Confession

Once my poems were Latinate,
But now they're Anglo-Saxonate.
Once I found a lot of pleasure
In obscuring every measure.

Now you have no need to scurry
To the nearest dictionary;
I strive to make my verses clear,
With words that please the eye and ear.

Will they like us out there?

Imagine faring out in space
To represent the human race:
What values would we try to stress
To justify our earthly mess?

Would other forms of life think well
About our planet's living hell,
The brutal wars, the genocide
We wage with patriotic pride?

Would aliens condone our urge
To murder children, and to purge
The men who choose to disagree
With rules decreed by you and me?

Way out there in the universe
Would we find praise - or just a curse?

No second chance

At a country place in late October,
Where trees are dressed in antique colors,
Brilliant bursts of red and ochre overlay
A palimpsest of past pleasures.

Former lovers in the silent house, uneasy,
Wait for remembered tones of a grand piano,
And frustrated by time's passage, strain to hear
Chords played long past, and only half-recalled.
The briefest memory of passion's music
Fails to interrupt the silence.

A winter wish

Fraught by weather wan, and weary,
February's days are dreary.
Condemned to freeze this time of year,
The month will not be warm, I fear,
Winter's cold, cruel winds will blow,
With four more weeks of ice and snow,

If I could have one wish for me,
I'd fly down to the southern sea,
Where warm days reign, and song birds sing,
While soft winds sigh, and lovers cling,
Where February's ways are sweet,
Beneath the summer sun's bold heat.

The giraffe

Sometimes I smile, and have to laugh,
When contemplating the giraffe.
A giant, peaceful herbivore,
Polite, he's disinclined to roar,
(Though he might give out a bellow
If he meets a nasty fellow).

He likes Acacia leaves to munch,
And cranes his neck to reach a bunch.
(Higher leaves are best, the upper,
Which he chomps on for his supper;
His gourmet taste for leaves is fine,
But he forgoes the glass of wine.)

No animal is quite as tall,
In height, he stands above them all.
The mild giraffe is in first place,
With stilts required, to see his face.

After last night's storm

I walked beside the restless sea
And thought of what we want to be,
Our foolishness, and how we try
To dominate both earth and sky.

The littered beach's tattered form
Displayed the wrack of last night's storm,
Crushed clam shells, ragged scraps of trash,
Bore witness to the storm king's lash.

A Christmas tree rose on the sand,
As if awaiting some bright plan,
Set there to make clear testament
To man's absurd capricious bent.

Do you see us?

Do you see us old people on the street?
A lot of us use canes, and can't walk fast;
We're old, but we had lives like you, complete
With kids, homes, jobs; that part of life's our past.
Do you see us, or do you look away,
Embarrassed we might stop, and talk, and fuss,
And tell you time will catch you too, one day?
(We have so much in common, you and us.)
Your anxiety doesn't make us gloat;
We're walking the same road, just further on.
Sometimes its smooth, sometimes bumpy, but note
How similar, the things we're musing on.
Can you see? If our presence blocks the view,
Be tolerant; we're just the same as you.