Home » Poems » Best » Len Solo » Best Len Solo Poems

Best Poems Written by Len Solo

Below are the all-time best Len Solo poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Len Solo Poem

It Was a Sunny Day

It was a sunny day,
mid-July,
the heat seeping
softly down into his bones,
out there in the back yard
where the grass
meets the woods,
just ambling around,
looking at the shrubs and flowers,
when a mosquito
landed silently on his arm.
It was small and black,
and he watched it settle
among the hairs just up from the wrist.
Then, he felt a slight prick
as the proboscis
went into his skin,
and he stared
as the mosquito
began to plump up.
That's when he
smacked it,
flatening the mosquito
in that one bright,
red drop of his blood,
out there in the
early afternoon sun.

Details | Len Solo Poem

Chugga

Chugga became our hero in third grade
and he passed into myth in eighth grade.
Chugga wasn't a Catholic, but his parents
sent him to school with us anyway.

In third grade, one early fall afternoon,
Sister Mary Grace was going down the line
hitting each of us on our up-turned palms
with a large wooden ruler.
She swung the ruler at Chugga's hand
when, poof, he pulled it away
and Sister hit herself in the leg.
We all laughed.
Of course, Chugga was marched down the hall
where Sister Mary Bertha made him kneel down,
smacked him across the face with her hand
and then struck both of his hands with the ruler.

I don't remember what he'd done wrong in eighth grade,
but Sister Bertha, all 4' 8" of her,
yanked all 5' 11" of skinny Chugga
out of his desk and dragged him across
the hall into the bathrooms.
He told us after school how she had made him
take down his pants and she
got her rocks off by
beating him on his ass and back
with a piece of oak wood that was
the foot rest from the back of a student's desk.
The board was over a foot long,
four inches wide and over an inch thick.
Chugga told us that Big Bertha had
broken the board while smacking him
across the back.

Details | Len Solo Poem

Hunkie Wedding

It was the
middle of the song
and all the instruments
kicked in,
keyboard, guitar and accordion,
two trumpets blasting,
the drummer pounding out
the one-two, one-two beat
of the Chicago-style polka,
the young couples hopping
and rocking side-to-side,
old couples sliding their feet,
when he began to twirl,
going 'round
and around,
keeping the beat,
from one end
of the crowded dance floor
to the other,
past the bride and groom's table,
past the bar,
everything reeling
in a a whirlwind
of colors and shapes,
smoke and beer and wine,
whoops and shouts
in Polish and Slovak,
"Hej! Hupaj siup!"
his partner laughing,
dancers stomping,
clarinet wailing,
the one-two, one-two
in him now,
pulling him in circles,
a dervish spinning,
right palm raised.

Details | Len Solo Poem

The Lone Tree Ahead

It was a brisk day
and he was out walking,
going up the road
through a tunnel of trees,
slanting sunlight on his back,
the wind urging him forward,
billowing his pants and coat,
leaves raining down,
skittering and scratching past his feet.
At the top of the hill
the trees ended suddenly
and his vision opened,
the wind driving sunlight
at the lone tree ahead,
green, brown, yellow and red leaves
twirling,
a giant pinwheel of
  w
       h
i
       r
          l
          i
        n
             g
sequins,
       spangling.

Details | Len Solo Poem

Sister Mary Grace

Sister Mary Grace
was my third grade teacher.
Like all of the other nuns in our school,
everything but the front part of her face
was hidden by a starched, white wimple
and a black habit,
layers of robe-like cloth which fell
straight from her shoulders to the floor.
I remember how her face
had a pale, never-in-the-sun look
and how the fingers on her left hand
were stiff, frozen and twisted.
Every Friday afternoon, she made the entire class
stand in a line along the front blackboards
with a hand extended, palm up.
Sister Grace would then go down the line
smacking each child's hand with a ruler,
once for each wrong committed that week.
We all got smacked a number of times because
we all had, of course, sinned that week.

Details | Len Solo Poem

Christmas Trees

We had lined both side of our driveway
with a variety of pine trees,
what we called evergreens,
each a different size,
the tallest by the road.

Before mid-November,
my Dad would take me
to where he had spotted
a good tree, a place
with no houses near,
in his travels to the bars,
the beer gartens,
he frequented around the county
to whet his whistle.
A good tree was about five feet tall,
no wide and not thin.
We'd dig up the tree,
keeping a big root ball,
place it in a metal wash tub,
which was about 2' in diameter
and a foot deep,
carry the tub
back to the car
and set it in the trunk.

We kept the tree outside
until a week before Christmas,
unless it got too cold,
which it did most winters,
and then we'd put it in the celler
by a window.
We'd bring the evergreen up
into the living room,
still in its tub,
center it on one wall,
(the recliner squeezed into a bedroom)
and my sisters would decorate the tree.
After the holidays, we took it
back down to the basement
where I watered it every week
until spring.

Dad and I would lug the tree out,
each with a hand on the tub's handles
and one underneath.
We'd plant it next in line
along the driveway,
moving toward the house,
making our history that way.

Details | Len Solo Poem

Mint

He was walking,
as he often did,
out back by the patch of peppermint
he'd planted
at the edge of the grass,
a low hedge against the weeds,
the dark a canopy
over the hill,
one of many,
suddedn and high
like Indian mounds,
there in southwestern Pennsylvania,
no stars in a moonless sky,
no holes to let the light in,
weighted clouds passing low and
moving slowly toward the mountains,
which hung black in the darkness
a few miles to the east,
bulking the landscape,
with the sharp smell of mint
rising all around,
a slow, green mist
spinning there with him
in the night.

Details | Len Solo Poem

Riding

They were riding in his 1959 Ford Fairlane.
It was seafoam green outside,
turquoise and white inside.
He had polished the car that afternoon
in his usual one-finger fashion.
It was wide open:
the white rag top was up,
but the side windows were all rolled down,
the back window unzipped
and the boot cover stretched and snapped down.
The car was long and wide,
flowing sleek and bright
past the dark trees lining the road,
the road white in the full moonlight.
She was next to him, close,
her left arm around his shoulders,
her right hand on his chest,
her short blond hair
fluttering against his face and neck.
She looked at his face,
smiling,
her upper lip opening wide,
flashing her teeth.
Leaning into him,
she kissed his neck,
lips just brushing the skin,
then his ear,
tongue working wet and soft,
while she ran her right hand over his chest,
slowly,
the hand going lower
and lower
as the Fairlane came around
a long, slow curve in the road,
no other cars in sight,
the wind flowing swift,
around and through them,
the car floating along in the white moonlight.

Details | Len Solo Poem

By the Lake

He was waiting, sitting
by the lake
watching the gray
water ripple and flow,
the slow wind pushing it
steadily away from the shore.
A sign on a tree by the bank
warned in black and red:
             NO SWIMMING
   SWIMMING CAN CAUSE ILLNESS.
His mind drifted
back to that hot summer day
when, after work, his dad
first took him swimming,
to the creek on the way to Mammoth,
just a short ride from home.

The creek ran through a field
behind the Klayka's house and barn
and they had to chase
the cows out of the stream
when they got there.
He watched his father
strip down to his shorts,
the dark green Army ones,
and he did the same,
just leaving their clothes in piles
on the bank above the creek.
His father dove in
and came up backwards
near the opposite side,
sliding slow and smooth and easy
through the brown water.
He ran,
holding his nose,
mouth clamped shut,
his right arm flailing the air,
and jumped,
feet hitting
the mucky bottom,
and sprang up,
head and shoulders popping
out of the water,
water flying all around him,
light exploding
in his eyes.

The water was warm
but it felt good
there in the stream
with his father
that hot summer day.

Details | Len Solo Poem

Tub

Grandmother used
the same kind
of round, metal tub
that we put the Christmas tree in
to soak her laundry
before she washed it.
She used the same tub
to clean a chicken she'd kill,
holding it upside down by the legs
and chopping off its head with an axe,
holding the bird so that the blood
drained through the neck into a pan,
from which she's make blood pudding,
not letting the chicken run
around the back yard
flinging blood all over
like our neighbors did
for a laugh.
She'd plunk the chicken
into hot water
and let it set there
for an hour
to soften the feathers
so she could easily pluck them.