Wonderful

You want to pull up stakes and make
a beeline out of dodge, but the old codger
has a score to settle; he tests your resolve
as your spirits wander. Under watchful eyes
your wish for non-existence is granted
and every man, woman and Zuzu is lesser
for it. Your brother dies, as do the guys
on his ship. You weren't there to save them.
Your mother sees another boarder,
not a son at all. You fall from her grace; losing face.
A bad Martini drives you to drink and  in the Nick of time,
a strange angel gets his wings on your dime!
You think you've wasted your life with so much to give.
This is the place to be, and the people you need to touch.
Is that asking too much of life?

© JPW - 2013

Poets United - Verse First: We Are Interconnected

Memoir of Me at Three

Clumsy kid always hid
in out of the way places.
Atop the refrigerator...
in the pigeon coop...
under the front porch...
I carried a torch for the girl
next door (she was much older)
all of four. Walks in the pram
holding hands and sleeping
together under the trees 
in the park. Afraid of the dark,
loved my mom and dad,
had a sister and two brothers
(with others in my future),
skinned knees and sutures.
A silent sort, never resorting to words
when a good hand gesture
would suffice. A very nice life
when I remember me at three.

© JPW 2013

Written for (but too late to submit) dVerse Poets Pub - Poetics: Try to Remember

Out In Front

Out in front
there's a rickety porch,
rough hewn timbers with tree bark
still clinging to their fibrous skeletons.
Rocking chairs and a stump table;
shavings from a whittled branch
strewn about the weathered floor boards.

Out in front
there's a tree; tall and stately,
a monument to the longevity apparent
since it was planted, a feeble sapling 
much like himself - thin, gangly and weak.
It speaks of perseverance and dedication -
fulfilling its station to mark time and grow.

Out in front
near the tree, there's a lake...
a pond, really. Reeds and lily pads
defining its edge. Sounds of crickets and croaks
of bullfrogs, cicada whines reverberate in the late
afternoon. Soon their sounds will be silenced
as the seasonal change lumbers into the valley.

Out in front
is a tire dangling, a rope looped over a branch 
of the stately tree. Dirt dug out, a furrow where feet
dragging and kicking kept sticking the ground
with a new found ferocity. Gaining in height and velocity,
the children take turns launching, airborne to land
in a heap with a thud; sometimes blood appears, the poor dears.

Out in front
a wagon waits; flatbed secured, a hitch holding tightly.
On a brightly hued morning, and without much in the way
of a warning, grandfather had passed. The town folk amassed
in respect; paying forward what had come around on occasion.
Sadly in procession, he was carried from the house - a finality.
Placed upon the caisson, a solemn silence ensued. 

Out in front
the porch remained; rockers swaying in the stiffness of a late breeze.
Birds nested in the tree and the pond continued with activity
and the sounds of life. No one sat on the pendulous tire as it
swung hypnotic. The front door was ajar, but it was in exit,
not as an invitation to enter. Out in back the fields had grown
unruly and left to sit fallow. But, out in front a good fellow has gone.

©JPW 2013

Poetic Asides by Robert Lee Brewer - Prompt # 235 - "Front" poem

Poets United - Poetry Pantry #166

dVerse Poets Pub - OLN #113