Weary travelers look down not out
At smartphones
At iPads like this one
The train stops
No station, just stops
I look out past my daughter through the smeared window
Only Baltimore I think
But before me are lines of tiny connected houses
Some kept, some not
Radiating away from my window
Like the spokes of a wheel on a forgotten wagon
Too long in a field out behind a rundown barn
Passed by time some spokes broken and jagged
Some almost new
It's only Baltimore
There are plains here before me
Waving fields of grass in irregular rows
That dart to and fro along abandoned concrete sidewalks
Growing deeply and unmolested by steel
Where workers used to walk to jobs
In factories
But that was long ago
Here in Baltimore
Other buildings here too
In the distance ivy shows against red brick
A factory, it's insides awash with light
Visible through massive unbroken windows
The light pours in through a completely open sky
To the workers below
Here in Baltimore
The workers are green and sturdy
They stand in clumps and masses on the factory floor
Their leaves and branches reach towards the light
They grow uncaring as to where they are
Seeming not to notice their place of work
They will work anywhere
Even in Baltimore
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Saturday, June 30, 2012
Quiet Car
The quiet car causes one to ask questions
Like, whose definition of quiet are we riding under?
There is noise
The steady roar of the air conditioning
The muffled rumble of steel wheels on steel rails
A sneeze
A cough
The blunt tap of finger on touch screen
A rustle from a paper or magazine
It allows one to sleep
Or to think
About the Japanese man across the isle
Or his Japanese wife
I think they're Japanese
And where they are taking his parents
Or her parents
Is it a day in the city?
If so, which one?
New York?
Philly?
DC?
They are both older than I
And as I sit in the quiet car I wonder
Can they still hear the noises I do?
Can you?
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Like, whose definition of quiet are we riding under?
There is noise
The steady roar of the air conditioning
The muffled rumble of steel wheels on steel rails
A sneeze
A cough
The blunt tap of finger on touch screen
A rustle from a paper or magazine
It allows one to sleep
Or to think
About the Japanese man across the isle
Or his Japanese wife
I think they're Japanese
And where they are taking his parents
Or her parents
Is it a day in the city?
If so, which one?
New York?
Philly?
DC?
They are both older than I
And as I sit in the quiet car I wonder
Can they still hear the noises I do?
Can you?
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:Amtrak
Monday, June 18, 2012
My Desk
My desk has spaghetti on it
It does, really
And leaves
and bricks
and two cannon which point at my face
when the spaghetti doesn’t twist them some other way
The spaghetti is sauceless
no butter or cheese either
it connects my laptop to the world
To the scanner, two printers, a hard drive, my cell
phone, my iPod
Power
It lies there in a mass, woven together like marsh
grass in a Gullah basket I saw in the museum on Hilton Head once
But not as pretty or expensive
The leaves are stacked nicely for leaves anyway
In piles near the edges of the desk
Poised like the ships teetering on the edge of the
flat world
They tell me things
Who I need to pay, who I can put off until next month
that my daughter should consider Pratt even though she
wants to be a journalist
They’ll be reshuffled and eventually filed or thrown
away
Not like tree leaves
The ones that get raked up into piles
To be jumped in
The pointy pin oakey ones like the ones on a Gullah basket
woven from marsh grass I saw once in a museum on Hilton Head
The bricks are smaller than real brinks
The kind towns slap all over their storefronts in the
Northeast to make them look Colonial
Like Williamsburg
Virginia
Still, my bricks are smarter, not stronger mind you,
just smarter
They are a cell phone, a hard drive and an iPod
They are a cell phone, a hard drive and an iPod
They hold things more important to me than the colonial
bricks could
People, places, things all stored in little tiny bits
Like rice in that Gullah basket woven from marsh
grass that I saw in the museum on Hilton Head once
And don’t worry
The two cannon which sit, pointed at my head, don’t
fire bullets
They're speakers which fire things far more important
Than bullets
They fire a barrage of words and music and
ideas from people smarter than me
From people in places I’ve never been
Places I may never go
Places where they weave baskets out of marsh grass
like the one I saw in that museum on Hilton Head once.
Monday, June 11, 2012
The Spot
As I sit on the covered terrace
Surrounded by 90 years of family
My eye is drawn, as great grandpa David had planned
To the spot where the mountains meet
Beyond that, the next mountain just sitting there
Tauntingly reflected in the pond at the bottom of the hill
As if knowing that for today
It is out of reach
As sun wakes and light comes to the hillside
Buzzards take flight, awakened by the promise of new currents
Representing the end of life
They are appropriate for today
The creek rumbles down the valley
Refreshed by evening rain
It too is drawn to the spot
At the bottom of the hill
Where the mountains meet
Where the next mountain watches
Under the black soaring wings
Where two people, separated by consequence
Return to each other's arms forever
Surrounded by 90 years of family
My eye is drawn, as great grandpa David had planned
To the spot where the mountains meet
Beyond that, the next mountain just sitting there
Tauntingly reflected in the pond at the bottom of the hill
As if knowing that for today
It is out of reach
As sun wakes and light comes to the hillside
Buzzards take flight, awakened by the promise of new currents
Representing the end of life
They are appropriate for today
The creek rumbles down the valley
Refreshed by evening rain
It too is drawn to the spot
At the bottom of the hill
Where the mountains meet
Where the next mountain watches
Under the black soaring wings
Where two people, separated by consequence
Return to each other's arms forever
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Dangling Wanderer?
Sugar ant on bathroom floor
By the shower, near the door
You wander here, you wander there
You wander here, you wander there
Up and down most anywhere
You do not notice, above your head
An eight leg’d wolf hangs by a thread
And next to him suspended there
Are friends of yours dangling in mid-air
They do not move, wrapped so tight
Asleep forever, oh endless night
But as descends the hungry bug
You wander left, under the rug
Sunday, June 03, 2012
The Big Wide New
Speeches are made
Pictures are snapped
A straw bowler flies
A tear is shed
And life begins again
A new chapter
New places
New challenges
New adventures
New friends
For a woman who is
A woman
Not as tall as she'd like
Compassionate, intelligent, witty and fun
A friend
Good byes are said
Tears fall again
Old friends are left
But not really
For in this age we are all connected
But still
Virtual is not face to face
School is not camp
There is no return next season
We know this
You do too
So as you go, pack your heart
With memories of family and friends
Of the people who admire you
Who love you
Of us
Hold them close
As you walk forever forward
Down the path yet traveled
Into the big wide new
Into life
Pictures are snapped
A straw bowler flies
A tear is shed
And life begins again
A new chapter
New places
New challenges
New adventures
New friends
For a woman who is
A woman
Not as tall as she'd like
Compassionate, intelligent, witty and fun
A friend
Good byes are said
Tears fall again
Old friends are left
But not really
For in this age we are all connected
But still
Virtual is not face to face
School is not camp
There is no return next season
We know this
You do too
So as you go, pack your heart
With memories of family and friends
Of the people who admire you
Who love you
Of us
Hold them close
As you walk forever forward
Down the path yet traveled
Into the big wide new
Into life
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