A Forgotten Photograph

Some teardrops fell upon
the discovered photograph
causing a slight smudge and
newly found reminiscences.

She said “I can’t remember which
is his face in the sea of uniforms”,
as her years were spent busy
raising children, so far removed
from a place called My Phouc Tay.

Time hurries by and people’s
lives change but the photographs
remain with us to resurrect
feelings from long ago and
memories of those forever missing.

Will you?

Will you come for the fourth of July?
We can watch the fireworks in the sky
Lighting up and blasting all around
With merriment and electricity
In the eruption you whistle to me.

Feel the hot air gently warm thee
Bake under a hot summer sun
We can watch an old b&w movie
Loretta Young marries David Niven
He was pretending to be a magician,

We can have a honeymoon in Hawaii
Where I can improve my English
Splashing around in a blue sea
Of sublime tropical tranquility
Sorry, this poem is not finished

Please excuse the lack of iambic meter

Sappy Silje

Silje kept a Swedish flag inside her pocket
She lost her paratrooper charm and locket
and decided to take a walk down memory’s lanes
where her favorite brownstone had become a school,
her first bar was now a Laundromat – the place
where she had learned about drinking to be cool.

She remembered the time from a trip long ago
driving too fast down the Pacific Coast Highway,
her mother taking hold of her hands gasping
as she must have said at least three Hail Mary’s.

Silje had loved to listen to songs and guitar,
Neil Young feeling Helpless, Janice howling
A "piece of my heart" and cry cry baby blues,
Melanie with her songs of peace by the fire.
A photo of her father near the big geyser.

She dreaded each St. Patrick’s Day:
“If you’re sad it’s the Nordic way”
“If you’re sensitive it’s the Irish in you”
This is what she had been told --
Dramatics sort of being part of her mold.
all the while trying to keep a stiff upper lip
as her Grandma insisted to be as a Britisher.

Jack and the jellyfish

Jack went to the beach
not to the ocean
but to the bay
where the water is calm
and the children can play
easily along the shore,
without the worry of waves
crashing down over sand castles
built with ever so much care,
and it happened to be here
on the shoreline by the bay
where Jack found jellyfish
snuggled cozily beneath
damp mounds of sea sand--
"Look Mommy, look what I found"
as he scooped them up into his pail
then all the other children came
running within the same vicinity
with Brendan shouting "Come see
come look at this discovery -
"it's fish out of water"

Untitled

We sneak into the church after
Mass has ended and swipe bulletins
to bring home later and pretend
that we went to worship
where we always light candles

I forget my lessons from catechism
yet forever smell the frankincense
Leftover at the alter of this devotion
and see the names of boys who were
someone’s older brother or one’s friends
printed with such precision and clarity

Funerals occur with flags draped over caskets
we go to play in the park or up at the corner
for we are children on the brink of adolescence
though not far from the convent is a schoolyard
where sometimes there is an altercation

Across the street my mother is calling out to me
where along the blue sky’s periphery
I see plumes of smoke dark and ominous
shouting a reminder that war is never ending
and can be fought on any type of battlefield

We walk down the aisles of the supermarket
my mother and me in search of treats
sifting through items in this lap of luxury
for packages to send to the boys overseas
and I develop a habit of waving to firemen

1/15/07