Poetry

Our world has two moons,
I saw them both last night,
one in the darkened sky,
and the other
breaking across a mirrored lake,
both silver, but one
cold and pale, and the other
wet and shimmering.

Joe Psarto, a Westlake resident whose poetry has appeared many times in the Observer, won the grand prize in this year's WCLV Valentine's Day Love Poem Contest with his poem "Blush." Joe beat out over two hundred entries. His winning poem can be seen on the WCLV website, www.wclv.com.

I am the one who longs to be Superwoman,
Yet plummets into despair as I push against
My true self.

I am the one who wants to travel the world,
To experience the sensation of wealth
And the hopelessness of poverty.
                                                                                                                                                  
I am the one who protects you from those
Who would harm you. I shield you from any evil
Which may be near.

Moles and Voles

           (for the children)

Moles and voles and swans and geese,

and spiders' webs and golden fleece,

and little boys and little girls,

and hissing snakes and smiling squirrels,

and rain and snow and spring and fall,

 and dogs and cats, I love them all.

Getting down to brass tacks: In the old American country  store, the owner would put brass tacks, to measure 36 inches, in the counter top as they measured bolts of piece goods.

Inch: We know it as a unit of measurement. King Edgar of England (944) said it was the length of the knuckle of his thumb.

Dress to the nines: If you had a suit made and you ordered an expensive one, tradition says the tailor should use nine yards of material.

I raise a toast to Sigmund Freud,
A seer who found my skull devoid
Of any trace of neuroplasm,
And in its place a ghastly chasm.

He proved to be a pioneer
Who plumbed the depths of groundless fear;
And when he asked me, “Yoost vas los ist?”
He brought relief to my neurosis.

And so his memory I revere,
With love and honor quite sincere.
He was a thinker so sublime –
And the head shrinker of all time.

The soft music
of an early morning rain
playing on the grass and trees
in B flat major
is as beautiful as
a Beethoven piano sonata,
same key, so I open
my window wider,
my ear gets wet,
and the wind says to me,
– hush, listen! –
and hands me a towel.

They buried her beneath the earth
and left me weeping there.
And from my post I could not see
dark eyes, sweet face, soft hair.

The air fell dead and nature paused
as silence entered in.
Then moon and stars and angels
came with a Palanquin.

They carried her up from the land,
dark eyes, sweet face, soft hair,
and quitting me for fleecy clouds
she left me weeping there.

silk pillow
you are too soft
I will flee to the mountain

rock mountain
you are too hard
I will go back to my pillow

soft pillow
hard mountain
my wife - it was you all the time

One cold night the moon rose full
in perfect periodic roundness
– of course, she is a lady –
and bragged that peoples and nations
have worshipped her, and she liked it,
and that was her sin,
and why she was an exile.

Oh yes, the way it is,
it's in the Book.

I wondered,
does my dog worship me,
I'd like that,
and is that my sin?

He looked up and said to me
– in hushed barks –
that he knows nothing of theology,
that he loves me,
nothing more, nothing less,
and I knew my dog was holy.

The search for the Absolute

is tempered in a great man

by a mother who will always

think of him as a child.

He may move kingdoms

with sword or pen

and love a beautiful Circe,

but his mother

sees tin soldiers lined up

on the table, and she knows

when it's time for his nap

by the dispositions on his face.

He pouts and she smiles,

he smiles and she laughs,

he laughs and she thinks of

gods and men and little boys,

and tucks him in at night,

chasing the ghosts away.

I never get what I want when I want what I want

because my want all looks the same.

I never say what I mean when the time comes around,

I never say what I mean to say.

If all you can think is how great they can write

and your pen will never mean a thing,

To create the most effective spoof,
Select a genius not a goof.
Employ a person so superior
No one could ever class inferior,
For if your choice is near the top,
You cannot cause his fame to drop
By giving him a gentle ribbing
Or with a sting in your ad-libbing:
Such things can't threaten his acumen –
They'll make him just a bit more human.
So let this be your comic rule:
"Laugh with the statesman, not at the fool."

Fuller House
Beautiful old house,
you came to us sailing down
Lake Erie's shore.
How many of your order have had
a sea-adventure like that?
But no more water-trips for you,
gallant one,
you are home
and here to stay
forever and a day.
Have no trepidations,
Huntington is your family now,
and we will love you evermore,
brick by brick,
wood by wood,
room by room,
door by door.
And here's a buckeye
for your boutonniere.

Beauty is the roses' hue                                                                                  
Bathed in sunlight
Kissed with dew.

A baby's face
Cherubic smile
Brightens up the darkest place.

Tiny kitten, soft and white,
Stately pine tree,
Colorful kite.

When life is cruel and filled with pain,
It's these  which lift
My spirit again.

Whenas my Celia walks
My blood flows hot.
Your permeating eye, dear Herrick,
So long ago, has quickened mine.

So now when Celia walks,
My blood flows fire-like
As she moves in polyester so diaphenous. And dances
Such movement glides,
Excites the eye, the mind, the heart.
And when my Celia walks,
Each step pulls tight
The sheath she wears. Then, then...

Blood, sweat and tears: The phrase was made popular from the first speech by Prime Minister Winston Churchill on May 13, 1940.

Bone up on: Victorian Henry Bohn published translations of the classics, popular with students cramming for exams. The phrase means to study intensively.

Names.

Identifying words,

And more:

Expectations when given,

Challenges as received,

Meanings while lived,

Legacies remembered.

Words are common,

Names are not,

Each uniquely

One’s own.

Ah, October,

A beautiful month.

You gladden my heart,

With your reds, oranges,

Greens and golds.

Harbinger of winter's wonder

And nature's slumber

You are a mixture

Of hope and despair

As all life prepares

For the challenge of

A long winter

And the promises of

Another spring.

October: The tenth month of the year, gets it name from the Latin "octo" (eight) as it was the eighth month in the Roman calendar.

Peanut gallery: The cheapest seats in a vaudeville theater. The loudest, most rowdy section.

Chagrin: From the Germanic word "grami" for sorry or trouble. Nowadays it signifies slight disappointment tinged with irritation.

The lady is flapping her lips
and tongue. She has a cell phone
stuck to her ear with super glue.
A small child is at her side
holding on tightly,
attached, invisible,
wondering if she will ever
learn to talk.
I hope the lady doesn't
ask me the time of day, for
my mother taught me not to speak
to someone on the phone.

Too young to know what was going on,
Too young to know right from wrong.
I was just too young.
Too young to know where my parents were,
Too young to know where my siblings were.
Too young to know what courts were or social workers,
Too young to know what foster homes were,
Too young to understand what group homes were.
I was just too young. Too young to understand what
was being dished out to me.
Then...I wasn't old enough.
I wasn't old enough to go certain places

The oak leafs are dying
and they don't seem to know it.
Golds and reds and oranges,
with sweet, sweet voices
like sea nymphs,
are drawing them into a
final moment of glory
after a lazy season of green.
 
The leafs sparkle and sing
in the cool breeze,
twisting and tinkling
and dancing a jig.
 
But it's a daemon painting
the wonders across their skins.
The leafs back away,
too late, too late,
 
and begin to fall.
 
And all the while
the Watchers shout,
- how beautiful it is -

(Done 04/07/1976 for U.S. Bicentennial)

Sing jubilee four times:

for world-heard shot the year before,

for pen in hand,

and blood and treasure.  ---

Great bell did joy

the taproots of our now.

 

(Toward 2010 Bay Village Bicentennial)

Hail Cahoons and Osborns, et al.

and splendid-looking beach

and ours who fought

at the 'Canal and Bulge and since...

Others and we will say more pre-'10.

When November's winds
Barrel through
Leafless trees
I sigh.

Tell me why I
Stay and face
The cold when
San Diego's sun beckons,

Tropical climates call
To me yet when
I see the first
Gentle snow

I know Cleveland
Will always be
Home
For me.

The volunteer
stood ready
Unsure of his commitment

The old man
Looking at his hands
scarred but sun tanned

Oiled bodies on the summer sand
Frisbees in the air
Jet skis in the water

It's like tending a garden
and watching the stems
rise tall and shrink small,
blacks juxtaposing reds
– an interracial affair –
then dissipating into four piles
at the top of the garden,
then picked up,
ripped, stripped,
strewn, mixed,
fixed anew into brand new ranks
piling higher and higher to the right.

I turned into the avenue
and met a stately row
of young pear trees
shimmering in the morning light.
They were dressed in white flowers 
where the night before 
had been twigs and branches 
of bent-naked-wood.
And when the sun hid 
behind a fluffy cloud,
leaving a feathery glow 
across the land,
they became an Irish lace, 
a cloth of royal pedigree.
And with the wind 
holding their hands
they danced a dainty jig for me.

Buddy, why did the boss reject

your football headline

that, sparingly, spoke

of backfielders? --- 

What does he call the baseball 3

who patrol the outfield

God made man in his own perfect form,

Then for each critter established a norm.

And if you won't freely His powers admit,

Take the best of the animal kingdom, to wit:

An ant-eating mammal so legendary

That it always comes first in the dictionary;

A diaphanous fish with a touch like a tickle,

And the rough-coated fellow that once graced a nickel.

Yet before He reflected and found them good,

Made a beast with a trunk, and a snake with a hood;

An hombre that drinks without bending his knees,

And pokes his head from the tops of the trees.

And if He could make all these creatures so grand,

With harts in the highlands and heads in the sand;

A bald-headed scavenger riding a gale;

A four-legged hoofer escaped from a jail;

An impeccable bird that wears a tuxedo –

Why on earth did He make the ...

...the insect that brings epidermal sgraffito?

Chic: The word denotes an outfit, object or place that exudes sophistication and style. From the German (not French) word "schick," meaning fashionable.

Clean 'round the bend: Completely crazy or eccentric. Said to be an old naval term for anybody who is mad.

Pass the acid test:  Someone or something that has been subjected to a conclusive test. From the gold rush era as a method of testing for real gold.

When summer days were dry and sunny,
A farmer lad, for pocket money,
Came into town to cut the grass
For city folk of higher class
Who did not care to push their mowers
But spent spare time in boats as rowers.

Now when the boy became a man,
He built a daydream and a plan,
And since more fit for storytime
I’ll put it into words that rhyme.

Upon My Way To Scotland Yard

Upon my way to Scotland Yard,
I met a statue of the Bard
I doffed my hat in deep respect
And fondness for his intellect.

It's the end of my shift as I sit  on the bench looking at my open locker.

My eyes come to rest on my old beat-up lunch box with its dings, dents and scratches.

It seems a lot like me. A union man from the "school of hard knocks."

Over the years I have suffered my share of dents and dings, but still take pride in my American work ethic.

On her birthday I go alone
down to the Great Northern Mall
and sit on a bench in front of JC Penney,
drinking hot coffee and reading Yeats.

The Mall buzzes with electric noise,
the inside air bright and warm,
yet seeming a winter's darkness.
Busy silent people swarm about me.

I feel invisible, an alien.
I pretend to wait for her
as she shops,
and I become disconcerted.

She is taking too long. 

In our belligerence we reject
the Apache medicine man
and the Shinto monk of old Japan
who assign life to rocks and rills,
and mountains and hills, and clouds,
and the flashing lightning, too, and
speak to their dishes and pots,
thanking them for their services.

We say it is nothing
but superstition and myth,
a waste of time, a poetic madness.

Yet I find myself - my very self -
talking to the trees. And as for flowers,
I cannot pass by those blushing ladies
without a nod,
and, for the dew-covered ones,
a crimson sigh.

I'd like to coach girls in sports

for a while.

They don't know many cliches;

they speak basic English.

A refreshing change.

A cold Sunday and the church-goers were bundled up.

The very old man in front of me in the pew could not weigh more than 120 lbs.

He took off his "Browns" watch cap to reveal a bald spot and some wispy white hair, from his comb-over, that floated for a moment in the holy air.

He opened his personal prayer book. It was black faux leather, its corners dog-eared by use and the gold edges of the pages had gone to mostly silver from age.

Our time together
Is measured
In minutes.
 
Each second my heart
Cries out
Touch me.
 
Press your fingers
To mine
Trace my lifeline.
 
Hold my hand
For a moment
So I might know
I'm really alive.