Monthly Archives: April 2017

Good Grief: rimas dissolutas

Good grief! What else did you expect?
A world set suddenly to rights,
some glibly promised golden dawn,
rough places sanded down to plain,
and milk and honey handed out
to both devout and infidel?

Instead, you got a fresh train wreck:
horrific days and sleepless nights,
with conflict that just lingers on
and brings no joy at all, just pain.
Why such surprise when people shout
and damn your policies to hell?

My God! Did you expect a prize
for proudly showing ignorance
of what it means to “keep it real”
or silent, suffer in the dark
while your parade glides loudly by
and celebrates your privilege?

And even now, with “opened” eyes,
you make clumsy attempts to dance,
pretending you can still appeal
to those who see you as a shark.
You’re blind to even your own lies
but still call protest sacrilege.

28 APR 2017

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The Critic: riddle

Who tears apart, but never builds;
in summer, says he prefers chills;
proclaims “I won’t” when others will;
expects to never pay the bill?

Who tends to “no”, withholding “yes”;
predicts more failure than success;
looks to curse rather than bless;
just compliments under duress?

Who finds the flaw in beauty’s whole;
un-masks delusions in each role;
runs not to praise, at best, cajole;
and celebrates his self-control?

Who gets no joy in dance or song,
unless detailing things gone wrong;
and sits aloof, above the throng
who sway and smile and sing along?

Who in the end has only words;
an empty theater of absurd;
gray stones that never turns to birds;
and empty echoes never heard?

Who condescends, too proud to bend;
see only foes, and not one friend;
from years of living to offend;
alone, unwanted in the end?

The Critic.

28 APR 2017

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Lose or Win: rhupunt

What may begin
as lose or win
soon starts to spin
outside that frame.

It seems like play,
this bob and sway:
a bright display,
almost a game,

a wild careen,
drifting between
two wide extremes,
darkness and flame.

Always the chance
in the day’s dance
any advance
could leave you lame.

Each place you are,
gutter or star,
leaves its own scar.
No point in blame.

Thus every art
contains, in part,
true and false starts.
Each ends the same.

27 APR 2017

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Idol

Don’t want to be an American idol,
good for a season and then tossed away;
held up like Jesus and the King James Bible,
blamed for the country’s future going astray.

Don’t want to be an American idol,
hawking potato chips and new Chevrolets;
starting out starstruck, ending up suicidal,
shriveled and spit out prematurely gray.

Don’t follow me thinking I’m headed somewhere
you’ll recognize on TV.
Don’t waste your time trying to be somebody
who only wants to be me.

Don’t want to be an American idol,
shrink-wrapped and candy-coated fantasy;
sold on the corner at a dozen a penny,
bootlegged in mixed degrees of quality.

Don’t want to be an American idol,
famous for being a celebrity;
pretending at a something somewhere near vital,
believing whatever I’m supposed to be.

Don’t follow me thinking that I’ve got something
to make life easy and free.
Don’t waste your time trying to be a somebody
who only wants to be me.

26 APR 2017

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Wake Early: rhopalic verse

Wake early, quietly, deliberate;
look closely, carefully, attentively.
Pay greater attention, specifically,
to whispers: lingering, ephemeral.

26 APR 2017

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Day Flight: rannaigheacht mhor

Each new day is so fleeting:
like a busy bee flitting
between its sweet hits, floating,
never slowing nor quitting.

Life’s made of days flying:
sighed hellos and then goings.
Through each room we go gliding:
near colliding, then dying.

19 APR 2017

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Little Bird: rannaigheacht ghairid

Little bird:
did you think that no one heard
your bright melody at dawn,
long gone before day’s first word?

Seems absurd
that your little tune conferred
on my thoughts such peaceful ease
across the breeze, little bird.

17 APR 2017

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