Broken Glass

I heard the crash of broken glass
before I saw the blood run red.
My brother and I were chasing
each other. He slammed the door.
I stopped it with my hand.

Not too smart, mother will be angry.
Whose fault is it?
Dad is tired
and there’s a mess to clean.
Fun turns to panic.
I get the broom, my brother
holds the dust pan. One of
the younger ones runs
to tell about the shattered glass.

We lie, “Don’t know
how it happened,” we said.
We got closer that night
after we decided to deceive.

Dad finds a scrap of wood
It has to do for a week or two.

I still have the scar
right here on my pinky finger.

Lessons From My Mother

My mother told stories before we went to sleep,
nothing was ever written down, but she loved
to tell about when she was young. We would gather
at her feet to listen to tales from her childhood.

There was the time her uncle saw her eating
an orange peel she picked off the floor.
She was given a dozen oranges,
and told to eat the peels off each one.
She never liked oranges after that,
and we never ate things that fell on the ground.

One incident made her sad when she tricked
her grandfather, who was blind. She took the string
that lead him to the outhouse and tied it to the barn door.
She had to clean his chamber pot for a week.
We realized it wasn't nice to play practical jokes
and were glad we had indoor plumbing.

She remembered summers on the open range
where she whistled to bring in the cows
and handled horses and cattle with ease.
We galloped around on our wooden sticks,
herding the chickens into their coops.
We blew spittle until we learned to whistle.









My favorite was the one about the rickety buckboard
she rode to school and how dad was the best basketball
player in fifth grade. She blushed anytime he looked at her
but waited to marry him until after the war.
He looked so handsome in his Coast Guard blues.
We learned there was never a right time to fall in love.

I don’t know when she stopped telling stories.
Some of the younger kids don’t remember them at all.
Then one day she was gone but her stories linger on
of that time, long ago, in the farmlands of New Mexico.

Life Unedited

We watch the flicker from the black and white clips
no sound, bad lighting, camera jumps
from subject to subject
a quick view of grainy faces
in the eight millimeter click, click, click.

Aunt Bessie wiggles her butt while tending
her faternal twins. She turns around, smiles and winks.
We got word, the girl committed suicide at thirty-four,
there is nothing in the clips from her first birthday
revealing things would turn out that way.

Elva and Ellen, like gray haired teens, dance
to the Anderson Sisters’, Boogie Woggie Boy.
A blood clot took one at fifty-six the other died
at eighty five. Are they together again, shaking
those hips, twisting their hands up high?

Tony and Callie kiss every time the camera
finds them. They can’t keep their hands
off each other. A marriage of nineteen years
tossed aside. He died alone last year
on a Colorado mountainside.

Tick, tick, tick,
the projector sputters,
this reel is done
but life continues on...unedited.

No Birthday This Year

I want to stay 59, do you hear?
No more aging or growing older
So cancel my birthday this year

I’ve given up my youthful fear
With age I’ve grown bolder
I want to stay 59, do you hear?

All my daily schedules dear
are neatly arranged in that folder
So cancel my birthday this year

I’m comfortable in my career
I don’t mind the pain in my shoulder
I want to stay 59, do you hear?

I thought it over, my mind is clear
My blood, once hot, has grown colder
So cancel my birthday this year

When I die …then I’ll smolder
But for now I won’t get older
I want to stay 59, do you hear?
So cancel my birthday this year.

This is a birthday wish for the twins,
my brother and sister who celebrated
their birthdays yesterday.

Grim Reaper

Reaction to all the news in the headlines.
No disrespect intended for the deceased or their families.















The most famous sidekick,
a beauty queen,
and King of Pop,
all died in the same week.
The media hurried to find their
legacy on reels of old film
and archives from T.V.

Headline news showed
Ed McMahon was losing his home
medical bills had overwhelmed him.

Farrah Fawcett, brought her death
into our living rooms;
reality T.V. at its most intense.

Michael Jackson on the
eve of his comeback
had a heart attack
and couldn’t recover.

Money, fame, beauty and talent
couldn’t protect them
from the grim reaper.

A shiver goes down my spine,
is it my turn the next time?

Oops, guess I'm not,
Billy Mays took that slot.

Mediterranean

Mediterranean Sea
Warm temperate climate
Blue gentle waters lulling
Travelers to dream





Sorrento, Italy
Winding mountain roads
Villas overlooking sea
Splash of emerald green

Three Poems Created From A Single Word

This style takes a single word and then do a free write to whatever follows. Like the chance poem there can be surprises.

Handsome

My girlfriend said she fell in love
with a man so handsome
he could have been a model for Michelangelo.
So attractive he could have graced the Vatican
or been on the cover of GQ
wearing the latest fashion.
Of course I expected to see a Greek God.
A man with chiseled features, carved in marble.

Instead I met someone whose heart was generous.
I was startled by his gentleness and didn’t notice
the scars on his face until he mentioned them.
His princely charm was reflected in his easy laughter.
I was captured by his clear conscious
and sincere desire to be civilized.

I too fell in love and will do whatever
I need to take him from her.


Thrift

Some said he was thrifty
he didn’t waste so he didn’t want
horded today for tomorrow.
Some called him prudent
but his family found him stingy,
a rain cloud in the Mojave.
All would surely die
if they didn’t leave him
so one by one they ran away.


Grief

When his wife died
his blood turned cold
he didn’t talk
didn’t covet.
A stationary artifact
long forgotten except
for an occasional lizard
perched on his shoulder
gathering heat from
the afternoon sun.

Daylight or nighttime
he could be found,
a silent creature,
like a stone,
sitting alone
in his garden.