Foundry Poems

LIFE OF A SHOVEL

I REMEMBER MY CREATOR 
A GREAT BIG BURLY LAD
I WAS SENT OFF TO THE HARDWARE STORE
TO DO THE SAME JOB AS MY DAD.
A YOUNG CHAP CAME A BOUGHT ME
HE TOOK ME TO THE SITE
HE MADE ME WORK FOR HOURS ON END
MORNING NOON AND NIGHT.
MY BLADE IS GOING RUSTY  NOW
MY EDGE HAS GONE TO POT
MY SHAFT THAT ONCE WAS RIGID
IS GOING SOFT AND STARTING TO ROT.
I KNOW MY DAYS ARE NUMBERED 
I'M PASSED MY USE BY DATE
COULD YOU TAKE ME TO THE FOUNDRY PLEASE
TURN ME INTO SOMETHING MORE ORNATE.
 IT'S HARD WORK BEING A SHOVEL
 I WANT TO RETIRE.

Foundry and Mill

Larks are ascending funnels of sky,
songs smoke from enteral chimneys.
In an industrial park a fine Autumn light
burns bright.

Shoes fill with walkers,
we are out and praising
the clanking machinery,
for we are all leaves 
in the same furnace.

What we suppose
to be sleep and decline
is a wooded factory, a whittle and grind
gearing-up for an over-spilling,
a bundling color-filled season,
one that will in time
hammer snow out of spoilage.

The Larks are trilling,
they rise to the top of their voices.
Conveyer belts of cooling hymns
are ready to be parceled and sent, 
addressed graphically:

'Return to Sender.'

Dust Blown Around In Gust and Thrust

into side  must thrust
wind would come up with a gust
did survive from dust 

we knew they were trans
which had been part of their plans
either Fred's or Fran's

we love our mother
is perfect like no other
even another

fire seemed to spread
trees burned up than were dead
dreamed of when in bed

to God  we will pray
tornado not come our way
away from us stay

Carolina country
with an iron foundry
along the boundary

Need to have a poetry group at 
St. James Episcopal Church.

The Book of Revelations

He walked up Mill Street past the Foundry,
That citadel across from Nailers Row.
With eight kids and their mother as dependents,
He earned the pay that brought the bacon home.

An immigrant, he labored at the open-hearth
With Dagos, and Polacks, and Micks.
He had thirteen years at the Phoenix Works.
Eighteenth of February, nineteen twenty-six.

While Luigi tended the tap hole,
And Kowalski skimmed off the slag,
He proceeded to enter the gas flue.
To clean out the soot with a rag. 

Nobody witnessed the mishap.
No one even knew who it was.
They recovered his belt and his work boots.
All the coroner said was, “Because.”

The paper’s front page told the story
Of a stranger who perished in hell.
They ran a correction, but misspelled his name,
Though his mourners were listed as well.

There is truth to this family legend,
But a mystery also implied;
He was burned beyond recognition.
Do we truly know who it was died?

Summers Day

On sports betting I’d bet my life
Praying I choose the right odds.
Lately I’ve been placing my trust in cocktails and gin
Trying to embrace these new habits I have,
Like writing poems and living  life off the income I’m yet to receive.
 I’m forging this ode to the tone of today’s sunset
As ballads sung by men of vintage days come to mind,
 I caress my infant beard and think of what my future wife is to read,
I have found myself praising a lass with stanzas and consonants once more,
We go together,
Like marshmallows and fire
The sweet of my words are to be gauged by the foundry of its maker.
In this epoch she is the one I compare to a summers day.

The Foundry

What is… inherent,
what’s not… implied

Epiphanous moments
—waiting inside

(Bryn Mawr College: January, 2021)

Disturbution 2

 Wet a glance as the nocturne faded. Deeply rooted was the clause of all men's fears and queries. Nonetheless stagnant to the terms of the ever growing woe-field at dusk. Nevermore would the twelfth cripple slay the beast of foundry lane. Cups of variation would beam and gawk the very presence of egotistical teas, or anything like it for that matter.
 She had very much grown to like the groans of the cask watcher, as she needled him, sew. Mana waned, exalted at at the fact that a taco stand could ne'r grasp the sheer magnificence of such a blur of cosmic obliteration. 
Fathers of bears DO enjoy skittles, after they have fallen to the gleaming, sometimes tripe-ridden lakes of the barbarian fist junkies of old. Don't ask me why, but scattered pie is far more delicious.

City Water

Risen
From the springtime flooding along South MLK
A sh#t-skinned slimy pipe
Pops half way up from a grimy hole
Like a gopher molded from iron ore

Neck and head periscoping left then right
Tiny arms bolted to its furry chest of rust
Surveying the silence of this industrial prairie
And the graves pocked from Foundry hammers

Until a school bell bangs
And a kaleidoscope gang of cell phone kids
Clamber from broken windows and dim doorways
To play in this forbidden park
Riding and rocking the new springer like a rodeo bronco

Screwing
The old boss back to its subterranean foundation
Another generation
Re-connecting the muddy wells to our silver faucets.

Transcendent and Divine

Science will never prove
The existence of God
Science will never disprove
The existence of God
Its physics pre-emergent
Its logic self contained
If anything, a tool
To measure what’s at hand
But like the foundry never
Retaining the artists spirit
Quantum theory will never 
Define the Creator
Both simple and complex
Defying contradiction
It’s inside the deepest paradoxes
That we come closest to God
And within those contradictions
Become truly ourselves
Emerging from the great mystery
  —both transcendent and divine

(Villanova Pennsylvania: May, 2019)

Battle Cry

I am as subtle as the maker who made me;
I’m not the strongest,
I’m not the bravest,
I’m not the luckiest,
I’m not the smartest,
And definitely not the brightest,
I’m just one who works the hardest.
These words are a battle cry, save your empathy!
Least be assured that I’m a man of fight
For steel is steel and is not subject to the foundry that forged it
My feet are a massif and belly, a fireball.
This poem is a battle cry, only smoke and sirens
Today the toy soldier comes with a grenade.


24/11/2018
Copyright © All Rights Reserved

Robin

Here
A
Little
Robin sings.
His joyful piping
Brings happiness to human ears,
His fiery redbreast glowing like a foundry furnace.

But
We
Humans
Misconstrue
His soliloquy.
No harbinger of Spring is he,
Unique amongst our garden birds, he sings all year round.

He 
Sings
Not for
Happiness
Nor joy of Nature –
He’s driven by a primal urge,
His song, a warning, a territorial battle cry.

Cut Or

Idk
What 
To do
Cut myself
Or live through
And this is real
I know the pain
And may your
Choice be the latter
Cuz in the race your
Heart n soul’s
What matters
#soul foundry

Watershed Thunder

Watershed thunder 

Rise up the hill transformed by illusions, 
majestic mountains tells a  story.
intrigued  to us this ancient  world,
to celebrate this natural  glory   

Boasting  with  eagles  of  great flight,
waterfalls drool like jaggered  curtains, 
draped in rainbows  of colour  bright,

White thunder roars with sock - like feet.
pounding the rocks with erratic blows,
repeating the waves of history,
to a coastal foundry of the  sea,

Pills Pushed To the Front

Smoky and scarred 
pills pushed to front 
a poker or blunt 

raised through the ruins 
will be leaving here soon 

open the chest 
where living's a soul 
burnt out by black coal 

sifting the diamonds 
sure is no chore 
sparkling rich waters 
just pick the right drawer 

curled up in the corner 
vague flickers ignite 
words are repeated 
teaching soft light 

fill up the foundry 
where emptiness lies 
a need to a burning 
seen in innocent eyes

The Emperor Takes His Ease

L'Empéreur s'amuse

(after Victor Hugo)

For the banished ones, of stubborn resistance,
France is far off.  The tomb is near.
But don’t worry, Prince.  Enjoy your existence.
In the Bois de Boulogne, chase deer,
chase women in the theatre.  Rome’s burning incense 
for you.  The Tsar calls you “mon frère”.

Play on, sweet Prince.  You have swans in Compiegne
and you have the wines of Bordeaux.
You seek novelty, amusement?  Why then,
they’ll bring you fourchettes from Les Baux.
Swooning under your crown of grapes, tiens!
You’re something out of Caravaggio.

The convicts are building the lighthouse.  Fine.
So ordered, by the King.
They’re casting bells on foundry lines.
In hellish heat, they’re suffering. 
One day their light is going to shine.
Those bells are going to ring.

So dawdle, dally.  Have your fun.
Put on your languid airs.
The thread of Fate’s already spun.
Who’s going to hear your prayers?
Who will save you?  Where will you run,
when the people take what’s theirs?

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