Tromped Poems

They Came Last Night

They came last night
Sashayed and tromped through
A dreamy, semi-wakefulness
Snapshots of vague faces
Riffling pages of pageantry
Shuffling through suffering.
I failed to recognize many
Longed to linger with others
Applauded successes
Cheered failures resiliency
Reached to touch, to caress
The sinewy shadows of sorrow.
Awed by the strength and tenacity
Of life’s forever fortunes
As they danced across its ballroom floor
Huddled in its corners
Laughed at its ever-changing punchline.
A soft tear reminding me
That I had somehow been there
Shared a cosmic connection
With a distant,
Yet eternal
Moment.

Boots With Attitude

Boots with attitude
Tromped into the marketplace
Chopping up parquet floors
Approaching me
Stomping closer and closer
I backed away
Terrified of this woman
It takes super confidence to wear boots like this
And these boots are not just made for walk’n.

Meeting Benscar

He is a Benscar, a burly, beastly, bellowing, befitting ugly bug troll.
This was said by my older cousin who fibs, his name is mean mole.
I do not believe you, I said, because I was aware cousin Ruth.
I think for once in his life, Grandma said “He might be telling the truth”.

We all tromped down to the river to meet this troll named Benscar.
He was taking the carburetor out of grandpa’s 1972 red and white car.
What are you doing? Grandma asked, “To Leroy’s Four Four Two?”
I thought I would clean it up and give it as a gift to the two of you.

Not so mean I told Mole, who looked sheepish and sick.
He had been hoping that his relatives would be a little more thick.
Neither grandma, grandpa or I ever believed Mole after that.
Neither did Benscar, who stayed around to play with our farm cat.

Justice Takes Holly Down

Holly McGilly was mean and rude to her mother today
Justice, the old honest hen heard her and was blown away
I will make that rude teenager take her rude words away
She took Holly down in the barnyard that day

She clucked on her head and she spit on her chin, so soft.
She rolled her in pig manure, and knocked her glasses off
She tromped her with her talons and she pecked her with her beak.
The rooster knew better to call her off, so the animals did not speak.

Your mother is terrific, kind and wonderful, the hen said.
Next time you hurt her feelings, you are going to wind up dead.
Holly ran back to apologize in triplicate to her mother that day.
But the second she turned eighteen, she moved far far away.

My Eight Year Old Straightened Me Out

Do not….
I repeat…
Do not not not not not
Have brand new carpeting put in
The same day as a rain storm and an 8-year-old girl's slumber party.

I am usually the fun-loving, happy, excited birthday girl’s mama.
I was yelling my head off within hours as thirteen girls tromped mud
onto my brand new carpeting
in the dining room where the sliding glass doors were
through the living room
up the stairs and into the bedroom.

My eight-year-old daughter straightened me out.
Remember Mom, all of these girls are not as smart as I am.
I can tell them and you can tell them, but they are excited.
Some of them have never been to a slumber party.
They need a bit more fun and less drama from you.
I stopped yelling at that point, feeling badly about my behavior.

Disco Loving Santa

My husband was normal until he turned fifty Mrs. Claus said.
Then he bought a red sports car and went a bit crazy inside his head.
He’s down at the Reindeer lodge disco dancing tonight.
He is grooving and grinding to other’s delight.

Our children are embarrassed, the reindeer are smirking.
They think it ridiculously amusing to see Santa twerking.
Let’s go down there and see it for ourselves, Mrs. C.
She argued because the lodge charged a fee.

I’ll pay the fee, you get dressed up. Let’s go!
We tromped through the wonderland, enjoying the snow.
Santa was thrilled when he saw his bride enter.
They discoed away, then they sat down for dinner.

Three Year Old Remembers

Three-year-old traveler.
Excited story.
Filling my mind.
My soul feels the strong truth of it.
He is reliving a lifetime over and over
He assures me
We will be a family forever.
Each page turned delicately,
some parts torn out and tromped on.
Reincarnation easy.

The Deep Mystery

THE DEEP MYSTERY

The biggest animal species on earth was ever been,
the dinosaurs roamed proud the land of the Jurassic.
In fierce fights they were the ones to always win,
everything surrounding them seemed so very weak.

When they tromped sloth on massive legs of pillar,
pounded the unstable landforms getting torn apart,
enacting for all the meek animals around a thriller.
The ground shook, in fear they scrambled to dart

Some 65 million years ago dinosaurs disappeared
in an abrupt extinction event in the earth’s history.
If an asteroid strike or volcanic eruption engineered
the fatal catastrophe, is still buried in deep mystery.

Their fragile fossils in rock strata will show the way
to the scientist Holmes to solve the enigma someday.

June 25, 2019

Advice For the Pain Inflictors

Broken battered angry deranged parents 
Try to break their children at an early age
So they will not be alone in their misery
It works with some, however, with others 
It completely backfires.

They take their pain and shake it into poetry, and art.
They write it into songs and musicals that become world-renown
They ease their sad experiences into ways to help others
Think Oprah, Shirley Temple, Maya Angelou, Tyler Perry and Ellen DGeneres 

Children who shine the brightest as adults were often the ones
Who were put down, tromped on, slapped, whipped and 
belted when they were children.
Our most proficient writers, authors, poets, singers, dancers, and actresses 
The ones whom we all look up to, were often put down as children.

Listen, you broken battered angry deranged parents 
Beware, your pain-inflicting will not work.
Worse, when they become rich and famous,
They may wipe their shoes of you
And not help you at all in your old age.

Falling In Love With a Raccoon

The raccoon was brazen
Bold, devilishly handsome
I fell in love quickly
I know. Raccoons are no good for opossums
But the heart wants who the heart wants.

We met on a warm day
in the throes of summer
He was eating cat food when I arrived
to the consternation of a gray tabby
who was sitting on a prissy 
large-flowered puffy porch chair.

“spoiled princess”, the gentleman said
with his large bandit eyes.
“brat probably” I replied, demurely, flicking my pink tail.
He stopped eating and looked at me for second.
Wandered off porch, giving me the rest of the food.

Lights began flickering on and off.
I thought it was lightning at first 
Then a large WallyGeemer tromped out.
He was in his underwear.
I flipped to my side, pretending dead.
“EDNA!” the WallyGeemer screamed.

I had heard this voice before.
It is a voice of fear.
He went back inside and slammed the door.
I was halfway back to the marsh when the
generous Raccoon stepped into my path.
“Would you um like to um…”
“Of course,” I said.
And we did.

The Candor of the Enemy

They were once young warriors well trained Marines
Trained by their government...mean green killing machines...
They tromped through the jungles looking to kill,
Hoping to avoid dying with an ineffable feel!

For deep in the jungle  Vietcong all around.
Waiting to ambush and placed us prone on the ground
At the precise moment they opened fire on the point man
But though they show power; as best as they can

Shined on the tempest wake, their wondering hours done!
Their plight to remember...But what is their remedy? None!
It was for freedom or so they were told
Under the glow of the Vietnam sun; dead...stone cold!

Colour of a Storm

I think of him, a thunder of regret floods my throat.
Trust given, taken and tromped upon.
I think of us, existing in half portions.
Glass clear I stood, unaware of the shatter of half-truths. 

Decidedly elephant gray, his lies loom large, passively yet powerful,

Clouding our lives, seeping out, an unstoppable fog.

I think of him, a book without words, no black nor white, just a cover.
Forgiveness far from his narrow lips.
I think of my heart,  rainbow potential, waiting for the certainty of sunrise,

And the healing rain.

Dreaming

Dreaming

Nothing is sure but maybe, 
imagination enthralls
you might find me if your looking 
when your dreamtime comes to call
if a rooster calls at midnight 
and the dog pees up the wall
and you tremble in your little bed
it makes no sense at all
so i'm left here to waffle  
and me little bed does call
cos its getting here so chilly
did a ghostly footfall fall
infinity does call the sleeper
and i'll surely heed its call
the ghostly sound the creeper
"get back in your stall!"
I can see you now a floating
nubile figure by the bed
i'm off to sleep I'm hoping
getting interested

Don Johnson
Dear Francine

If it rattles round inside your head
you let it out its making bread
11pm i was off to sleep
but the tromper tromped 
and thats not all
i went to bed as footsteps fall
a wraith did float in from the hall
but i'm back to counting sheep

Don

The Little Boy In the Velvet Red Vest

When my heels tromped down the dark narrow path
Where the buck- even – trod
It was early fall, and the trees were half trimmed.
The sun flickered through the barren tops,
    and the greenish- brown canopy hung low and half dressed

However, it was not ashamed

The leaves crinkled and they crunched
    where my feet and I traveled
And not too far, as I lagged along
     I came upon an empty nest

It lay in decay
 from the wind and the rain
For how long,
only as long as the eggs were gone

And while I stood there with my head half cocked
I looked close at the old dilapidated twigs that rot
I remembered the boy in the velvet red vest
O’ how nicely it was weaved
it fit snug around his delegate chest

I see him every spring
And no matter how old I get
He still wears the same velvet red vest

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