Santa arrived needing help ...

that Christmas Eve as I scrambled down the darkened stairs

into a lighted kitchen, awake and believing it Christmas morn,

to see my dad putting together the gas station

with its working lift and doors that opened,

what I’d asked for that afternoon on Santa’s lap

at the Sears and Roebuck, had seen in their Christmas catalog,

pouring over it and marking what I wanted most;

but my mother intercepted me, too late, to take me by the hand

back up the stairs and into bed, not a word exchanged

about my father helping Santa, nor, held fast,

the candy cane taken from my stocking hung there

at the top of the stairs, for Santa had come,

as he had every year, and every year since,

even now as I, like my father, help him out

with doll houses, bikes and wagons, “assembly required”

on Christmas Eve by elves and fathers pitching in,

caught by children, eager and creeping early

down from their rooms, awake and believing.

Merry Christmas,

"and on Earth, peace, goodwill to men."

A Christmas Poem, 2015

Over Bethlehem, Santa’s sleigh slows down

and the jangle of harness bells ceases

on this holy night, the stars brightly shining,

a night to celebrate a savior’s birth;

but that savior never came, some would claim,

just a baby born of low birth, from Nazareth,

too poor for a proper birth, nurses and attendants,

a child born in a stable among the animals, bleating and cooing,

and the first visitors but the shepherds, common laborers,

not men of influence, and the wise men, too,

scholarly men following a star, some cosmic oddity foretelling,

just a baby, forgotten in his growing up, no savior at all,

only tales told of an immaculate birth and questionable lineage;

but in Bethlehem, Santa’s sleigh slows down and the jangle

of harness bells ceases in homage to a savior born

this day in the city of David, heralded by the angels

on this holy night celebrated, the stars brightly shining,

just as Santa slows and the bells cease over the ancient

cities of Ur and Lumbini and Mecca, homage to saviors born

on holy nights like this, Abraham, Siddhartha Gautama, Muhammad,

led by a light of faith serenely beaming on a new

and glorious morn, a grateful chorus, sweet hymns of joy

raised in a weary world seeking Peace, seeking Him.

---------------

Dona Nobis Pacem

Snow

Snow is quiet weather --

soundless as it falls, drifting down

in a slow silent spiral, these single flakes,

intricate lacework spun in the cold air of winter

and wind-blown, slow crystals singly drifting,

alone and quiet; and a soft hush descends,

gently settling on our lives --

Snow, the quiet weather.

Autumn Rain Softly Falling

Late autumn rain, softly falling, is cold and raw,

chilling us “to the bone,” old farmers claim,

and driving us back inside

to warm ourselves by a fire, wrapped in fleece and wool

and clutching tight a cup of coffee, acrid,

hot, and strong, a quiet time to reflect,

looking inward, to prepare us for the winter months ahead,

long winter months here at the lake, silent,

now, save for a soft autumn rain, cold and raw.

Someplace

Some place, faintly, very faint now,

are our initials written on a stone wall,

from when we were younger, she and I, in high school,

stone carving out stone in a dark, dampened room,

salty and cool; and standing together,

we lightly etched, granite gouging,

a “J” and an “R” and a “W”, holding hands

and holding each other, inseparable,

believing what we carved there,

carved in stone, like stone eternal,

would stay unchanged, and some place, now

are our initials carved, a lovers’ sign,

still carved faintly and unseen, ageless,

stone carving out stone, all that remains of us,

she and I, and those high school days in love.

Rain is Falling through the Roof

Rain is falling through the roof,

drop by drop, and steady,

to collect in a pan I placed there,

an old pan, bent and crushed, used up, no use now

but for collecting fallen rain,

the rain falling through my roof,

drop by drop, and steady,

a rhythmic drumming, a metallic ting over time

transformed, a faint splash grown loud

in the quiet of the room, like an unseen clock ticking

somewhere, growing louder, for sleep evades me, lying here,

the gentle sound of a summer rain above me soothing,

but for this single beat, drop by drop,

steady, rhythmically filling an old pan, bent

and crushed, of no use now, feeding my fears,

overflowing itself and flooding, carrying me away

as I struggle to fall asleep and dream, like Alice

falling down a rabbit hole, adrift in her own tears,

left to wander, directionless, in a world gone mad,

lost and frightened, unable to find my own way home,

where the rain is falling through the roof,

keeping me awake through the seconds passing drop

by drop into an old pan, bent and crushed, and steady.

Wallflowers

In the din of junior high, filtered lights

and muted colors blend with the music’s pulsations

into a hazed memory of standing alone against a wall,

a wallflower, a memory that doesn’t fade as flowers do

in time and decades passing by, passing slowly:

heavy feet drumming and pounding on the wooden floor

of a junior high dance he didn’t want to attend, but did,

feeding his loneliness, a loneliness he still remembers,

like a wallflower pressed flat

between the pages of then and now,

an impression left on the pages of his life.

The loons left yesterday

taking with them their raucous call

to make their way down the coast

to warmer climates, and some days I wonder

why I don’t follow them, just leave behind the frozen ground

and the cold air, wet with snow and ice,

and make my way to a sandy beach to stretch upon,

a little umbrella’d drink nearby,

a winter tan warming my skin and, perhaps,

my spirit, too, lying there, yet thinking of the lake,

of home, and the eagles that remained to catch the thermals

or perch themselves atop a craggy tree in awe

of a winter morning, blue and clear and bright enough

to see into tomorrow and the summer months ahead,

see the things we lose sight of, lost in our own migrations,

sunshine on the winter snow, glistening and alive and fresh,

us, too, remembering, eager for spring and the loons’ return.

Silent in Summer's Passing

It’s quiet here on the lake, now, late in autumn,

colors past their prime and fallen, and tree limbs laid bare.

The docks have all been pulled onto the shore

and the boats are gone, stowed away from the winter’s

ice and snow, left to idle away the dormant months ahead.

All is quiet, now, but for the eerie sound of a few loons

reluctant to leave, their voices echoing in the early

evening darkness or just before the rising of the sun,

the morning’s light still faint; and a mist rises

from the lake, a mirror this day reflecting back the season,

cold and mute, a faint echo of summer turned to fall.

Their calling to each other, perhaps, bemoans their going,

a sadness at nature’s migration to the coast, leaving

and leaving behind them, alone, the gentle brush of waves

constant at the water’s edge, leaf strewn and brittle,

a shoreline gone silent in summer’s passing,

restless in the stillness of the winter months

that stretch before us, those who stay behind

in the quiet of the lake, reluctant, ourselves, perhaps,

staying behind to idle away the dormant months, reflecting,

alone and still and restless.

Where Are You Going?

“Where are you going?” she asks.

"Out," I say. "For a walk."

                                                 "But where?"

Perhaps just to the top of the hill,

the dog and I, a slow climb

up a rutted road, and rocky,

rock-strewn to trip me

in my mindless amble, wandering;

or to the point, around the cove,

to look back to where I am now,

leaving this place, look back at where

I’ve been, unaware, even, how I got here,

not sure if I’ll return or continue on;

or maybe to the trailhead, the East’s

long trail, and pausing there, wondering:

north to the mountain end? or south,

taking that first step, Georgia bound?

A journey I don’t have time to complete,

not today, but another day, perhaps;

“I don’t know, just going out.

For a walk. Come, take my hand.

Walk with me into tomorrow.”

The Apples

In autumn, the apples announce the season,

boldly proclaiming it in red and green and golden

fruit, sweet and tart, ripe, and fit for picking:

this our reward at the end of a long summer,

readying us for the winter months ahead.

Leaving

“All aboard,” I heard faintly

amid the hiss of steam and the smell

of smoke and ash filtering through

the still air of the station, standing here,

waiting to board a train that would never come,

would never leave the station again, for the last train

left years ago, decades, long before

the station master locked the door and left himself.

The rails have since rusted over, grown wild with brush

and weed, the windows cracked and broken,

and the paint is faded to dried board,

left now to vandals and to the young

seeking sanctuary there, out of sight, out of view,

finding it, perhaps, among the littered floor

and broken glass, their lives carved or burned,

graffiti’d, loud onto walls gone silent.

And I’m standing here, waiting, listening,

my ears straining to hear the decades gone by

and the stilled voice of a young man, ticket in hand,

a small satchel, anxious to leave

and not come back, as I once left,
seeking fame and fortune someplace else,
and coming home, now, no richer, really, than when I left.

And turning back, I find I’ve missed the train

to take me home to the place I lost in leaving;

that last train left years ago, decades,

leaving me behind, wiser, perhaps, and changed,

different, but listening, now, and wondering.

He Died Early

He died early, too early for one so young, they’d said,

long before seatbelts had laws to keep us secure,

suspend us upside down in rolling over,

bruised, perhaps, and banged up

and broken, but living, still -

that all came later, too late for him –

and they drove all night, leaving in darkness

to arrive just as the sun rose on the new day,

to comfort their grieving family needing them,

even as they needed comfort themselves, trying to stay strong

through their tears, for them, for each other.

That night his room was shut against his dying, the door

pulled to and latched, though not locked, just shut

and they left it that way, fearing to enter,

not sure of what nor why, but keeping it shut in,

that eerie quiet that accompanies death, the quietude of absence.

They slept that night holding each other tight

in the twin bed that had been hers for the years

before one another, before him even, holding each other,

shutting out their fears behind the door to his room,

the room next to the one where they huddled,

both rooms shrouded in silence but for their tears falling,

tears released now in their weakness, away from family

for whom they have remained strong, denying their own grief.

And in the morning, their eyes bleary and heavy

with restless sleep and the long day ahead, bucked up

and brave, they emerged, the doors wide open, theirs and his.

Neither admits to a nocturnal journey, nor a simple walk

in their sleeplessness, neither noting the other’s leaving,

the click of a door opening or the creak of hinges, long unused,

swinging back, not even the groan of shifting floorboards

as if someone has walked across them, as they have for years,

for as long as she can remember from her childhood, knowing,

but not acknowledging when their parents checked on them

or giving away their sneaking in, caught and in trouble,

but not this night, no squeak, no groan, no presence,

but the open doors, doors shut tight, shutting out their fears.

And for many years, years passing after the funeral,

their grief turned to quiet resignation of life and death,

no one, even the young taken too early exempt from this,

for these many years they wondered, wondering still,

who had opened the doors, theirs and his, undetected,

checking on them in their grief and restless sleep,

one last moment, “it’s ok now.” For there was,

somehow, a comfort there, a comfort unexplained

by that open door, a brief moment of sorrow removed,

a knowing, a sensing, a still voice, soft, unheard.

Do the dead, perhaps, come home, then, one more time

before leaving, if leave they must, come home one last time,

to bid farewell, to leave us alone in our grief,

our grief too much in our attempt to stay strong?

Or do they come home to remember, to remember home

and who they are, what they are leaving behind and who,

those memories that even death cannot take, to soften

what comes next, that last leaving, leaving us behind,

death but a place of memories brought to life, remembering?

On an Autumn Day She Rose and Left

On an autumn day, late in the season,

the colors faded and fallen, bare limbs

raked clear the clouds to let the sun through,

and she rose and left, unseen in her going.

Her morning table, arranged by her bedtime habit

of setting it out, was ready for him, for his day,

but the plate was long empty, no bacon frying or coffee perked,

no odor of breakfast lingering; not even the juice glass

was in its place, chilled and waiting in the icebox.

Her apron, worn thin through decades of breakfasts

and early morning risings, now hung behind the door,

its long strings dangling behind a frayed hem,

an apron starkly lit by the morning light’s

illumination, yet shadowless and flat, a cardboard cutout

dark and silent in this empty house this autumn day.

Missing, though, was the great coat she wore, gray wool,

and practical, sensible for the changing weather

grown cold and raw, and we found her footprints,

small and faint, slow steps leading to the pond

beyond the house, reed-hidden among the cat-tails, tall

and bent, spent, white filaments, like hair, blown and clinging,

and the scarf she wore, too we found, red and gold,

delicate, draped over a low branch, cracked, now, and old,

barren in this late autumn season, to be cut and burned

in the winter months ahead in our need for warmth,

the cold of solitude and loneliness too much to bear.

River-bound

Born in a river-town, we grow up

watching the river flow, free and endless,

sea-ward through the narrows and channels of our lives,

constantly moving, and away to the ocean and other shores,

places we can only imagine as possibility or fantasy,

asleep here on her banks, as we are, restless and watching;

but this river runs through us, too, calls us

with a yearning that we can feel deep within us,

hat gnaws at our very being, churning, a temptation

to rise up and go, follow the currents and eddies of our hearts

swelled now by that river flowing through us, free and endless,

this river that has been our lives lingering here, river-bound,

a siren’s call – perhaps - and yet we leave, for we must,

we sailors, restless and tired of watching,

sea-ward through the narrows and channels of our lives;

and the river-town keeps watch from the cupolas,

the widows’ watch, waiting for us to return, patient,

the charmer’s spell broken and sending us back,

sending us home to our lovers’ arms that take us in,

and returning home, full circle, back to our birth-right,

we feel again the longing, like Ulysses, the pull

of the river coursing through us, free and endless, sea-ward,

and restless still, held back by the course of the tides

that are our lives, lives lived, river-bound, in a river-town.

Summers End

Here in our little town, the summer folk are leaving,

the long weekend behind us, an end and an exodus,

returning to their real lives someplace else, away

to places they call home, their camps now closed and shuttered,

docks and boats safely stored for the coming winter.

But our lives continue here, autumn lying ahead

in reds and orange; lighter shades of gold and green

embrace us now in the silence of their leaving,

a silence we turn inward toward ourselves,

another summer gone and our winters stretching ahead.

And the days shrink before us, days gone dark

before we are ready, spoiled as we were by this summer season,

rising and then settling again in darkness,

a darkness blown in on a breeze, slightly felt,

as we fortify ourselves, taking stock and laying in our needs.

Our needs are but a few, really, a red sunset over the lake,

a fire and friends to share our evening, talk

of the changes ahead and life itself, the warmth

of living here among the changing seasons,

the smell of burning leaves smoldering in the air;

and the barrenness of fall, stark against a fading sky,

the scent of snow to come, quilting our lives,

and the winter stars’ return, Orion’s belt and his great

stride marching across the blackness of a deep winter night,

carrying with him the promises of our lives lived here.

For we are blessed by these heavens above us,

by the seasons we share, nature’s cycle of birth

and growth and, yes, death, and in death, renewal,

a continuance of our lives shared with the summer folk

leaving, a reminder of the seasons of our own time,

the blessings of who we are and where we live.

Driving South

Driving down to visit my new grandson,

highway driving, mostly, on I-95 south,

cutting across New York’s Big Apple City,

with its glitz and glitter, and around the nation’s capital,

a city troubled by its own political aims,

a long drive fighting the weather and roads.

This long journey began not here, though, not today,

but at Banbury Cross, England under Elizabethan reign,

began with a tailor’s Puritan son, dissatisfied at home

and leaving for a new world, yet he was left behind in dying,

sending on, instead, his sons, who gave us our start,

our roots running deep, generations passed down to me

fighting the traffic stalled bumper to bumper,

crawling along, too slow, or flowing fast, speeding by,

them by me and me by them in my haste to arrive.

But this journey never ends, lasts forever, really,

goes onward into eternity, carrying with it

the genes of generations past, genes begun

at Banbury Cross, a tailor’s son, dissatisfied,

our lives, now, but an extension of his carried

down through the generations, just as I drive now

to visit my new grandson beginning his own journey,

heading into this same eternity to make his own way,

guided by us who have traveled before him

to bring ourselves to where we are now, here, today,

arriving and rooted deep, generations passing down to him,

and carrying us onward, onward into eternity.

Smooth

Smooth

Smooze (smooch?) (smooge?)

Smooch

Snooze

     -long, double “O” sound–

Snore, Snort

Snicker, Snigger

     - “s”“n” “sn” together sound

            “sn . . .”

                   soft and hard back to back

                          oxymoron -

Snail

Snot

     - snail snot?

Sneaky

Sneak

Sneakers

Sneer

Sneeze

Sneezy 

     - a dwarf, 1 of 7

Snide

Sniff, Sniffle

Snifter 

     – brandy snifter

Snip

Snipe, snipe at

Snack

Snap, snappy, snip-snap,

Snake

Snare

Snarl

     - snared snake snarled?

Snitch

Snob, snobbish, snobby

Snow - slow

Snood

Snoop

Snoot

     - snooty snoot

Snout

Snorkel

     - snorkel snout

          -out, out, damn snout

Snub, snubby, snubbier

     - to snub

Snuff –‘s ‘nuff?

Snuffle, sniffle

Snug – snug as a bug in a rug

Snuggle!

     -- Smooth! --

Two Short Poems

Late August

Late August is tinged with autumn,

summer’s green fading into gold and red,

and the days growing shorter, ending

starlit in a celestial darkness.

---

Nurtured

Delicate blossoms bloom in toughened earth, rain-fed,

kissed by the morning’s breeze gently blowing.

The Turtle

It’s a long way across the road,

so he stops halfway, this turtle does,

where a yellow line would be, if this

weren’t an old backcountry road leading

nowhere important, just home at the end

of the day, or a short jaunt to town,

but it’s dangerous just lying there, as he is,

resting, or perhaps sunning himself,

his plastron warm against the pavement,

his hard shell reflecting the afternoon sun.

It’s dangerous, though, exposed like this, vulnerable

to a hungry coyote or the local boys mean

in their late season’s boredom needing relief,

or the summer folk rushing by to catch

the long days left of summer, too soon fading

into autumn’s colors and falling leaves,

their SUVs laden down for the weekend’s escape,

focused too far to see him lying there, resting and still.

So we stop, pulling onto the slate that joins

the road to the lake below, to hoist him up

from behind, carefully held at arm’s length.

He just pulls himself into himself, secure in his shell,

as we carry him safely to the water’s edge,

his destination, this ancient creature,

still alive by his own good fortune,

and us who share this lake we both call home.