Sketches - 44 (October 28th, 2014)

44.

October is a curious month.

Yearly harvest gives it up,

        cool winds blow and gust down and out

        of Cascades and even

        further up through

        and over the Rocky

        Mountains, the bone skeleton

        tree branches tremble for it.

And the hiss-cage-roar

of the lawn mowers, the blue

thin plume of exhaust just

before stowing it all away

for another winter to collect

whatever winter-long twinkle dust

in the garage.

A month of giant impossible

moons flooded in rust yellow

light and candy wrappers

fluttering drearily down

small town street gutters

after all is shut down

for the night.

For several Octobers in

a row I found myself

wrought with untimely

          disasters.

But for some reason now,

that has calmed itself

          down.

     I suppose disaster

     still has time to leap in,

October hasn't quite

              gotten over itself

              yet.

(October 28th, 2014)

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Sketches - 43 (October 26th, 2014)

43.

Hot indoors - Sunday

evening and unexpected

sad Indian Summer taking

breath away, tobacco pipe

also thinning my lungs as

my 40 something belly threatens

to pop further over my waist

line.  I try to eat just right

but necessity nods and

shoulders and directs,

sometimes its just easier in that

fitful day end hot sun to

order drive thru,  

take in the fast food fries,

the salted greasy onion

                           rings -

slop grease melted

slice of American odd-yellow cheese

caressing the

ever peppered Don and

Millie's diner

meat shoved into

styrofoam

containers

and slid

across the

wiped over

dull-silvered

diner

counter,

snarling wisp of cloud in

an otherwise deep eternal

blue sky, eternal in its

featureless blue as I do

imagine in quiet evenings

such as this one, all traffic

noiselessly swimming, teaming

in quiet veins and arteries of

autumned streets past hospitals,

grocers, car garages and bars.

Gulp down a last swallow

of coffee before deciding

that now would be a good

time to deliver my daughters

jacket and daycare payment

check to my ex’s mailbox.

But this is truly none of

my real concern or your business.  I am

simply looking forward to driving

out in that cool black

October evening, let some

of that sweat coating the

roots of my hair chill out,

           light my tobacco pipe

          and puff giant

          white clouds of

          tobacco breath

          into the car, watch the 

wall of smoke zip out

          the cracked-open window.

There is much to realize

when the town shuffles by

fast enough to be meaningless

and there is only the radio and

                I,

sometimes a prophetic union, but

more often than not, frizzled sold

and done.

(October 26th, 2014)

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Sketches - 42 (October 26th, 2014)

42.

Black coffee since

the midnight world

began in cool-chill

October breath gusting

through the open back

door and rich cigarette

smell throughout the

        kitchen.

Clothes in the dryer

spin cozily - house

work never done

with 5 mouths to

feed, job worry woes

but all this scrawling

and songs to show for

           it.

(October 26th, 2014)

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Sketches - 41 (October 25th, 2014)

41.

The Ramshackle House,

like a big old boat sailing and

rocking steadily through tides

of weather fronts, footfalls over

its half a million various

splinters, sometimes I’m singing out

shocks of whole songs behind

its water stained windows.  

I’m wearing the same dirty weathered

green ‘scrub’ bottoms I’ve

had on for days now -

wife Ash is off west of

midtown calling on her grandfather

after last night’s memorial

service for his wife.

I woke up from a nap

in our second story bed

room - its the only room

in the ramshackle house

with windows paneling

off the south east

corner and could see the

sun gleaming from it’s decent

in the west onto the window’s

old thin wood window frames,

that ancient orange/red

color cast on to the faded

paint chipped white of the

ramshackle house’s original

coat of 1930’s paint.  The

hue of such a setting sun

is the color of invitation, an

invitation to keep moving

            and moving.

The setting sun itself, an

         invitation, specifically

created for Nomads and lost

children to wander into.

(October 25th, 2014)

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Sketches - 40 (October 21rst, 2014)

40.

Dark October night with a

distant yawn-roar of traffic.

My wife breathes on in calm

sleep upon our newly made

bed in a newly made room.

A drunken yelling voice outside

breaks the black-liquid silence

and kids breath on as well

in their own sleep crowded by

            kid-dreams and

            it seems I’m the

            only one up left

            to scribble.

The crazed day-end insect

screech is gone, subsided

into the various bright red

rust colors of fall.

          

Now there’s only that yawn roar

               of distant traffic

               and occasional

               hoot of lonesome

               river barges over

               the dark cold

               Missouri river gurgling

               close by the slumbering

               shoulders of everyone’s

               east Nebraska

               sleep.

(October 21rst, 2014)

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