waterways: poetry in the mainstream vol.28 no. 6

8/14/2019 Waterways: Poetry in the Mainstream Vol.28 No. 6

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Imperfection Ellaraine Lockie

I learned early on

the complexity of people

How paradoxes teach confusionwhen unspeakable exploitsare packaged with compassion

Childhood cross stitchedin a quilt of contradictionWhere betrayal traverses trustweaving in and out of the same weft

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Indistinguishable and insidiousin its undercover destruction

From needle pricked fearsthat stuttered the security blanket

Leaving threadbare spotsas though molested by mothPatches of thin skin exposed

Fifty-five years andfinally unafraid to confrontthe bare facts of human frailty

First publiSweet Ann

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The Man in the Alley Rex Sexton

He stood shivering,hand in hand with himself,a bundle of ragesholding itselfin the dead of night,staring through the darkness a frail, wasting, shadow of himself.Then he took a step forward,Although he had nowhere to go.

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May 10, 1990 Carol Hamilton

The clock on her desk

had stopped years before,but my father had bought itfor her, and the clock wasas handsome as he once was.

The clock in her kitchen

made its little leapsinto the future, though, in the nightby some miracle unexplained,

she stopped, too.

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Worldview Anselm Brocki

When my besieged

Inner self cantstand the thoughtof one more dayat work or anothersocial dinner, a lesspartisan, morewordly part of mecompares my singlewell-off life of car,house, and health

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care with the livesof Cro-Magnonsspreading across

Europe after the lastIce Age, oarsmenin a trireme afterbeing rammed duringthe Battle of Salamis,and soldiers on bothsides in World War Ispending their finaldays in senselessmuddy trenches.

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Goyas Portrait of Ferrer Mary K. Lindberg

What would it be like,

he thinks, green eyesrising from the velvety red book in his hand,if my wife were reallyin love with me?

His dark Byronic hair rushes

forward, as if blown by windsailing words off the page.Three fingers grip the verses,capturing the idea.

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His absent gazeticks the moment whenthe physical world fades;he sees only his own thoughtsstirred by word, phrase,rhyming couplet.

She would; no she wouldnt.But then, if she did,

we could do what she wont.That might be quite pleasant,even sublime. I think she will.

First published in Beloit Poetry JVol. 57, No. 1, Fall 20

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where each breath will slowly kill mebecause I move there uninvited,unwelcome, becauseI am what I am and no more.

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Senior Citizen Bill Vernon

You walk in a crowdand no one seems tonotice your presence.

Say somethingand everyone looksaround for the speaker.

Youve disappearedbeneath gray hair.Its a disguise.

Few are ableto find youunderneath.

Even a mirrorconfirms you arenow somebody else.

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a hand in lifts the heart will inman

he was admonished to keep cleanhe was old and weak and afraid of falling in the shower

he asked if a fellow in the mens home

could help him bathe but was told that was againstthe rules, that if a fellow resident helped and fellthe home could be sued. he could get help from outside.the assistant could take risk on his own.

at first a friend from his poetry workshop helped. thenhe took his risks and bathed alone.

he had by the rules to keep clean. by similar rules, hehad to risk alone.

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what loss! he could not get a fellow residents help . . . moralecould have been raised: trust could be built.

but no: the fear of being sued came first. residents

lost a change to grow stronger together.priority was fear of lossto home offices.

No. risks had to be on outsiders. moralecould not be raised from within residents. financial security camefirst.

these old men could live and diealone.

23 december t

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The Time and Temperature Lady James Babbs

when I was youngerI dialed her numberlate at night lying onthe bed in my roombecauseI loved the sound ofher voicethe way she said

the numbers likeshe was speaking

just to me andfor a long timeI thought she was

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really out there somewheresitting alone in some glass boothwaiting for the phone to ringand even after I discoveredshe was only a recordingthere were still nightswhen I called her andheld the phone to my earafter shed finished hopingif I waited long enough

her voice would come back onasking meif I was okay anddid I need anything else

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Strength in Family Bill Roberts

Theyre so tired of her at this pointThat they give a weekend partyTo honor her coming passing.In her bewildered stateShe accepts what is inevitableAnd will pass on for them.

To spare them further suffering,As they have suffered terriblyOver her ten years of illness.Her doctors call the latest episodeA tumor flare, releasing calciumIn the system, confusion to the brain.

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It will pass, he predicts,And she might hang on another two years,But her family will not have it.Enough, damn God, is enough.

She, so strong over yearsOf unrelenting fight,

Will toss it in, close her eyes andQuit to accommodate family,Most of whom I have never met,Most of whom were not around toMeet in these ten years of struggle.There is a strength in family.

First published in The Comstock Review, Spring 2000 Vol. 131


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Good Death George Held

I was the treating doctor, and . . . this is the firsttime ever a man has legally ended his life.Dr. Philip Nitschke, N.Y. Times 9/26/96

Voluntary euthanasia, that goodDeath, dwells with us at last,Now the Australian has punched the keyOn his lethal laptop.

The inexorable crab grabbing at his gut,His wifes hand in his, heStarts the process of self-Extermination.

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The computer activates the RubeGoldberg apparatusRigged to release enough barbituratesFor pay-back on death row.

Like the flame-fringed scorpionTurning tail on itself,We scarcely know whether to scornOr praise this creation,

Brainchild of noble Dr. Nitschke,known for his bedside mannerand now a candidate for the NobelRest-in-Peace Prize.

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Now the rest of us who ebb intoThe geriatric seaToo slowly, whose threshold for sufferingOr self-regard is low,

Know that in the final pinch we mayElect to play at God,Author of so many other good deaths,And end what once was sacred.

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Where Grass Is Greener Geoff Stevens

When young you had your ears greased

to remove your inquisitive headfrom between the iron railings.Your dreams were always of placeson the other side.And although today the wall is highwith broken swards of glasscemented to the top

you have learnt to enter through the doorand wonder why you neverthought of it before.

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Obedience Re-do Joan Payne Kincaid

She wants brown monkey and a chew stickin back of me on the puter chair

tri color Parson Jack Russellfrom a long walk and obedience classwhere the substitute teacher tried to drag heron a metal choker until she yelped and I said enoughand then in a corner she got tangledon an about turn and I fell like a stone

nearly landing on her but being a Russell shes usedto barns and horses so was way ahead of it;never again some stupid heel command on a metalchoke and never forgive the guy for doingsuch to a four month old pup who was doing her best.

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The Deaf Ventriloquist Jack Conway

There is a bag lady on Asylum Street who speaks in tongues,which ones, I have no idea. She says that her life has beenlike a blind man reading lips in an insane asylum.You dont know who to believe.She says she is, of all things on this earth,the ventriloquist for the universe.Im the one who puts words in your mouthand makes you speak, she claims.Thats insane, I told her.You see, she said. I just did it again.Are you telling me you putall the words in everyones mouth?Didnt I just say that, she said. How could you?Its hard work, she said. I havent got the time for this, I said.Im not in charge of Time, she said. Hes in charge of Time.

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She pointed to a man carrying a green plastic bagfilled it seemed with redeemable bottles and cans.Its a bad night for mouth-breathers at the redemption center, she said.I left her there. Shes crazy as a loon. What did she think, I was a fool?

Besides, I saw her lips move.

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This Child Rarely Smiles R. Yurman

The long peak of his capdips into his foodshades his eyes

He cannot see the screenI touch his armHe leaves it on

It cannot bother him

He gives me gifts

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a batter at readymeant to danglefrom some ribboned home-team pin

glasses imprintedwith ballplayers faceslost knives discarded watches

Past the objects he hands meterrors gather behind him

I have nothing to offer in return

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For Tony the Cat (We Miss You Already) Paul Kareem Tayyar

She places seven flowers upon your body,One for each year that she had you,One more for good luck as she fills in the dirt.

I loved you so much, she says, as she closes your eyes,If you want to return you know where to find me,If not Ill see you again when my own heart gives out.

She places the lantern over your grave,She lights it before blowing a kiss to the wind and going inside.

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On the Film T HE Q UEEN Donald Lev

She looked just like the Queen, and he

was a very reasonable representation of Tony Blairand being an anglophile and a little bit royalistI loved them both.They might have been Disraeli and Victoria in some of thosePalace scenes.

I remember on the day King George VI died(he reigned throughout WWII, an age of giants,& left 2 small daughters, Elizabeth the Queen andher sister Margaret Rose

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who always used to be interesting copy.)I was in midtown Manhattan, I guesssomewhere in my teens, I forget the actual year

I was seeing a movie with my friend and second mother, Bettyborn in the County Galway, Irish to the core,who had tears in her eyes for the king, (whose death we learned offrom the Times Square news tower) not that the Irishloved the British monarachy, just that

things colonial are complex, especially emotionally.The elder of the two little princesses became Queen.She was Taurus like I was. This has to bein this record, it is that kind of record.

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The film was basically about the Pricess Di thingand of course, in that family Diwas little loved, and the Queen

had enough tsuris (theres probably aBritish upper class word for tsuris,but I dont know it) and the queen as Iknew she would, kept her famous stiff upper lip stiffand came through it, naturally, with a lot of class and dignity

and Tony Blair, who I do not like as Bushs lap dog,I had to like in this. He was this

slightly left popular politician who understood everything.

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waterways: poetry in the mainstream vol.28 no. 6

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