StarPoet Newsletter Vol. XI, No. VIII

Few of my clothes have pockets
-- All right and good in the fashion world --
Not that they'd look good on my body
Or be very practical wherever they went.

Breast pockets are useless, well, because of the breast,
Likewise pockets on my backside,
Major pockets in front ruin the line of the slacks,
And I don't carry keys there anyway.

Few women would fit a wallet in her pants
Or cram anything in more than lipstick;
A purse!  A purse!  My pockets for a purse!
Is the well dressed woman's battle cry.

Ascending the escalator on a chill winter morning,
Winding out of the caverns of the Pentagon Metro,
All the while watching for the rider with a bomb in his pants
And wondering which Army officers are committed lesbians.

Hundreds and thousands of half-awake commuters
Stumbling their way through the maze of buses and security,
Each moment a decision point, friend, foe, or family,
Accented by the operatives calmly lurking in their midst.

The snow melts, the sun stirs,
The wind finishes breaking the trees;
The county roads, covered with ice,
Still wait on the sound of snowplows.

Our island, quite isolated by the frozen drifts,
Remains silent except for the children sliding down
The gradual townhouse slopes, and the teenage boys
Showing off for their self-conscious young women.

A rough cold wind roars across the commons,
Toppling everything not rooted to the Earth,
Windows rattle, screen doors shake,
Naked human flesh chills, burst by violent burst
As human eyes marvel at the brightness of the sunshine.

A winter blast of determined, frigid air
Winds south from the artic through Lake Superior,
Whistling through southern vents and half-bent branches,
Sending the feathered birds and well furred squirrels
Far aground in the safety of their hidden sanctuaries..

No snow   No Snow   No Snow
Snow
Snow Snow Snow Snow Snow Snow Snow
Wind
Wind and Snow   Snow and Wind
Snow, Sleet, Wind and Snow
Blizzard
Reset
Start Again
Stay in Bed
Reset
Start Again

Few things are sure in life
-- Morning comes early, death comes to everyone,
They always run out of free chocolate ice cream --
Answers that seem perfectly reasonable today
May turn out to be completely wrong come tommorrow.
If the assumptions are questionable
-- God exists, man is intrinsically good,
Your date on Saturday night doesn't have herpes --
The outcome might be other than what one might expect,
But you aren't going to find out for sure unless you're out there;
Reality, afterall,  is nothing to write home about and, if you did,
There is a high probability your email would disappear without a trace.

HO * MO * SEX * U * AL
 
Nope.  Sorry.
You're close but no cigar.
 
A Dyke.   A Lesbian.
 
Except when I'm with a man
Then for want of words ...
 
Unless a woman will do ya.
 
Attraction first,
When the pheromones work,
Only then a check of body parts.
 
Love the sinner,
Love their body,
 
Then close the door
And get on with it.
 
Even if you have to check
For video cameras first.

 God and I don't need no Church,
 We don't need no Book,
 No Pope, no Preacher;
 We both have our doubts
 About the other's existence,
 But that doesn't stop
 Either us from living
 Or trying to make sense
 Of all of this nonsense.

The building moans with blowing snows
In counterpoint to the ancient howl
That shakes and bends the trees;
The air turns white with ominous rattle
Obscuring the homes across the street,
Driving me to sip hot cardamom tea
To ward off any gaels or banshees
Out challenging the winter wrath.

Snow tumbles in a shudder of tree and limb,
Takes flight from ground and roof top
To join the still unlanded flakes
Riding the crest of the the northern winds. 
The world is white with dark wooden branches
Awaiting the final gust that will crash the earth.
Land and heaven have grown one in winter,
Jumbled tightly by snow, wind, and ice
That storms the sky to noisy surrender.

I was trained to question my masters,
To challenge my betters; concurrently,
For my continued survival,  I learned
To duck and cover when things got rough;

A direct assault
Is seldom the best course of action,
Symbollic rebellion,
Just a guerilla show and tell.

I prefer to live full and prosper
Than become a Trotsky or a
Guantanamo rebel rouser,
Large crowds of students
Have always scared me:

I am and ever shall be
Opposed to collective terrorism.

Change comes slowly,
Even the American Revolution
Is still a thing underway,
Tidying up the odds and ends
We couldn't agree to
For two hundred years of history.