As he entered the
room he could see
that one painting
on the wall was
askew. He knew
what to do. As he
approached the
painting it looked
less askew until
he was very close
to it — at which
time it looked
perfectly fine.

The actor police captain said,
“Thank you for the friendship.”
The other actor,
an older lieutenant,
possibly considering retirement,
said to his superior officer,
“If it lasts.”
Yes, isn’t that all
that we can ask
for it to last…?
But there is always,
always that whiff
of the ever present “if.”

He watched four, talented white men sing
rock and roll songs from the 50s on —
most songs written and sung originally by

blacks and white rockers who got their best
ideas from blacks and the white boys did a
more than credible job at seemingly making

a career and living out of it, a much better
living than those original black writers and
singers. It was thoroughly enjoyable and he

kept beat with his feet. He remembers dancing
to those very same songs in all of his naive,
white adolescence. He looked at the equally

naive, primarily older white audience “get
in the groove,” fifty-five years later than
when he danced at the high school sock hop.

The group sang, “Dancin’ In the Streets,”
and the audience danced in the aisles
completely unaware that the song written

by, for and about blacks came to be a pro-
test song to rally blacks in the 60s to rise
up and dance in the streets for civil rights.

He doesn’t dance anymore but, unfortunately,
it appears that history repeats itself with
unaware whites paying big bucks to dance in

the aisles to old, black rock and roll songs
sung by whites. He wondered if there were
many blacks watching and, if so, what they

might be thinking. There was another shot
of that white audience and he winced as he
saw himself “dancin’ in the aisles.”

His feet stopped keeping beat.

The theologian wrote it;
She tried to sugar coat it
With “perhaps”:
“Perhaps, those whom we value least
Have the most to teach,”

She was a poet.
Did she know it?
She was also spot on,
Without the “perhaps.”
To this, Christians, in humility
Take off those ecclesial caps.

{The man encountered an abrupt,
Rude, dismissive customer service rep
For the airlines when he checked in.
She is black and he is white and he
Felt his racism rise. And then he had
To check his feelings. There is reason
There, two hundred years of reasons
There and he has to understand that.}

In that moment, he valued her least,
But she had much to teach.
He had time before his flight
To get it spiritually right.

Caps on, Christians.
All aboard!

We, like Scheherazade, should tell
a thousand stories to the world,

because, if given the opportunity,
the world would kill us after just

one night of love. Each night we
would keep the conclusion till the

next night. The world would wait
for the conclusion because every-

one loves a good story and we have
good stories to tell. At the end

of the thousand and one nights,
the world would not kill us be-

cause the world would know that
our stories are the world’s stories

and then for the next thousand nights,
the world could tell us the world’s

stories and we would fall in love
with the world.

The uneven sidewalks go up and down,
There is no flat, even place to walk.
The streets are quite narrow in this town.
The lilting language echoes from the talk.

It is a sweet sound, the French flair,
Subdued, not brash nor loud,
It circles and swirls through the autumn air
And floats like a light cumulus cloud.

A lady from New York with an Italian accent,
Said Old Quebec is quite international.
In Europe, one must from country to country be sent.
Here, is the feel of cross cultural.

Yes, you can hear English, Spanish, even guttural tones.
But it is French that lifts one over uneven cobblestones.

Old Quebec is old,
So is the little hotel
Where we are staying.
I feel cramped sitting
At the desk typing
This. I look to my left
And see the tiny fire-
Place. The original
French settlers must
Have been very small,
But very good builders
Because the architecture
Is incredible and has
Held up very well through
The years, except that
The two of us staying here
For a wedding anniversary
Wonder if the buildings
Are fire traps. There don’t
Seem to be good escape
Routes. The local Pinot
Grigio is very good. My
Goodness, that is a tiny
Fireplace. The regular
Size bed hardly leaves
Room to get around it.
I keep wondering what
They burned in the fire-
Places. Kindling? That
Wouldn’t last very long.
Teensy logs of wood?
Not much longer. In
The winter the nights
Would get very cold.
Coal? Really? I’ll have
To remember to ask
The front desk clerk.
The painting doesn’t
Match the room. It’s
One of those cheap
Warehouse things.
Other than that, the
Pinot Grigio really is
Good. Oh, and the
Stone walls are nice.
Is that smoke I smell
Or just the restaurant
Downstairs?

He sat on the upper deck of the double-decker
tour bus. The wind blew and he removed his
designer ball cap revealing the few remaining
hairs blowing in the wind. He wore a matching
Ralph Lauren tennis shirt and shorts as his crepe
paper-thin skin hung from his arms, starting to
crawl over his Rolex watch. A Louis Vuitton sweat
shirt hung from his drooping shoulders. The scaly
skin on his legs folded over the top of his John-
ston Murphy leather soled, five-layer heeled loafers.
When the bus finished its rounds, the man’s wife
scooped up the things to which he belonged, shuffled
through his ashes, exited the bus, tossed the belong-
ings in a waste receptacle, twirled the key chain she
had pulled from her husband’s shorts and headed
for the Beemer as her “crepey” skin blew in the
wind.

Feet circling,
gears changing,
ten miles waiting.
Used to be twenty.
Ten is now plenty.
Gearing up for twenty-five,
giving himself a high-five.

Where are the other old guys?

He’s the only one on the road.
His legs both screamed and crowed.
Back home, he’ll hoist a brew,
one or maybe two

then a little shut eye.

The poet condensed
a poem about condensing

by shortening
it up (or is it down?).

She did it in ten fewer
words than this,

leaving me to frown,
not know how to cut it up,

(or is it down?).

*idea from the poem ”Poet’s Work” by Lorine Niedecker