When the World is Safe Again
Each breaking day as I awake
I ask my God in His good grace
To simply let me hold my place
Until the world is safe again
For now we have to wear our mask
So we can all complete the task
Of staying safe and out of harm
Until the world is safe again
I am sure the day will dawn
When each of us can be reborn
And hold our loved ones close once more
When the world is safe again
Loneliness can steal our song
It’s just a case of staying strong
This Covid nightmare will be gone
When the world is safe again
With the healing vaccine at our door
This awful plague should be no more
And each of us can then rejoice
When the world is safe again
Then we all will give our thanks
To all of those who held their ranks
And fought to keep us free from pain
When the world is safe again
Michael Hoban, Ph.D. – Professor Emeritus, City U of NY
profhoban@msn.com - Lakewood, NJ - January 21, 2021
INCESSANT SUMMER RAIN
In morbid humid summer heat I feign, easily drain
Prospecting for a cool, crisp meandering breeze
Conceivably, nature might spill a gentle "summer rain"
A dismal cloud generates, an inkling of relief to gratify, such a tease
Now I sit in disbelief up upon my slimy unscrupulous roof
Optimistic the local church will indeed appease the pleas
Answer the call and dutifully open its doors , "Poof "
For I live in the crippled, dripping, drowning state of Texas
Where relentless rain & Lakewood megaplex turned infectious
Positioned on my slurry roof I could swear I witnessed Neptune
Eyes ablaze, he was wearing a distinct gnarly grin
Throwing damning lightening bolts and declaring a monsoon
Rooting for the pastor, during disaster, to literally sin
Incredulous Neptune didn't anticipate people together
United would take care of brother & the chthonic weather
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at the risk of red leaves unfurling
perennial wisdom just outside
my peripheral vision, their lace
reeling against the city potholes
sinking deeper into ich bin ein Clevelander
despair,
i confirm that it is spring
trumpeting its pageantry
as the pages turn,
just before the summer of past
regrets ferrets its pensive conclusion
but that's not really what i want to say,
it's poetic foreplay
i want to tell you how i adore your
eyes, soft and misty and steel grey
with blue-tipped clouds,
i want to tell you that i kiss the dimple
on your chin a thousand times while you
scrape and paint and go about your day,
i want to say thank you for being real;
dancing into this morning's cup of brew
we drink each other down
long ago you stared across a far away landscape
and i meet your gaze thundering across poems
we would write.