Doggerel
UNTITLED
One more chance.
Isn’t that what we all want, one more chance?
The teacher said, what would you do with it?
Gimme it and see.
Oh no, it doesn’t work like that. You must tell me first before I grant it. You have to have a plan.
A plan?
A plan. You must change.
I’ll be good. I will change.
I did too. I changed. I was good.
At least the teacher was pleased.
UNTITLED
The invitation came
to the Super Bowl party.
To me who despises football.
I reviewed my standard diatribe about violence and its manifestation in American sports.
I, considered that I am an avowed pacifist who wishes not to harm even the stinkbugs who drop without warning from the ceiling to my keyboard.
I am one who condemns aberrant behavior of every source and type.
I am one who loved his wife.
But these were people whom I didn’t know well and I wished to establish an image.
Thus, I attended.
And offered witty observations on the season, the quality of the snacks, the comfort of my chair, and the finery all about me as well as insightful comments on the progress of the game.
And fell head over heels with lust for the wife of the host.
UNTITLED
When Frank at the repair shop joked
that I was too old to go camping in Montana,
dope that I am, I
claimed I was older than he.
And the asshole agreed.
Poetry
This is what you shall do; Love the earth and sun and the animals,
despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy,
devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have
patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or
unknown or to any man or number of men, re-examine all you have been told at school
or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh
shall be a great poem.
Walt Whitman
I went out to the hazel wood,
Because a fire was in my head,
And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
And hooked a berry to a thread
And when white moths were on the wing,
And moth-like stars were flickering out,
I dropped the berry in a stream
And caught a little silver trout.
When I had laid it on the floor
I went to blow the fire a-flame,
But something rustled on the floor,
And someone called me by my name:
It had become a glimmering girl
With apple blossom in her hair
Who called me by my name and ran
And faded through the brightening air.
Though I am old with wandering
Through hollow lands and hilly lands,
I will find out where she has gone,
And kiss her lips and take her hands
And walk among long dappled grass,
And pluck till time and times are done,
The silver apples of the moon,
The golden apples of the sun.
William Butler Yeats
The Walking Man
I see him along the road,
a journeyman in all seasons.
His legs are relentless against harshest air,
with the muscled arms pumping,
driving his fists upward
toward the visor of his cap.
The black glasses fix their shadows,
showing holes for eyes,
his skull reaching, but never passing,
the limit of my land.
But on some late dawn, I know,
with the scant leaves hardly noted,
he will pass the car’s way,
front my small house and bid me
with a toss of his grim chin
to walk the downhill with him.
Or on a road riven by frost,
I shall rush to match his steps,
to heed the dare, keep the promise,
and take the closing curve.
And so we’ll pass at last,
in his wise smiled silence,
the pavement’s end together.
Paul M. Hedeen
(from When I Think About Rain)
