Send A Cake

I want to send
A sweet little cake
Of green and purple and gold
To a nice little person
With the grandest heart
So full of life and so bold;
In her railroad town
Twixt here and there
With its bicyclist and a spry crossing guard;
Life saunters on
As without a care
In these times both easy and most hard.
COTU Gal
Guides us on
From inland rail thence to sea;
Perhaps one day
If the Fates grant upon
A chance to be in such company.
With this mere birthday wish
Escaping heart and mind,
Without cold years counted mathematical,
I wish unto her
Many happy years to her return,
With blessings to our own virtual COTU Gal.

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Do You Mean Me?

Are those soft words meant for me?
Is it now safe to settle into tranquility?
Icy rains ahead on roads fog-wrapped
Fleeing a love wherein I was once trapped.
Twelfth Night revelers muster at the Carrollton barn
Their annual trek to recover their childhood yarn:

Hey, throw me something mister!
Hey, don’t look that way at my sister!
Meet me at The Avenue and Seventh
Of course! Bring your cousin Kenneth!
Doubloons, cups, beads, catch the daylight;
Oh baby, kiss me good; sweetie, hug me tight.

And so Hump Day with ashes full arrives
And recriminations cut with dull knives—
I only kissed her once on a day care forgot.
We’re done, that’s it, you’d rather not—
Why is life in the thirties so stupid?
Aren’t we adults, who killed Cupid?

Why do we think ourselves
Into such boxes of darkness,
Into that snare of wrong turns;
To put down hard roots
Into a newer unloved land;
Grasping, weak and missing—
Another lost kite string over the hedge;
Another lost thing we swore to keep;
Living a clueless life over the edge
As now I lay me down to sleep?

Are those soft words meant for me?
Is it now safe to settle into tranquility?
Diseases and ruin now arrive to drag us back home.
My armor was never silver but warehouse chrome.
O, to die in Ashland, intox’ed by her clackety-clack.
Just to home return, but you can never ever go back.

Avec Toi

I miss walking Paris
I miss Washington DC
I really miss those nice things
You used to think about me
I really like my neighbor
Even if I don’t know her name
Such things can’t be helped
There’s no one left to blame
The cat wants to meow outside
He doesn’t care much for Amelie
He just likes chasing whatever
Presents far away from me
I loved a Nordic goddess
I danced at her only wedding
We reconnected somehow on Facebook
Now I must vacuum, Jack keeps on shedding
I have seen true beauty
And felt arid with bottomless pain
I cannot understand the darkness
Kathy sees in Ashland’s daily grain train
I want to return to New Orleans
And lure the regard of a new pretty head
But I just write small lines in Austin
Watching Amelie avec a glass of Fonseca instead

Saint Patrick’s Day 2018

Really, must, have to get out of this room
The plum trees of Ashland are all in a-bloom
There’s Kathy A. at the cam
As I get on my St. Pat’s Day tam
Heading for an Irish coffee or go boom!