Some small poems

UPDATED OCCASSIONALLY - Jack Vaughan 

----

Strange Edison Electrical Illumination

At about the age of 10, Edison goes to the creek with young friend George Lockwood, who disappears in the eddies to drown. Edison observes the creek water for a long time, maybe rapt by the dying Lockwood’s breath bubbles. At last, after the long wait for Lockwood to surface, Edison finally goes home to dinner and to bed without telling anyone about the event. Meanwhile, a party searches for Lockwood – eventually they come to hear Edison’s story of his drowning.

Self-taught polymath, 

noted as a man of amazing concentration. 

He could look intently at what was there

and was able to uncover deep first principles 

as he tinkered with pieces of 

metal, carbon, vulcanite, lamp black 

and assorted materials.

More than that, 

he had a gift for 

imaginative re-application of principles 

to conjure new products, 

and improve on existing successes. 

This was all to result from 

long nights and extended work stints.

Edison’s 1st patent was for 

an electro-chemical vote recorder. 

But fast voting was not a ‘must-have.’ 

It failed in the market.

So, he resolved to focus efforts 

only on things that people wanted to use.  

For there is no technology without useful case.  -2021

https://tinyurl.com/2p95tnyt  Source  matter secondary

~~~~~~~~~~~

St Josephs Day 2022

I was born under a nuclear cloud

When Korea flashed n napalm bombed

The cloud moved over the hill

without some of us

without the Rosenbergs

without the Rockefellers

without the Shah

without Momar

The cloud stewed

n slithered n grew

and now alight n alack

the cloud comes back.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The girl in my garden
has grey fractious hair

Silver
radiation
signaling. 

                          -Summer 2021

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Uneven world

Uneven the distribution of pork
Uneven the path of dogfood

Uneven the rebirth of commerce
Uneven the availability of vaccines.

                         -Nov 26 2021

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

2018

How suddenly fragile the world it was when i was a lad and nukes first deployed

but what fun to dream in Wisconsin snow globe when the blizzard closed the school

~~~~~~~~~~~

Sweet Sunny South Song

I dreamed I was ported
in a teletime stream
to the sweet sunny south
i did ride

where the past
was sage and mint on the left
and juleps and beer
on the right

how glad jack was
to just be back where
the magnolias blossom
again

until i found the rights of
some voters
tramped like grapes in
the devil's den.

--

Sept 11

Sirens planes birds 

sound different today. 

But the blue sky 

almost the same.

---


Talking with Mark

I was talking with Mark
when we were watching football
a way to sit things out since
black night was falling
on his time here above the ground

Talking with Mark
about the horses
the barrel races on the farm
the boss's wife's horse
the fast beautiful horses of summer

A memory so distinctly
in motion.


---


Milkweed Bistro Morning

She plays with her hair
Like you may not be there
on the sidewalk
on a chair
at the Bistro on the street.

Lone bird

Singing

It's blues

As summer

Gets hotter - 

The conversation

Is more

Choice

And big jets

Of endless commerce

Scarf up what's left

of the sky.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

hologram experiment

i lay awake in summer heat

tossing with the city sounds

wall flowers on the wall they vamp

in a leafy shadow dance

narcotic smoke seeps from the floor

tempests vortex in the air*

in cold sweat in secret writs

they lollygag and linger there.

*dylan: 'the tempests struggle in the air'

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I'm a bygone day
cant go to the hardware
and  keep from crying

but I go anyway.

!~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~!

I hear her on the air

in the rustling leaves

in the communiqués of birds in the trees

She’s the antidote for
peculiar and preponderating facts
that connect this tragic age

Ida mae

Ida mae

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Gausian Moon

The full moon tonight is a pearl in a whirly smoke veil that is passing on over to Nova Scotia in silence

And its halo assumes the copper and indigo colors of William Blake’s dramas

The mountains of the moon

The Sun’s distant light
Looking back on the swirl of life 

Looking back at this fool’s errand Earth

And again I ask the sky 

Who’s hostage am I? - Jack Vaughan

[[THere follows...Same poem set with a different approach to abstraction-

Hostage

A smoky image

the moon tonight

a girl

whirling in

a veil

moving toward

Nova scotia

dreaming. - Jack Vaughan

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Invisible Friend - After Champion Jack's TB Blues
i.
when i was just a little boy
i was about the age of five
when i was just a little boy
i was about the age of five
i dint have to pretend
cause I had an invisible friend

ii.
He lived under the kitchen table
the best friend i ever found
on old augusta street
the best friend i ever found
nobody else could see Mel
but i liked him anyhow.

iii.
when i grew up
i became a drinking man.
I'd stop by the bar with a paper
and my friend would understand
we'd talk about assassinations
anything that came to hand

iv.
now my friend is gone
I'm not going to see him again
got Arthur-itus
n I may not drink again
but how i wish that i could see-
see my old invisible friend.
~~~~~~~~~~

When the half-and-half is half full
there’s a guy in the house that fills it

he fills it back with milk
He calls it half and half and half

Don’t ask If it’s half full or half empty
Because he’ll fill it either way.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

skunk in the garden
known for its spray
which
wakes me at night
and tells me to turn
each fan on exhaust

i saw its other side
skunk rooting
low and prehistoric
tending to the earth
slow moving
like a sloth

i have never
seen
such patience
would like to be so calm and cool

but
for now i
tend to
the sky.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

(After Apollinaire's "Pretty Red Head" )

Pale, fragile
ruddy red haired girl

and dark nomad-eyed

friend girl

both

in black

they stand close by 

the big box

of silver needles

at the 

institute

of 

contemporary

art

held by a magnetism 

&

i am thinking

maybe

mysticism too. 

- Asa Wentoff-Juan Mourning, 2009

--

Swimming lessons

The farmboys would send
their dogs on me -
as I rode my Schwinn on
the road -
where the cabbage
were humming.
--
(Pua Sadinia)

I came upon a waterfall
on the beautiful island
Light flowed through the greenery
on a flower like a diamond.


--

John the Revelator, great advocator
Get's 'em on the battle of Zion
Lord, tellin' the story, risin' in glory
Cried, "Lord, don't you love some I"
...
Well Moses to Moses, watchin' the flock[13]
Saw the bush where they had to stop[14]
God told Moses, "Pull off your shoes"[15]
Out of the flock, well you I choose[16]

--

Bottle man on sneaker feet with
Shopping cart bumps down the street
Sunday morning in sleepy universe

--
Turn the channel

The cabdriver’s dispatch
speaker calls
Dr. Fine
Dr. Howard
Dr. Fine

Let's throw in
one more
Dr. Howard

And shoes
crazy seek footing
on shiny
linoleum
--

Morn blues

I just remembered | 
that it's election day | 
So I bop on down behind the church | 
n vote for Tito Jackson


From the train I saw | 
radio tower disappear | 
it's top in cloudy mist - 
Next stop Waban  


#NationalPoetryDay 

----

Dont look up

C went out yesterday. It got dark and
she was of course
too far from
Ice Stn. Zebra. 

When I in the Corolla
intercepted her,
we both did agree,
this is a ghost town
and we are wandering ghosts. 

Everything is shut down. 
Eyes dart over masks.

And what do you know
but they were making a movie
there in Copley Sq, near the hotel,
where dad proposed
to ma
over
a long lunch.

To the extras,
 C with cane,
in the frame, says
'what's the movie?' 

And they say
'Dont Look Up'
which,
on cue,
she does,
to laughing
and chuckles.

Jan-2021

--
On leaving my Aunt Gert's burying

Gert's car - a gold Buick -
My dad had her sign over 
On just about her death bed
To me.

It was really small fare
for the care he gave her
on her way out the turnstile.

And - tho not as hip
as her previous SS like Skylark -
it was choice.

Having 
almost literally 
only been used to go
to church. There
in Harwichport.

Gert's car - refused to start
on the sunny day that 
I was leaving her burying.

Did my cousin  or me
jump the starter 
with a screwdriver?

I don’t know - but 
t'was a chuckle and a back shiver
both
as the old gold Buick started
and we held wonderment 
at ghostly electricity
in

the graveyard 
departing.

--

Why get hung up and brung down?
The Bees found the Assumption flowers, bud!

--

Poem: Here Rabbit Here

Hoppin' shadow of rabbit

dance on the morning sunlight 

and crystals in the snow.

OR

Hoppin' shadow

rabbit on the sunlight

in the crystal snow.

---

All a blur of youth

All a blur Springborn's basement. Guys singing sitting on washing machine. 

Drinking Limerock, Orangerock. Bottles everywhere.

Singing Happy Together - bababa-ba-bababa and slipping on the ice falling hilariously walking to the Nitty Gritty. 

Forgetting my manners and groping on Endowed Country Club Girl while dancing to I Think We're Alone Now - Later to be asked by her to the Country Club dance.

Saying no and feeling bad about losing my mind to the Orange Rock crush.

Throwing up lime-colored or orange-colored puke at work at 9am at the childrens bathroom at the Children's Room of the Racine Public Library the next morning. 

Dick Perkins winking and volunteering to clean up my mess. He may even have driven me home. Flash forward: I will never never drink Orancerock again.