Two Tickets to Paradise on Good Friday

Poem #14 April 14
Two Tickets to Paradise

Two tickets to Paradise
Jesus offered that fellow
on the cross on that day
we now call Good Friday.
"Truly, I say to you,
today you shall be with me
in Paradise."
Strange name for the day.
Some say it means “God Friday.”
Some say it means “Holy Friday,”
and some, “Pious Friday.”
Whatever.
It’s the day Jesus was crucified.
By the way, I read this morning that “up to 36”
ISIS fighters were killed by
the mother of all bombs, a 21 ton,
$20 million bomb, the MOAB,
aka, MFOAB.
The cost of death keeps going up.


Poem #8 April 8
Saturday

Some Saturday mornings are like
a highway stretching out in front of you
mile after mile and you have no particular destination.

Today is one of those Saturdays for me.
I woke up earlier than I really wanted, but I made some coffee,
considered what to prepare for breakfast, and checked the news.

I need to write a poem today I remembered just before the above
six lines were written. I am enjoying these poem a day April poems,
and never know quite what they will be until they tell me.

I wrote a few sarcastic facebooks posts
about our president. I still can’t get myself to say his name.
I continue to hope he doesn’t get us all killed.

I might get my motorcycle out and go for a ride on that
highway I mentioned. I might work on a painting of favorite
books for an old friend of mine from grad school.

I did sit on my deck drinking a cup of coffee
enjoying the sounds of spring out there:
kids playing in the park, birds chirping,
motorcycles revving by on 84th street.

Now I’m watching the Masters golf tournament thinking
I could have been on the pro tour if only I had been
a lot, lot, lot, lot, lot, lot, lot better.

I may practice some of my tenor sax music and
transpose a few more parts from alto to tenor.
So far, I’ve scored Tequila, Wooly Bully, and Rebel Rouser.

Later, I’ll probably head to the grocery store and make
something nice for dinner, sip some bourbon afterwards,
and watch a favorite show on TV.

Poem #9 April 9

The Last Time I Shot Somebody

The last time I ever shot anybody
was many years ago in Friend, Ne.
It may have been the year President Kennedy
was assassinated, 1963. Or maybe it was in 1962.
We lived then on the southeast edge of town,
the town on one side and fields of milo and corn on the other.
We lived in the old Blanchard house so named
for its former residents, church members who were renting
the house as a temporary parsonage. There was an orchard
with a few apple and pear trees, a chicken coop with no chickens,
and an empty building where it was said
someone used to make cheese.
The two-story house stood large on that corner lot,
and we lived there while the congregation was building
a modern ranch style house closer to the town center and the church.
The Webbs lived on the lot north of the orchard
and there was a red barn and maybe ten Webb kids,
including Cathy, tawny-haired and freckled and about my age,
whom I loved for several weeks. They moved away though.
She never knew of this secret love,
but I watched her kill and pluck a
chicken for dinner one time and was smitten.
I chased one of their pigs with her one time
when it got out of its pen, a high-point of that summer.
It probably met a similar fate as the chicken
but I don’t remember that part.
One nice spring or summer day, I was hunting
birds and squirrels and rabbits
with my Daisy pump-action BB gun in the Webb’s yard
when Steve drove by on his bicycle.
Steve was, I think, ten or so at the time,
and I took aim from the cover of a tree,
took a shot, and got him right in the bum.
I had to apologize later after his dad, the Postmaster in town
told my dad, the Congregational minister, about that shot.
I think Steve and I were in Boy Scouts together.
I lost touch with Steve for many years but have since
made connection again on social media, where I apologized again,
and where he occasionally reminds me of that fateful day.
He served in the Navy for many years on a submarine
and now lives in Florida. We trade facebook postings these days,
and comment on the politics of the day.
As for Cathy, her family moved away,
and a few years later my family moved away,
leaving only the small-town memories.

Poem #10 April 10

A Crack in the Clouds

Moments ago, I stepped out my cubicle and
looked out the north-facing window-wall of
the Metro south campus where I work
and saw about thirty flowering fruit trees struck
by a beam of sunshine under a dull cloudy sky.
They shone for a few moments with a white burst of brilliance
against the still drab brown-green grass below them,
like a supernova from a distant star.
The long silver-painted outside wall of a nearby packing plant
reflected that same sunbeam back at me, too, like a mirror.
How lucky for me to be standing there when the sun
appeared through that crack in the clouds on an
otherwise average Monday.


Poem #11 April 11

Tuesdays

I like Tuesdays right now.
I have classes on Mondays and Wednesdays,
so I can fill Tuesdays with what I want: today was
painting chickens wearing sunglasses in the morning
(in looking at 'painting chickens wearing sunglasses
in the morning', I think I need to clarify:
first -they are not live chickens wearing sunglasses in the morning, it's a painting;
second, the 'in the morning' part pertains to when
the painting happened not the wearing of the sunglasses;
third, I was not wearing the sunglasses.
It's a picture of chickens wearing sunglasses that I painted in the morning.
Uh oh, it's not that I simply painted the sunglasses in the morning.........
the relative pronoun 'that' applies to the entire noun phrase
not just the terminal noun of the phrase.....
oh crap,never mind, I'll add the picture below),
golf in the afternoon, and usually, band practice in the evening.
Hard to beat that with a stick.
Add that I golfed well, shot a 78 at Johnny Goodman
municipal golf course, named after Johnny
who won the 1933 US Open as an amateur,
and it’s an even better day.
Alas, though, no band tonight - one guitar player was busy.
Guess I’ll just have to sit here in my leather Barcalounger,
write this poem, tilt the chair back a bit,
watch some favorite shows on the tv,
and sip on some bourbon on the rocks.write this poem,
tilt the chair back a bit,
watch some favorite shows on the tv,
and sip on some bourbon on the rocks.




Poem #12 April 12

The Swiss Army Watch

I had a Swiss Army watch
several years ago.
Actually it was my son’s,
but he let me wear it.
And I think I still have it.
It needed a new battery,
so I headed to the nearby Super Target.
The young lady at the watch station
said they couldn’t replace the battery
unless I had purchased it there.
“Liability issues,” she said.
“Liability issues,” I thought
as I walked to the parking lot.
“It’s just a watch.”
The gal at Walmart said pretty much
the same thing only she mentioned
her boyfriend had a similar watch
and it was a very nice watch.
She referred me to Enrique’s Jeweler’s
in Ralston where I was able to get the
right battery installed. It wasn’t too much
later after that when the watch band broke.
I haven’t worn it since.


Poem #13 April 13

Living Life at the Speed of Time

I'm living life at the speed of time,
while listening to some old John Prine.
I'm painting a nice cool ocean breeze,
and doing just what I damn well please.
Music on the turntable turns;
the toast in the toaster burns.
But I’m living life at the speed of time,
while listening to some old John Prine.
Tides ebb and flow at the speed of time,
and make the grunion run.
My earth moves in a long curved line,
orbiting an average yellow star, the sun.
I'm sipping coffee, pondering the muse,
and doing what I damn well choose.
But I'm living life at the speed of time
while listening to some old John Prine.