on beardless chins

 Riding through the night and rain
on old Route 66, racing a freight train;
to a grade crossing five miles down the road.

On the stereo, a deep voice growls
about boxcars moving south, like words
out of my mouth and a blended thread of thought.

This stormy night  brings me home with a smile
my favorite team is losin' again, but the wipers
match the rhythm of my mood, i'm so good
in the cozy piece of the bubble in which I live

[Outside, Man has sown soul foul seeds and imagines that
the world bleeds, but no, it is just he- the heedless and the innocents nearby]

The world of men is changin' so, new wars find old grief
snatchin' young lives the Thief now risen from the East.
And once again, I see the Old burying  the young
flag-draped boxes frame final kisses on beardless chins.

It is an allegory of the human condition:
the permissions given to evil; to take our love
and leave the shell to ground. On the war-worn path,
a strike for righteousness:  for life's sake, young life,
and that yet to be in swelled bellies and magical dreams

I'm in the bubble amid a world swirled by change
in the bubble: a  space that has not yet felt
the flood-freeze-and-burn legacy of reckless man

So, I drive and complete the tedious circle of this day
so fortunate in the thousands of ways
we daily see and rarely say- even to self

My bubble is a world still filled with people I love
and with a heart that finally has learned
the strength that comes by gratitude, and the power to see
the overwhelming beauty that life can bring

paper plane

 Its been awhile since I was nine
a memory flashes and feels set free
and the paper airplane flew so fine

when blank page folded to my special lines
well defined my ingenuity
Its been awhile since I was nine

a reach into the bright  sunshine
i curled  wings to climb quickly
and the paper airplane flew so fine

run and chase to quick rewind
being the best came so easy
Its been awhile since I was nine

do memories age like wine?
does time unwind the mystery?
and the paper airplane flew so fine

a proud of my brilliant design
relive a  day that was all it could be
Its been awhile since I was nine
and the paper airplane flew so fine

Poppies

 There is a poem in the poppy--
 layered, soft, and fair;
an effusion of nature's wisdom,
and all it gathers near-
And for a field a-flowing
with wind and sultry red,
my thoughts drift to Flanders  
where wistful eyes opened to sun
and closed to dark
The folly of men remembered
 and greatest love forgot

And war did not die
verdant 'neath the sky, and red
flowed for decades beyond,  til now
when we can in stillness reflect
on so many years of people
and so few of peace

Captive of times -- we say
and rue the bloodied days, as if
the choices were not ours; and captive
we remain-- democracy teeters,
tyrants rise, and truth is on the run!

Through summer heat, slanted winter sun
as the world spits back the poisons we have sown
we live in fire and freeze, flood and sere,
ancient mountains of ice melt to rising seas .
We sit in the balance and
 consider the price of life

I remember priceless poppies, red and reaching
bathed in  love of a nearby star, and the young
clash, flash, and fall-- like seeds of autumn
planting for a tomorrow they would not see
as do we all...

In the rise and fall, circle of being,
rotation of the universe, and we
fail to keep the promises made
to Flanders field and so many more
places without such flowered names

And we twist slow in winds of lies   
ground down in jaws of deceit
as if it were not ours
to raise the sword of truth
and wield it with the strength of certainty
that right is within us and
the brightness of the future
burns our eyes