Long General Poems
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I strolled through the local cemetery the other day
And here are some epitaphs I observed along the way:
Cletus O'Toole lies herein
Too much boozing done him in!
Here lies a gambler molding in his crypt
Odds are he was shot by a chump he had gyped!
His spouse spotted him leaving a house of ill repute
In short order she done him in during a heated dispute!
Clyde raced down the mountain and failed to swerve
Meeting his doom on an S-shaped curve!
His plea to the judge was ruled to be moot
He was sentenced to hang for fencing some loot!
Buckaroo Bob was throwed from his horse
And was buried with his boots on as a matter of course!
The town ruffian was our late friend Keith
He met his match and was interred sans his teeth!
Pilot Pete's final radio message was, "Oh! Shoot!"
Seems he forgot to don his parachute!
Farrier Fred was a premier cobbler as a general rule
Alas, he was kicked in the head by an unruly mule!
Butcher Bruce was expert at wielding his knife
But in a fatal spat he was out-wielded by his wife!
POTD 24 June 2021
This is not a message of destruction,
From my heart I still receive instructions,
I am a man who disregard general instructions,
We all need someone anyone to give our attention to,
I hide behind my looks as a form of protection.
May I stop rhyming and whining,
I give to you, by this, an honor Your Highness,
I saw so much of you, even when dehydrated you gave out tears,
By them my heart was of a soldier in to spears.
You see all I need to glitter, in a world that only triumph,
Its hard to find a living when all you have is a doubt,
Hard to find an answer when the question won't come out,
Your only considered mature when you know what love is about,
Farewell to you, a she who scares away the dark,
Be strong woman, one day in love you'll get stuck.
June nineteenth one hundred and fifty years ago
Juneteenth hint: three hundred
and sixty six days
after eighteen sixty four.
Major General Gordon Granger
led the Union Soldiers to Galveston, Texas,
to announce the end of the Civil war
and the freedom of all enslaved people.
Jim Crow sat perched
over the event horizon
waiting in the wings,
which brought darkened
(non-sheltering) skies
not only for the hot pocket
of suddenly emancipated
persons of color,
who would subsequently experience
immense prejudice
upon their embarkation
as (no pun intended)
"masters" of their own selves
while attempting to eke out a living
dirt poor, yet resourceful
hunkering down on plantations,
which property eminent domain
of federal government,
(a political entity
characterized by union
of partially self-governing provinces,
states, or other regions),
whereby said body electric
codified, fortified, and indemnified
manifest destiny, a phrase
coined in 1845, the idea
that United States destined—
by God advocates believed—
to expand its dominion
and spread democracy and capitalism
across the entire North American continent.
Though institution of slavery
supposedly rendered null and void
at the stroke of a pen
(courtesy Abraham Lincoln)
well actual legislation
passed by Congress on January 31, 1865,
and ratified on December 6, 1865,
the 13th Amendment abolished slavery
in the United States.
Nevertheless merciless abuse
heaped upon the *****
despite their legal status
being Granted leeway
to persevere life, liberty
and pursuit of happiness.
Recognition as equal brethren
among collective soul of American
fraught with bitter aversion,
condemnation, and ejaculation
of physical and verbal violence
against people of color,
whose melanin enriched complexion
birthrights rendered hidebound
severely limited
inalienable rights as declared
in Declaration of Independence,
now still utter abhorrence
regarding treatment
of those proud enterprising people,
whose once storied
African past left in tatters
leaving sparse threads
woven together by diligent dogged research
nsync with twenty first century technology
to allow, enable and provide opportunity
to stitch together a more complete tapestry
and spiritual fusion with shackled ancestors.
Dad was puttering around today
Playing with me
God we haven’t played in years
You know, Dad’s eighty now
I remember how he looked in photos at twenty
I remember the twinkle in his eyes
at my sons two year old birthday party.
We played computer, you see Dad it can do this LOOK
LOOK here it does this too!
I did so like kissing the top of his bald head.
So good to see that old comb-over long gone now
So good to smell the MY Dad smell of clean clothes and soap.
Your files need to be organized Dad.
You have them all glommed up in with the general documents files.
Know wonder you can’t find them, all the love poems to his dear heart Ruth.
I wonder if he remembers my wedding day.
He was so handsome in his tux that day.
I remember his smile then as he watched me
walk the white carpet in the garden by the mill pond.
Joy, now is that any name to call a dog [oops SHE doesn’t know she’s a dog!]
The dust mop of a pooch barked indignantly as, I took her Daddies attention from
her.
Had a dog once, Babe was her name, she was a huge sheepdog, we lost
our Babe when I lost my Dad for a long time, BUT he's been back along while too
now
Dad was sharing with me and I so loved it. Me, of course being his first girl,
sharing with me, his love and happiness with his last girl OUR Ruth.
Elysian fields long since embraced dada's soul
which rocketed into aerospace
(courtesy General Electric satellite)
just a tad more'n eighteen plus months ago,
nevertheless melancholy
still plucks mine heart strings.
Mine psyche still situated awry
placid countenance of yours truly doth belie
residual sadness easily prompted
can easily trigger me to cry
linkedin when grim reaper gloated
October 7th, 2020
ye did somewhat peacefully die
though methinks immortality
I did briefly espy,
when miracles of modern medicine
tried, but could not
stave off mortality nor fortify
depredations of aging concerning
one wunderkind whose accomplishments
laudatory when a young handsome guy,
whose intelligence scored high
native talent aptitude tests did imply.
The late Boyce Brandon Harris
exhibited prolific talents at young age
aside being scholastically gifted,
acquiring graduate degree
courtesy Columbia University,
freshly minted mechanical engineer
(he admirably ranked within
uppermost percentile academically),
I hashtag thy mine deceased father
(a polymath - jack-of-all-trades),
who possessed (née excelled)
at diverse creative abilities.
Aside from being schooled
as mechanical engineer,
(which courses in mathematics and science
he passed with flying colors)
his mind genetically bequeathed
to craft almost anything under the sun
evidenced first by yours truly,
the second offspring and sole son
who ofttimes felt intimidated
at being in presence
of said Renaissance man.
Handicrafts included
expending blood, sweat, and tears
to craft multitude of projects;
i. building me Flintstone (foot powered)
car with wooden license plate.
ii. making playhouse for all three
of us - his progeny.
iii. amassing wood pile(s),
to stoke wood burning stoves
iv. designing Zayda trail for Teddy and Ruff
(two doggone mixed breed Border Collies
rescued courtesy youngest sister
at her Jacobsburg, Penna work site)
v. constructing sauna in cellar,
The garden sunlight plays tag
with our fat ginger cat.
Dad watches World War Two
he grinds his teeth
a general forced to take a back seat.
Mother is in the kitchen
not her natural territory.
She opens cupboards exploring contents.
It is a blue and white kitchen
made of trees that died in 1974
along with linoleum dreams.
She shakes a martini like a
blind cardsharp. Her wrists
are heron bones
that click a gold-toothed charm chain.
Flashes of recollection -
they follow me up beige carpeted stairs.
Small bathroom-toilet to the right
where once I saw mum naked.
Oedipus lives down the hall
as a young teenager.
From my window
I see the long narrow garden
with its back gate.
Passion-flowers entwining pine boards.
When the Nazi Storm Troopers come
I will fire down at them, lobbing hissing grenades
that land like angry cats onto their fleeing backs.
A knock on my bedroom door.
I can hear myself breathing heavily,
a teenager desperately yells: 'Keep out!'
Mum pauses to catch her breath.
She is out of uniform,
and speaking
to a camera in my head.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The general’s monocle holds
no reflection~
only maps
where borders bleed
like wet ink.
His uniform stiffens
with every medal,
each one hammered from
the same mute ore.
He signs the orders first,
then breakfast~
black coffee, bitter as spent shells.
The map is clean
where his finger rests,
no mud, no blood,
just ink-stained creases.
Five thousand tons of steel will roll
where his pencil hesitates.
The military machine
calls it strategy~
a word that appeals
to the masses
better than
corpse or widow.
Down the hall, the lieutenant
memorizes his father’s frown,
practicing it in the mirror.
Promotion tastes like
brass buttons
dissolving on his tongue.
The General studies the map again~
his coffee gone cold.
He traces borders
with his finger.
one that’s never touched dirt
or trembled in surrender.
Victory fits neatly
in his briefcase.
On the battlefield weeks later,
a corporal triumphantly
wipes his blade
and thinks of the boy
who called him coward
ten years ago,
in a schoolyard.
Later, alone,
the General admires his reflection
in the polished table,
imagining history books
too kind to mention
the tremor
in his hand.
And the wartime ego?
It never dies.
It digs trenches in the mind,
planting flags
in the graveyards
of reason.
...The sharp-shooters opened on him first,
Cutting down fifteen of his dragoons,
Tartleton ordered a grand charged,
with his infantry now on the move.
The sharp-shooters fired and fell back,
were absorbed in the second line,
who had been ordered to fire twice,
then get out of there double-time.
They targeted British officers,
took them down with accurate shots,
then retreated back as ordered
giving much more then they got.
But Tarleton saw them running,
and assumed that his men had won,
then ran into the Continentals,
three-hundred-fifty men with guns.
The militia moved behind them,
tnd out came a thunderous roar,
Swathes of British fell to the ground,
their ‘victory’ now nevermore.
Then that same militia regrouped,
swung right to hit Britain's left flank,
then came colonial cavalry
from the right into Tarleton’s ranks.
Fire poured from three directions,
the British now in an enfilade,
caught in a double envelopment,
like the Romans trapped at Cumae.
To add to it the British
hadn’t slept in forty-eight hours,
the will to fight went out of them,
to keep on wasnot in their power.
Without getting word from above
most threw up their arms and they quit,
six-hundred thirty were captured,
one hundred ten dead before this.
Tarlteton himself road back to
his remaining cavalry troops,
tried to get them to charge again,
but this order they just refused.
Knowing what would be done to him
if by the rebels he was captured,
Tarleton fled with three hundred men,
all of his force that had endured.
Cornwallis’s army remained,
but had lost the cream of the crop,
he marched from South Carolina,
his efforts to pacify dropped.
Instead he headed up northwards,
to chase General Nathaniel Greene down,
leading to a chain of events
that would bring about doom at Yorktown.
For the hard-pressed Americans
it was a huge moral victory,
bringing back hope of success
thanks to Daniel Morgan’s masterpiece.
I’m not sure what I’m writing about but it’s okay because as I type, I speak through my mind and into a piece of paper or my notes.
I love how I can have no clue about what I’m writing but I love finishing a essay or poem or whatever this is,
And seeing that I don’t have to lie about anything because it’s just there in plain sight after minutes of typing, writing, etc is so beautiful,
I wish life were as easy and simple as this but it’s not because life isn’t like typing or writing.
You can’t just pause and stop life for a second or a minute or even a day to figure things out, you have to act fast and be smart about it.
You need to make the right decision right there and then.
The difference with writing is that you are able to pause and re-read your work and fix it.
In real life you can’t always do that,
Especially if it was meant to be done right then and there.
You can’t expect life to be perfect and neither can you a poem.
Nothing in life will always be perfect and that’s okay.
Nothing in general is perfect.
You aren’t either.
You have to make the best of what you have got.
Yes, you can write your story in your own ways but is it the truth?
Are you over-exaggerating it to seem like someone you know that deep down you aren’t?
Or do you just want validation from people? I’m not sure what I’ve been ranting about but I’m glad I’ve been typing because time has passed,
I have distracted myself from all the thoughts running through my head and I have poured my soul into this iPad.
Good night.
I reckon you could rightly say that I am from the old school,
But some of the politically correct stuff today, as a general rule,
Leaves me scratching my skull, baffled and so incredulous,
Groping for the proper words as I try to be cautious and sedulous!
When I was growing up many years ago, people were "happy and gay!"
I know I step on sensitive toes but that term would offend some today!
When you were "happy and gay" it meant that you were jolly and elated,
But "gay" has a different connotation today, completely unrelated!
When you "made love" in my day it usually meant you were "necking",
Parked in your old jalopy, music playing, smooching and pecking!
Nowadays, "making love" has a different connotation, but I'll keep it clean!
I shouldn't have to draw a picture - I think you'll figure out what I mean!
Families were disgraced in my day when young Susie was found with child.
She was scorned and sent to "visit Aunt Gladys" out of state, to put it mild!
Seems it's a badge of honor today and is something to be glorified!
Well, whatever, but if it were my kid I would be sorely mortified!
Gossip would run amok when a couple "shacked up" in my old hometown!
Today, "living together" is the politically correct term for settling down!
This was written with lingua in cheek but freedom of tongue guarantees,
That this four score old coot can write anything that he dang well please!
Robert L. Hinshaw, CMSgt, USAF, Retired
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