A WINTER EVENING
Rain is falling, loud enough to hear.
Damping out the last light.
Winter is different.
Different from summer,
When the light never seems to die.
Where there is always something more to do.
Winter is different.
A quiet time, if you let it.
The day measured shorter.
Thoughts turn to warmth,
Sips of scotch, a fireplace.
A meal on the table.
Winter is different.
A loved one and bed to go to.
The curious satisfaction of it all.
The last sight of the trees,
Bare now and stalwart.
Close together protecting each other.
Maybe a brief glimmer of sunset,
Viewed between the rain clouds.
Thankfulness for the warmth around.
You think these things,
Not time for in summer.
Winter is different.
DESERT SPIRITS
It's warmth and quiet
Captures your should, taking
It to a ciecful place
You've never known.
The desert wants to
Learn about you, to
Hear your dreams.
If it likes your dreams,
The desert may let you stay
For awhile, if not
It will sweep you away.
All the while reminding
You with sudden desert storms,
It's always there, watching...
FACTORY WINDOW
Worker Faces all the same
Building cars, missiles, and trucks.
Worker Faces all the same
Behind these windows,
Workers faces all the same
Come and went each day.
Workers faces all the same
Only sound from work.
Workers faces all the same
Like machines within.
Workers faces all the same
No one ever knew their names.
Young ’22
MARKS
Thoughts wash over you,
Like incoming waves,
Only to go out.
Just beyond the grasp.
Like a blank wall with
Marks left, You seek
To bring it all together.
Fighting back the frustration,
Waiting for shells to be
Left on the beach.
Ones you can reach for.
CITY ON THE HILL
A city on the hill,
Most people called it a town.
It still glittered,
But the gold was gone.
People still live out their lives.
School chums, family, work.
Day after day, their dreams
A paycheck away.
Not much changed,
A hope here and there,
Most gone away.
Always the sound
Of distant trains
That could take you
A paycheck away.
FALLING BRICKS
Words sharp as
The crash of falling bricks
Against the soft day of you.
Gone once said, only the
Debris of what's done.
How I could have stopped,
Paused, held back the
Pounding of the day.
The brick damage not me.
I am more gentle than that.
Please grace me with pause.
The world hurts enough
Let me not be the hurter.
JAY
Jay waited for the next ride,
the constant beat of the city in the background
Soaking up the time, like a drummer in a band.
He didn't like quiet times,
His thoughts often drifted back to dark places.
Missteps, miss deeds and worse.
How they hurt others and himself.
Thoughts that always got through
In reflective times.
Somehow giving a crazy deafness
To the better parts of his life.
He tried to quiet these hauntings,
Hoping they would go away.
They only became less dark,
A graying if you will.
Overtime he understood
This was the best you could hope for.
That the real test of life being if you learned.