One For Laura

C’mon let’s go
I’ve been waiting for hours
Time to conquer
All poetry’s towers

Open the doors
Let loose the knowledge
I gotta learn this stuff
If I wanna get into college

Dickinson and Eliot,
Starting with Gilgamesh,
But trust me, you’ll lose me
If you include ole John Tesh

So, let’s learn about rhyme
In all its naïf pentameter
Hey, this isn’t too bad
For an old rhyming amateur

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Running Away (No One Knows)

Running away
Running hard
Getting away is not in the cards
FAILURE looms
Failure grows
My loss is mine
In verse or prose
Hunger for release
Hunger for the answer
The way out
Any way to get away
Not enough burgundy
Not enough merlot
Can’t find the reason
Can’t find the door
What’s to become
Of the knowing heart now so old
In a recumbent species no longer bold
The problem’s all sewed up by ten o’clock
And the problem tarries not for sand or rock
Where to go
When the tears end
where to hug when no one turns a face
Who am I and why am I here
Dying in the cold and the dark is just one thing I fear
The scars from the bars with their jars of disdain
Who gives a damn about the yarn rotting in the falling rain
So small the plans I plan to ply
Given half a chance ten times I’ll try
Make proud the child who still grows
Despite the warning No One Knows

Look Away, Time

Once she was so pretty—
Now she tries to look not so old.
Can you still see her eyes sparkle
Beneath her hair of store-bought gold?
Have you found your one and only?
Hold on with all you’ve got,
Or like those who end up so lonely,
You may forget the grace you were taught.
He used to know so much—
Now he thinks he’s lost his place.
He still loves his son and family
Even though he’s not sure about my face.
Study as hard as you can
And master the skills you need,
But keep a hard eye on Time
Which flies by at a freight train’s speed.
I still think she’s a beauty,
Even with her store-bought hair.
And despite the wrinkles and the crinkles,
I love her; and the rest? I no longer much care.