After the War

After the last fierce battle

I ventured out towards town...

So many remnants of the war:

Power lines and trees now down.

The townsfolk were out working,

Returning life to previous norms...

Surrounded by the fallen soldiers,

Who rose up to face the storms. 

Coal lumps, carrots and broken twigs,

Litter the soggy battlefields...

Rewriting each child's history,

As only a snow day fantasy yields.

The sun will declare the winners,

The soldier's bodies will soon be gone...

Youth will never forget these heroes,

They shaped on their curbs and lawn.

Tatted Lace

An elderly woman in Hungary,

(Gnarled fingers and deep rutted face)

Sat hunched at the public market,

Tatting and selling her lace.

It hangs in my stairwell landing,

Always appearing a bit off balance...

Until I noticed this morning

Nature had tatted the perfect valance.

Hanging

After school we hung like bats,

Eating candy on the climbing bars,

Learning how to “swallow up”

While seeing the world under cars.

Fifty-five years later,

I still remember the eerie sound;

We were watching our faces turn purple...

When the Cessna, hit the ground.

Jolted loose by the shaking earth,

We ran to the fiery scene.

Lindsey's dog found a woman's head,

Fetched proudly for the rescue team.

I look back on my first ten years,

School friends, the old home town...

Some of life's harshest lessons,

Were learned while hanging upside down.

Diving

The school crowd often socialized

Around our parent's swimming pools.

Most were tanned deck loiterers,

But a few were diving fools.

I was the one who placed one toe,

Into every neighborhood pond;

Envying those taking all the risks

Living life on the edge and beyond.

If life “Was a box of chocolates”,

I sampled one piece in the box...

Never consuming the entire pound,

Or spending a week in detox.

Now that I'm in my sixties,

I think of my dead friends at night;

Diving headfirst into unknown pools,

Unfettered and free of fright.

I don't think a jury could tell me,

Who lived the best quality time...

Those friends who sampled everything,

Or me who found caution sublime?

Windows

There are open windows to your soul,

Seers unlock windows to certain doom...

Some windows boast bright flower boxes,

Or the dirty glass in my hotel room.

Some windows are trained to block the light,

Dark drapes, or a venetian louver...

I only see a man watching me,

In my room in North Vancouver.

He's also watched from my hotel room

By one very curious dog...

Their voyeuristic romance extinguished;

Doused by Strait of Juan de Fuca fog.

It's All an Illusion!