Hoovers Damned

The whining agony
Of the vacuum cleaner
Confirms there is no hope

Trying for sweet music
Failing like
A dancing cripple

All I can do is mimic
Air raid sirens, fire trucks
And turn everything

Into homogenized fluff
Over a sediment of
Matching grey

Gasping for clean air
Eternally disappointed
By an unsavory diet

Of spiders, toenails, skin,
Insects dead and alive, hair
Cobwebs, coins, carpet

Nature abhors me
Pets run from me
People avoid in subtle ways.

WRM

The Pieces of the Clock Lie Scattered

So, hurry up!
The evening's coming.
The grown-ups are on the way.
There;ll be hell to pay.

You forgot about time
While you sought its secret
In the slippery wheels,
Some of which had teeth.

You meant to enthrall
The girl across the hall.
She drew so near,
Her breast brushed your ear.

She ought to have gone home,
But you kept telling her
You'll have it together again
And ticking in no time.

Instead, you're under the table
Together, searching the floor.
Your hands are trembling,
And there's a key in the door.

Charles Simic - current US poet Laureate

Acrostic Lament (notice the first letters of each line!)

Winter not giving up
It's attempt to slow us.
Lingering beyond the
Limited welcome
It had five months ago.
Allowing us to try on,
Many times our premature summer
Regalia. Thinking this year was different
It's being the first time for spring in March.
Changing the weather pattern
Henceforth deleting
April from the cold wet months.
Reaping harvest in August
Diminishing rain and ski seasons
Marking March as start of summer
Instigating climatic change.
Lamented by opponents of ozone depletion
Lambasted by organic decaf drinkers.
Alas it was all in our minds - winter
Remaining usual six months
Dividing the year equally as ever.

wrm (written in California in 2002)

Cellulart

This new thing
to be serious about.
Flashing, glistening, listening.

Fumbling, rumbling
chirping cheeping.

A-rockin and a-bobbin
connecting to the
collective unconscious unreliable.

Diminutive device
Clever contraption
Enhanced capacity for interruption.

When the telephone was invented
it worked
great trouble was taken to
avoid being heard.

WRM - (on the birthday of Alexander Graham Bell)

First to Arrive at the Party

To go in? to order a drink?
To disturb the card houses
Of cheese, crackers, strawberries?
Or wait?

To try not to concentrate
On the trish-trash music
Or the shapely, silent waitress
The quietly deafening hiss of the heaters
Or imagine the sunset reflected accross the lake

Daylight incrimentally drained
By each burst of, teasingly, tippled
Laughter from another party
But only after the silent blessings
Of the swans and the uneducated
Raucus dismissal of the ducks.

THe music clicks, whines and unwinds
Ceaselessly and STILL nobody arrives

Floodlit table flowers smile
Into non-existent eyes
Real flowers, toes in the dirt,
Close their minds
And put their faith in dawn.

Suddenly I am blended with eight others who,
Smile back at the flowers
Demolish and engulf the houses
Gone the hiss, the music, the ducks.

WRM

A Couple to Think About

Transport

In the frying pan
On the stove
I found my love
And me naked.

Chopped onions
Fell on our heads
And made us cry.
It's like a parade,
I told her, confetti
When some guy
Reaches the moon.

"Means of transport,"
She replied obscurely
While we fried.
"Means of transport!"

Charles Simic.

Halitosis

He coughed
I watched and knew
Inhaling any of his breath
Would be fatal

From his depths
He dredged disgusting liquors
And propelled them
In a supersonic bullet
To the street.

This was a moan universal
In his repulsiveness
Not even one stitch
Of his clothing endeared him.

WRM

Shape Poem

I know I said no photos but I can't type or cut and past this - click on it to enlarge and read it.

WRM