move
The most sleepy persons
The power to lift leaden eyelids
The ability to make frowns
Turn to smiles and evoke memories
Of timeworn kitchen tables
And chipped coffee cups
And cold linoleum floors
No more or less
It’s childhood
It’s parents and grandparents
Old neighborhoods
Summer, Winter, Spring and Fall
And yet all it truly is
Is a bit of aromatic vapor
Just bacon frying
Coffee brewin’
Anticipation
…And memories…