Thursday, April 28, 2016

My Claim

I have lost my load
Is that so bad?
Like some trans-Pacific freighter
Dropping a container of rubber duckies
From a storm swept deck.
They will wash ashore
Someday down the line
And amuse us with the stories of their travels
How freely they have tossed about
In gyres of whales and pink plastic bottles
(These, the signatures of our times.)

So now you may have notices
That I stand up taller some
A freer man by fortune
Not stooped with such burdens and bundles
(That I took on somewhat naively…
Such foolish freight.)
And even the weigh
Of those more righteous loads
Which we carry on our way
Seems lighter and so much brighter now …
So mourn not for my labored loss
Oh men of Lloyd’s of London
(Of which I will not make a claim)
It’s the morning of a newer day
The storm has passed
And nothing seems the same.

Monday, April 18, 2016

Listening to the Rain

There is nothing I can do today
But listen to the rain
No need to force the issue much
So I will take what comes my way
And as it washes through my mind
It conjures up a dream
An ember from the night before
And of different day
Of someone who I made appear
Or maybe she was real?
I do recall and fondly so
That she was soft
And warm
And so
Playfully we fit and joined
Like puppies in a velvet pile
And ego-less we found our way
With nothing left except a smile.

 

Black Sand Beach

I saw you
From the black sand beach
Dancing to the sounds
Of the great Pacific orchestra.
You were naked,
So close to an ancestral form
Naked, standing upon a ragged rock
Dancing in a mermaid’s dream
Gifted with two swaying legs
Perched above the roiling surf
Swaying with the great gear rhythms
Bonding body
Land to sea
Linking the beauty of eternity.
I searched my heart
Now opened wide
But could not find a way
Sweet dream
To love you any more.

 

 

 

 

Monday, April 11, 2016

Warning! This is not a poem.


Barnyard Musings

I was walking across the yard this morning to look into the chicken coop. Something of a raucous nature was going on down there, which isn’t unusual.  Chickens seem to spend a lot of time gleefully marveling ova the laying of an egg, maybe: “How long have you been holding that one in, or my-my-my if you don’t mind I’d like to sit on that one later, or oh my aching ovaries…”  In any event, on the way across the grass I stepped in dog crap.  Nice and fresh too, that tarry conglomerate consistency, with the stickiness of super glue (super poo?) 

Fortunately, I was wearing my barn boots, so I didn’t get any on the cuff of my pants.  Unfortunately, I was wearing my barn boots, which have treads deeper than many canyons in Arizona.  So for the next few minutes I was doing that dance, you know the doggie shuffle; dragging my foot through the tall grass, looking for a puddle to dissolve some of this sh*t, a stick perhaps to scrape (notice the word crap is in the word scrape?)  it from between the labyrinth of cracks and crevasses, while at the same time hopping on one foot, while at the same time trying not to step on the same land mine again.  Been there?

I must mention that this is not the first time recently, for me to have this special event.  The last two occasions were the moment or two just before I entered a vehicle.  Once the door was shut with windows up, all occupants got the pleasure of sharing the olfactory by-products of the lower gut of a canine, which might have originally been dog kibble, plus a thousand and one other edibles available at ground level.  Let me just remind you that this is a farm…lots of interesting objectionable objects on the ground and dog-reachable.  Some real taste sensations…  And have you noticed that dogs are not all that discriminating? No, not at all.  So apologetically out of the car I go and now I get a chance to do the dog-do shuffle by the roadside, to the amused pity of most ever passer-by.  We all know what that scene looks like, right up there with drunks puking in the bushes and little boys peeing onto the rear wheel hubcaps.  I swear I saw a couple slow down to get a better look, camera in hand.  I fear a posting on YouTube is next.

But alas, boot passably clean, I found my way to the chicken coop to check out the hens and see what the ruckus is all about.  We worry about the potential of a Mongoose, those sly opportunistic devils.  They too are willing to wade through a fair amount of excrement to visit the chickens, and snatch an egg or maybe a hen…

And then to my surprise, I discovered two Mourning Doves caught by their own devices in the empty section of the last coop.  Maybe they were enticed by the chance to fill their bills with a bit of chicken scratch?  I, of the prefrontal lobe, have determined that they got in through the wire mesh, but in panic, were flying from one end to the other, helter-skelter crashing and freaking out even further, then flying and crashing again.  Not a good strategy for escape. First dove to second dove: “ok, that didn’t work…ok, that didn’t work, ok…”  But eventually, befuddled and exhausted, they dropped to the coop floor, and there within minutes, simply walked over to the wire mesh wall, stepped through, and discover freedom from this claustrophobic cage.  Duh!

So am I witnessing a moment of avian Zen, some sort of dove dharma?  Maybe, maybe it’s that easy.  Maybe we all should stop thrashing about and avoid the panic, and find our freedom?  Or at least watch where we fly, or step.

Duh!

Fini

Sunday, April 10, 2016

Eyeing the Dawn

Eyeing the Dawn

Lying in bed
Staring out the window
Slit-eyeing the dawn,
Which seems shy at first
Pale and damp
As if it is working up the nerve
To approach
To show itself
Wishing to ask the night if it
Might like this first dance.

Then some slow moments later
It gusts and rains nervously
Adolescent
Growing so full of itself
That it is now undeniable,
Still gray but emboldened
Filling with pallor
And blushed with a touch of cheeky color:
The new day dances,
Wearing a carnation boutonniere.


-P. Sanderson

Sunday, April 3, 2016

Not So Bad

Everything is hard
Before it is easy.

Just look at those birds
Picking out the seeds
In the driving vernal snow.
Hunkered down downy
Staying strong
Full feathered and waiting…
And HA!
There it is
The Sun
Dosing us all in its
Everlasting glory.
Improbable, yet dependably warm.

And they know like we know:
Not so bad,
Becomes oh so better,
As hard cold snow
Becomes easy heat.
 

Friday, April 1, 2016

The Great Green World

The day,
Gray by way of fog
And squirrel bottom clouds,
Is asking me to walk around
The blossoming maple,
Linger longer
And watch for the moment
Of the inevitable eruption
Of the great green world.