Gave up the road.
Took off the load.
Went home
No longer wanted to roam.
Health.
Lack of wealth.
Living on family's land.
It's been grand.
My son has joined me.
Eye to eye we see.
We started our own little farm.
It does have its charm.
Chickens running to and fro.
Watching our garden grow.
Cockadoodledoo.
The sky is turning blue.
Wake up and do what you do.
Water and feed.
Clean up the dirty deed.
Blue legged chickens that like to fight.
Letting them out at first light.
Putting them up during the night.
Plenty for me to do.
I'm happy that's true.
Heath is still bad.
But I don't feel sad.
I'm home, so I'm glad.
Have a brand new car.
Cause I don't waste time at a bar.
Nice to have family around.
Being on home ground.
Have a place to call my own.
Where love is always shown.
Proves you can always go home.
When you no longer want to roam.
Home is where love is.
I find that my bliss.
what is he rolling up the road? a child asked them.
We snickered and hollered and hooted, said his Uncle Clem
What do you think it is? Aunt Marta threw in with a bit of glee
For of course it was poo, him being a dung-beetle see.
In the distance I hear the Indianapolis 500
or maybe it is a truly aggressive muscle car
it is traveling south west
her fierce engine sounds remind me of my red mustang
my purple trans am, my powerful 442.
Cars that would burn up the road
racing worthy
I smile remembering my life pre-mini-vans
The day I met an actor
Father Brown sat in my garden drinking beer
with fellow actors and producers.
Father Brown remembered me he had seen
Me watching him every weekday on Tv.
The actor profession is strictly hierarchical
I could not sit at his table but be placed
among the actor, like the one coming out
of the post office walking up the road and
has no speaking role.
I had a watering can and when watering
A rose bush near him, he spoke to me.
“So, you like to watch Father Brown?
“Yes, sir, I love the program.”
“Thank you,” he said, with that, he turned
to the other casts by the table
unsure driver inches into the parking lot
I have a pet snail who could outwalk this car
a man gets out
figures
a speed demon races up the road
takes the corner on one wheel
screeches her tires as she hops the curb
a woman gets out
I figure all the old guy has in his life is hours of tedious tv time
whereas, she has to clean, cook, and babysit grandchildren
"The Scent of Eden"
Up the road I walked
as if in some golden hazy dream
and along the road an honour guard
to the left of me, of red-ripe apple trees
I walked bare feet
into that lush abundance
of waving dark forest green
the scent of mystery, fresh petrichor
wet leaves underneath my soul
moistly called me in, to believe
some kind of beckoning
to unprocessed novel new beginnings
I plucked the largest I could find, as always
stretching too far above me
then, in my hands
I raised it to my rosy lips
before I took it fully in, my over-soul
breathed its knowledge o’er me like a twin
wisdom, its gilded giddy perfume
the scent of Eden,
sings
Candide Diderot. ‘25
sitting outside in my pajamas
a beautiful breezy May morning
dandelion, clover and violets at my feet
my puppy is splashing in his pool, making it muddy
King dog lies in the shade under a hemlock tree
fluffy white dandelion fuzz barely moves
I hear a small plane engine
not one bit of traffic here
birds are chirping and tweeting
diverse colors of green between trees and bushes
interstate noises are far off in the distance
someone shuts a door up the road
motorcycle engine
a lone car drives past
dogs used to chase the fence when this happened, not today
baby dog is digging a hole to put his face in
King dog sits on my foot, all one hundred and twenty-six pounds of him
perfect morning
each Cobblestone makes up the road
ouch from your very sharp high heel shoes
A village in the sun
There is a small village with a few streets that have no name and houses have no number twelve I bought a small home that had stood empty for years when not used as a stable for the unique Algarvian white long-eared donkey
Retired workers in the village up the road where the shop was located next door to a café where they sat enjoying their beer fixed my house and soon I with my dogs everyone in the Algarve has a dog and I could spend my time writing poetry or walking in the wood
This Idyll was too perfect to last, one day a group of English tourists came to my village, and I, the only one who spoke English sealed the village's fate by telling them what a wonderful this place was and that there were several empty houses for sale the homes were snapped up and before you could say, Adam, the village became English
Cans of beer in the ditches, late-night parties scantily dressed women craving sex and sun the idyll was over it was time to leave my refuge from a noisy place filled with people who said how much they loved Portugal
Where are the bamboo
Banana husk, dad's stone chair
Mom's vegetable pots.
Where are the rice fields
Peanuts, peas, potatoes
Corn, cassava, sweet and tamarind.
Where is my childhood place
I look for every sunset
Just look out at the simpliest things.
Now I have to fill up everything
To open up the road, open everything else
Why I am not happy at all.
This is the progress you said
Converting farmland to townhomes
Why choose the mountain anyway.
My heart breaks seeing greediness
Easy money dislocating happiness
On the lowly and the unprotected.
How long avarice living the land
Of simple living hide in the sun
God forbade how small conscience is.
Is urbanization answer loophole minds
In the lowland of wizardry breed
Is this what Third World country thinks.
I always say I have dog ears
they are rather wolf ears
I hear things others do not notice
the blowing fan of an air register irritates me
in the morning I wake to the neighbor’s rooster
or a large garbage truck rumbling up the road
my dogs barely hear these things,
continuing their relaxing slumber.
tingles of a ticking clock bug me
whereas no one else notices them
I can barely concentrate if someone is tapping
right now there is a noise I cannot pinpoint
It seems to permeate the air
it is one of those sounds unnoticeable to other humans
but I have wolf ears
I sit here, irritated, trying to decipher it
It might be a light fixture or a hum of a refrigerator
I cannot type another word, trying to sit in silence
begging for silence, which never comes
because I have wolf ears.
Around The Bend
Up the road
I see it bend
Where my feet
So surely send
A body hurled
Towards its end
Up around the bend
From death
My lips do chap
To watch the cat
So closely nap
I, the mouse
Who’s come to tap
It sure to wake
And prowl again
But however unaware
With no thought
Of misplaced care
A shadow did declare
Its faith
Below the moon
For time wore down
The wishes
Like the wake
Of little fishes
Is there something
More delicious
Than the death
Of someone else
The rising sun's fingers cast beams
As the truck's tires sing as it comes along
The crow now has arisen to caw
The lookout caws like something is wrong
There across the way the dove coos
A crow up the road caws too
In the oak tree an unusual sound
Such peace proclaimed brand new
Written June 25, 2024 ...Out On The Porch
So much of yesterday I can clearly see.
There was a man duly a part of my history.
He lived up the road a short distance from us.
We passed his house every day to catch the school bus.
Everyone called him by his last name, which was Baine.
I remember a face that seemed filled with lots of pain.
A hard-working man, but he seldom laughed or expressed joy.
He was the type of man that no one wanted to confront or annoy.
There was one thing about him that enabled me to better understand.
He had a younger wife named Bebe who left him for another younger man.
From that time onward he lived alone and made lots of 'moonshine'.
When I was just a boy, Mr. Baine became a very good friend of mine.
We both loved baseball, and his favorite team was the New York Yankees.
I was a Dodger fan, but we remained friends in spite of the rivalries.
Coming home from school one day, we all noticed that the entire roadway
had the smell of moonshine. It was obvious to us that Mr. Baine's whisky
still had been discovered by law enforcement.
No longer can you plan a trip
When driving is the means,
For calculating ETA’s
Is like a hill of beans.
Construction doesn’t help things,
Though it keeps the traffic slowed,
But the problem is how many
Cars and trucks clog up the road.
To cross a bridge this morning,
Where the backup was a mess,
Added fifty minutes to our ride,
As well as lots of stress.
At times we cannot help it –
Cars can take us door to door,
But it certainly takes longer
Than it ever did before.
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