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Best Poems Written by Francis Mandeville

Below are the all-time best Francis Mandeville poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

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Modern Bipedal Huminoides

Tire Town USA - An old flour mill with opportunistic metalwork; 
windowless, wooden building with last century's red paint and
an open garage with Able Men clad in baggy skins of oil stained overalls.  

No clear link between their tools and their linguistic barks.
Babbling as they dance around the wheel rim popper
Until a clean, white skinned maiden walks through the swinging doors.   


Check out the hottie in the lobby! yells some charming shark.
The blond goddess, wearing a braless tanktop and white summer 
pants draping seductively over her buttocks, stands behind her twin brother.   

Used tires, her brother ask the young Able Man by the broken kiosk. 
"Hey Boss" the young Able Man shouts as he steps toward the girl. 
The young Able Man offers the girl a bottle of water, which she declines.

An older Able Man escorts the boy deeper into the cavernous warehouse. 
"It's cold" the young Able Man says to her butt as she walks away and
then his shoulders slump as if the bottle weighs a ton.

This modern young caveman, a grease-smeared untouchable to this filly,
furrows his brows until they nearly meet over his nose and 
realizes he can never touch the likes of her.

Details | Francis Mandeville Poem

War on Thistle

A yellow notice on the gate with bold letterhead states
Noxious Weed Commission and then, in smaller red print, declares: 
Demand Notice to Remove Thistle.

This notice is a sudden smack behind the noggin. 
Bringing attention to a purple, spiky blossom 
on top of an orb wound tightly around a ball of seeds, 
swaying in the breeze and heeding this question:
What did you do?

To make the County use its bureaucratic might 
and declare thistle plants a blight, a public nuisance 
worthy of persecution.  And any resistance will cause 
an appearance before a judge who'll levy 
fines and imprisonment.
What did you do?

Shock begins to wane and reason filters into the brain;
this thistle, that goats devour like its a treat,
it explodes into a cotton suite that birds 
use to build a soft nest and squirrels 
a cozy den for all their kin.

Is this order just about the plants by the gate,
or does it include plants used by bees, 
or the plants that help pollinate veggies?  
Or the pretty blue thistle splashing color
in an otherwise rather dull foliage -
do those count too?

The notice drifts off into the finer print of legalese
using words like must, subject to, and other decrees
and then it ends with this call to arms - Declare War On Thistle! 
But whose side am I on?  And, when I am in jail,
will I get my thistle tea?

Details | Francis Mandeville Poem

Labor Day Road Trip

Another test to prove - 
if its true that distance is shorter 
to mom's house than mine?
And witness -
how belted-in kids can still spin up reasons
to fight and bite;
or explore why -
at least one kid gets sick
so quickly at the start of the trip;
and rehearse our scripts
on what to say or not say to the in-laws;
all this to the cadence of thump-thump-thump
of the concrete freeway;
And yet still discover happiness -
is a sizzling steak as big as a plate,
is a steaming cup of coffee,
a moment's peace, a blissful
pause at a truck stop,
where time and miles -
don't exist.

Details | Francis Mandeville Poem

An Artist Refuge

Slava Ukraini!
shroud the gallery's glass doors,
a solitary scene of grazing goats,
greets the guests along with music.
Confident, brush strokes curl muted
colors of rustic farm houses
behind broken, split-rail fences
on a cloudy Carpathian
day drawn by an artist sitting
in ruined, ravished Kherson -
a limping dog of a city
with patches of bare skin showing.
Other pictures, different story;
dark, dreadful, desolate people
in burnt, battered, bombed-out cities;
children clamber over charred wrecks
in streets strewn with bricks and debris.
Is the first picture - real or dream?
Drawn by an artist 'neath fiery missiles,
scene the artist pretends exist
to get through one more day of war?

Details | Francis Mandeville Poem

Gideon Stands Guard

The moon, a charcoal smudge, hangs low and dim,
while stars, like pinpricks, pierce the black night.
Clicking crickets creates a raucous hymn,
and katydids whir on new wings to take flight.

A yellow bulb's honeyed glow makes a homey sheen
until a timer flicks a switch turning off the light
and letting darkness rush into the tranquil scene,
making baby goats bleat from fright.

In the corner lays a lumpy carpet of fur
made by mamma goats cuddling nice and tight;
making the entire goat herd an entangled blur
of white rumps and necks entwined in the night.

Except for little Gideon, who stands in the barn door;
a castrated pygmy goat turned into a withered grazer,
stares at the house below without a snort or a snore,
as he chews his cud, thinking about some tormentor.

Why else stand guard?