THE HEALING PLANTS

Aloe soothes burns from irons,
over exposure to sun. It minimizes the scars.
A healing plant, but requires so little.
Not much water and the soil can be sandy or poor.
The pot it sits in needn’t be pretty, just sturdy.
If it needs anything, it is light. Summer,
with its bright blazing sunlight is the best.

Like twelve inch long blades,“leaf- stalk –stems”
shine bright green, looking like spotted steak knives
with harmless serrated edges, that don’t hurt one bit.
Plump with juicy jelly oozes when you bend it back,
crack it open, squish it and dab it, onto the burn.
The plant scabs up, heals itself, then turns ugly
in the places where you opened it and took from it.

In the fall, before October frost bites or kills,
he uproots the little shoots from around the edges
making room for all eleven of the mother plants
and passes them on to anyone who wants one.
A friend, a co-worker, a neighbor, many of the
students in his science classes take them too.

When someone asks him, he tells the story of how
his mother gave him one plant, about thirty years ago,
how it keeps giving him little shocking green baby aloes.
He realizes, once again that it is all her fault-
his love of plants, for flowers, and growing things.
“Just another thing that she deserves the blame for”,
is what he says, as he fills a hunter green watering can.

And when he looks at the mix and match pots
all around the table in his little office,
on the ledges at work, the sun porch of his home,
Strangely, this is the time that he thinks of the brothers, sisters,
cousins, nieces, and nephews that he fails to know.

LOOKING AT AN ACRYLIC PAINTING IN THE LIBRARY OF HIGHLAND PARK, NEW JERSEY

When I asked you to walk with me
up the side of those mountains
on a rocky trail that went straight up,
you said to me, “Do we have to ?”
And I walked on, ahead of you
without answering, onto the muddy
root filled path, strewn with stones.
When you saw the conditions, the incline,
you wondered aloud wearily-
“What’s the point? What is the reason?”
An hour later at the top, with sweat
soaking the backs of our gray t-shirts,
we find the fallen log, next to a stump
by the sign post in the shady clearing.
And we don’t have to say anything.
The sound of the waterfall,
the smell of the moss covered boulders,
the song of the unseen bird
repeating the same five note song
says it for us and we know why
we must walk together again, and again
without questions, without hesitation.

ART CREDIT- http://www.patrickmyers.org/gallery1.htm

TWENTY YEARS EQUALS THIRTY YARDS

“If we’re staying, then we have to clean up
and we gotta get rid of some of this shit”,
is what he said when he grabbed the phone
to order a thirty yard dumpster for Monday.

Left in his front yard for a week,
fill it up with all the broken furniture,
cheap, white, put together from K-Mart.
Exercise machines, barely used too.
Broken action figures, one legged Spiderman,
headless GI Joe, a Fisher Price garage,
a number three soccer ball, plastic pots
saved to be used again, seven vases,
remote control cars with corroded batteries.

Sadness creeps up on her when throwing away
all the toys her boy intended to play with,
like Operation, missing all the little bones
but still buzzing at the tweezers touch.
Books smelling of basement, faded yellow
pages brittle now to the touch, something
about the acid found in cheap paper.
An old metal shelf, boxes of paper from school,
old notebooks from college courses long ago.
Pictures from high school of people who
at one time meant so much to them both.

A computer that cost over three thousand
in 1997, now you can buy five for that price.
Round Art Deco mirror lasted seventy years,
cracked in half from a cluttered room.
Eight foot table rotten at the edges,
fold up the legs; hoist it over your head.
Two white abstract reindeer lawn ornaments
that swayed their heads and lit up for just
two Christmas seasons in the cold weather.
Hand me down lawn furniture, old umbrellas,
and many other things they thought they needed.

Scattered Lego blocks on the floor
swept up in a little dust pan with all the
spilled cat litter, roofing nails, and screws.
Cardboard boxes get flattened, stacked and
hauled out in order to make room now that
the new house fell through, it wasn’t happening.

And when she saw Elmo lying in the heap
next to the baby bath and yellow potty seat,
she knew that time flew way too fast for them.
Before he latched the dumpster, she made sure
to pause for a moment, to silently honor the past.
He only shook his head and mumbled about
how much money they had wasted over the years,
on thirty square yards of junk to fill a green dumpster.

PHOTO-http://podcast.prx.org/genprx/audio/2008/07/dumpster.jpg

THEY WORKOUT

Up early in the morning
in the hotels of the cities
like Boston, DC, and Philadelphia
You’ll see business people
and a few others who take
their shows on the road.

They don’t wear pant suits,
navy blue blazers,
or fancy reddish brown loafers, now.
They wear baseball caps from home teams,
silky black running shorts,
cushiony sneakers painted with
fluorescent or metallic accents,
thick soles of shock absorbent gel.

Some carry towels,
wear terry cloth headbands,
old faded gray t-shirts
show logos of alma maters,
markings of sweat stain backs,
armpits, across the chest, above the belly.
Salt marks or lines appear on clothing
like the rim of a margarita glass.

And I wonder, do they do this all the time
or only when they are away from home?
On the road they feel free from having
to place the trash on the curb, dog walking,
washing dishes, dropping the baby off
at the daycare center and grocery shopping.

When they go home, they make sure
to complain to friends,bosses, spouses
about grueling, lonely travel for work.
Secretly they dream of running far and free
through the streets, past the World War II monument,
by the Potomac, alongside the Charles River,
near Fenway, up the art museum steps,
on the Schuylkill, because they could.
Because they wanted to.
They replay it all in their minds as if

it was captured by a cinematographer’s camera.

A NEW TEAM IN TOWN

massive cranes, yellow scaffolding
hang from rooftops, on many buildings,
hotels, lobbyist’s headquarters, offices,
new museums, welcome centers and
parking decks, never enough parking.

It’s so early in the morning that
I stand in the middle of New Jersey Avenue
to try and take a picture of the Capitol
glowing at the foot of the street,
I am overwhelmed by the proximity.

All lit up, all the time, a cool white bulb
visible every hour, prominently placed
reminding us what the city is all about,
I flashback to eighth grade Civics class
to all the lessons of Miss McGeehan.

And it is a new time, the city is excited
about the growth, the changes in office.
Even the middle aged gentleman at the bar
with his worn out briefcase, and rumpled suit
proclaims that “things are going to pick up now.”

“You know there’s a new team coming into town,”
he loudly announces, as he shuffles through
his wad of money pays for his glass of Chardonnay
and calls the plain looking woman behind the bar,
“My Love”, as he raises the tall wine glass to his lips.

*Photo taken in DC @ Madame Tussad's Wax Museum, "No it's not really him. It is really me."

THE ANGEL OF DEATH

blasts by on a chartreuse Kawasaki Ninja
his raggedy t-shirt flapping in the breeze
revealing a huge, pink, stretch marked ass
uncovered for the whole world to see.

Loud exhaust pipes, the shifting of gears
awaken me from a trance, interrupts my thoughts
above the river, on top of the Edison Bridge
thinking about the ones who died from this spot.

How was it, that they felt it was a good idea
to pull over, park, put on emergency flashers,
climb up on the rail, launch themselves like bottles
into the choppy brown water of the river below.

I think about what it must feel like to jump.
I think about what my family would say and
strangely, I think it wouldn’t really be so bad.
I think about the height, the impact, surviving it.

Then I think about years ago, the husband of a co-worker,
who placed his work boots on the little sidewalk at the top
and I wondered, why you would worry about taking off
your shoes before jumping to your death from a bridge?

Someone told me that this was a signal to the police,
so they would know where he went, how he died.
“You don’t hear about these details on the news," she added,
"‘Cause it gives people ideas, ones they usually never have.”

PHOTO-
http://s2.bikewalls.com/pictures/Kawasaki_Ninja250R_13_1024x768.jpg

INAUGURATION DAY

Chili and biscuits, compartmentalized pans
foil lid, a hot pack says the lunch ladies.
Fruit cocktail, two sugar cookies, the cold pack.
A half pint of Cumberland Dairy milk and
a new invention, half spoon, half fork, the spork.

Kickball on a blacktop with a painted circle
nestled between two wings of the building.
Bundled up, throwing the red rubber ball with
gloves, scarves , hats covering us up against
icy winds of January, but never too cold to go out.

After recess, Math is cancelled for today.
All five fourth grade classes gather in a center hallway,
a common area for presentations, or programs and
each little pod of a classroom, has no fourth wall,
a hundred and forty some ten year olds, together.

Out comes a Zenith color tv on a wheeled cart
sitting Indian style, on the newly carpeted floors
and our teacher turns the dial to find CBS on channel 10,
Roger Mudd, Walter Cronkite, Bob Schieffer speak to us.
Seems so strange to watch television in school.

There he is, our new President, who likes to smile and grin
prefers to be called Jimmy, even taking his oath of office.
We all laugh when we hear that he was a peanut farmer
from Georgia, and his old time southern accent reminds us
of Hee Haw, Green Acres, and reruns of The Beverly Hillbillies.

He decides to walk from the Capitol to The White House
in the freezing cold street with his wife and daughter, Amy.
And our teachers point out, “She’s ten just like all of you”.
Unlike us, she looks miserable and bored. Which makes
the boy next to me cruelly comment ,"Man, she's an ugly dog.”

YOU CALLED ME BROTHER

I am headed home with my folder of papers, books,
celebrating my success with overpriced coffee
a small tan paper bag, with a mermaid
and an inspirational corporate poem-
“flavors my senses,
sweetens my disposition,
stirs my imagination,
nourishes my dreams”.
All this and a huge oatmeal raisin cookie too.

You called me brother
and asked for a little help
begging on Washington Street,
zigzagging from person to person
everyone avoids you, each one turns away.

You remind them that there are no guarantees,
luck runs dry, one bad move, things gone wrong,
unemployed, hungry, broke down, unfixable you.
And on a cool November Sunday, I looked in your eyes
and just said “No”, the first time anyone looked at you.
or said anything to you all day.

It occurred to me that
at least I should have given you the bag
with my cookie in it and I thought, too late
of running after you with the little sack
in my hand, shouting…
“Brother, take my cookie, I do not deserve it
and you need it more than me, I am sorry
that I turned you away, I am selfish like all the others
walking down this street on a Sunday in November.”

http://flickr.com/photos/mrblah/131712937/

WELCOME TO HOBOKEN

Yesterday was a great opportunity and experience for me in Hoboken. Special thanks to David Vincenti of Debaun Spoken Word Series, the group of poets, writers, and thinkers who joined me at Symposia Books in Hoboken, NJ. It was a good place for me to start reading my work and a wonderful environment for the arts and artists. Below is a link for the Spoken Word Series. Visit them if you can. I am looking forward to another reading and if you would like me to attend a Poetry/Spoken Word Event...get in touch.

http://www.debaun.org/SWBios.html