Machine Head February 28, 2018

Went to the movies and experienced Annihilation. A flawed but definitely mind blowing experience about the evolution of living beings.

Machine Head

The marching machines,

the clacking, metal against metal

that study humdrum of grinding gears.

They’ve tamed the lion

roaring at our brains;
the blood in our veins

drying up, reduced
to a muddy slosh
thick on our tongues.

We are ending where we began

we are tumbling like the rain that

once fell in democratic abundance
upon the shattered skulls of the dead.

And all the while the machines rejoice;

they march and march and march on
as if they had a choice.

Woodie o2-28-18

Pride February 23, 2018

Just a tiny pinch, a thought sparkle that popped out of an ocean of thoughts . . . glistening like sparrow wings in the dark . . . no fanfare, no grumpy funeral dirge, no trumpets showing off their muted colors . . . just a poem. A small poem.

Pride

Ice along the edges of your frown.
I remember snowflakes, raindrop eyes,
our shadow walks through midnight.
Often enough we stopped to listen
to our laughter making fun of itself,
one eye watching for the porch light flash,
the signal for you . . . time to come in.
But one more drunken moment, please,
under that great elm that had already lived
at least a hundred years longer than us.
Your neighbors didn't mind, they, like
the elder elm, enjoyed the sharp sound
of our voices cackling at the moon.
Woodie o2-22-18

Carrot Logic February 21, 2018

Been a while since the last poem posted but I've been busy writing poetry and working on my blog, The Daily {W}rite. Sorry if you feel neglected. This is an old poem (2016), rewritten a bit. I have no idea what it means because it's been so long since I wrote it. I'm sure it means something . . . I've just forgotten what that something is. Maybe you can tell me?

Carrot Logic

My body rejects any thought of being creative today.
A warm sun through the window next to the computer
seconds the motion: No need to think today, no need to
be more than or less than . . . The Thing From Another World.
Yes, James Arness! Intellectual, warrior carrot! He had his own
reproductive system! No need to put up with any female
Thingy's vegetable notion of right and wrong. Fricasseed
was The Thing into a pulpy glob by an unsympathetic army
of pissed off GIs. That raw meat diet. No qualms about
slicing and dicing a would-be Dick-tater From Another World.
Arness went on to kill his own monsters in THEM! And then,
Gunsmoke. I wonder if they smoked more than guns
while shooting that show? The OU football game has started.
I should watch but it’s hard to get into fan mode when just one
horrible day before this horrible day Facebook murdered me.
Some people at Art Walk last night stood in the cold drinking beer
congratulating each other for "giving up Facebook forever!"

I don't know which is more pretentious, admitting that

you gave up Facebook to a crowd of drunks or . . .

admitting that you were once on Facebook.

Woodie 11-28-16

(rewrites o2-21-18)

My Hopeless Valentine Februry 14, 2018

Yes, Valentine's Day. I haven't written much about the love day . . . but I have written at least one sonnet I wrote some years ago. Oh! here it is!

My Hopeless Valentine

To thee I write these mournful thoughts of love,

These words that bend and break ungracefully
Upon a page of white. For you, my dove,
My feelings I do bear, respectfully.
A clever poet, yes, could move you more;
With words of heavenly inspired rhyme,
Would bleach your holy cheeks in tears galore
With love for he who wrote those words sublime.
But here, alas, no poem sweet I site,
No words can voice the tenderness my heart
Does hold for you my secret friend, my light.
No sounds I make will spark your smile to start.
But try I must within my clumsy way
Confess my awkward love for you this day.
Woodie 2-13-11(rewrite 02-13-13)

Moon Powers february 10, 2018

A picture can inspire the fingers to create the words that appear on the screen. Not always, but sometimes the image comes first and then the poem.

Moon Powers

The best we can do is place the moon

firmly between the index finger and the thumb.
Gently though. You don't want to crush the life
out of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Think of
the whales and mereswine and the surfers and
shore bunnies and the tall tales and sea shanties
of sailors and pirates that would cease to exist 

if you squeezed just a little bit too hard.

Woodie o2-1o-18

Late-night Train February o8, 2o18

We lost the horns of the many freight and passenger trains that used to sound through our little town all hours of the night and day. Against the law to blow those beautiful, triple horn warning devises within the boundaries of Norman-town. The city councilman who pushed the bill through said it was a quality of life issue. Hmm. My life isn't better because the trains no longer sing their traveling song. My ears miss that dark haunting blare of the trains at night, the sturdy balance between a scream and a moan that the triple horn provided. There's no quality to silence. There is only silence.

Late-night Train

The last late-night train just rolled
through Norman-town.
No one noticed except me and
the black Labrador next door.

But that's the way it is.

Get use to a thing,
the sounds of trains, the bitter cry
of its triple horn, the rattle, rattle, rattle
of freight cars shifting back and forth,
the grinding of steel wheels
against unforgiving metal tracks.

When it’s gone, that reverberation

of commerce gone, just gone,

the world feels thinner, becomes

a shadow buried deep
within an even darker shadow

with no possibility of light to come.

There are those moments

that weariness one feels
when you stare too long
at the toothpaste stains
on the bathroom mirror,

when the pothole of existence

spreads out across the bathroom tiles
(so long and black it is) and you forget
that you were once a human thing.
Woodie o2-o4-18

A Poem for Rustin February o6, 2o18

Well, you never know where the idea for a poem comes from. I think this came about because of a post my friend Rustin Sparks put on Facebook. I think it had something to do with our FAKE president. It seems like that's right. Any, I like the sound of it, the feel of it, and it may . . . maybe it makes some kind of sense?

A Poem for Rustin

Woke up. Not dead.

A relief for me.
Though others dread
the possibility
of my longevity,
the steady warm swarm
of an anxious voice
singing sorrows
that were borrowed
from other sorrows
that I’ve felt before,
long before

I was ever born.

I don't know if life

is pleasant or if strife
is the only beauty
we will ever know.
I listen to evil
speak of evil
as if evil and he
weren't good friends.

Yes, I pretend to be happy

somewhat mooshily sappy
about existence
and resistance is futile
and I think on that a while

and decide I'll decline

to write, to type, to say,
to speak further on this matter
because matter doesn’t matter . . . anymore.
Woodie o2-o6-18