Road Reflections
Loquacious Lake Superior
© January 31, 2010 William Tecku
Salinger
© January 28, 2010 William Tecku
Yeah, you’ve read J. D.?
He died today.
Ya think it’s gonna snow?
It’s as cold as confusion.
The sky is gray.
They say while the sun was shinning
J. D. made his hay.
What he caught in the rye sure did pay!
He said it helped him hide
from the spotlight’s blaze,
its glowing heart of snow.
It’s as cold as a frozen rope,
and wildcards still beat treys.
Once J.D. caught his readers’ eyes
they couldn’t look away.
Like Holden, like summer snowmen,
he had to fade.
Someone once told me I should read him
for some reason
in another icicle season
that didn’t pay.
Bookmark it, baby.
J. D. died today.
Waking Up in the Old Sod
from St. Francis Strikes Oil! © 2009 William Tecku
Who else, one-half flying and one-half landed, is waking up
in the Old Sod this morning?
“Caw! caw!” answer some crows,
just off my resort room’s deck.
As aggressive as yesteryear’s invading infantries,
they advance in their feeding
across the song green grass
only dreamers
harvest best.
In a glen asleep, cool, and wet with dew,
I sow words as fading stars
plow back into the sky.
Halfway up the far hill, a handful of golfers stretch
and joke as they prepare to take on a challenging course
and wage war within themselves.
Speculators more distant than this spectator,
amour themselves with clever cons and contracts
to better milk more of the surrounding farm land from the farmers.
Their high-rolling, market-myopic eyes
fly spreadsheets and plot maps
“as straight as the crow flies”
to the bottom line.
Like golf, it’s only a gentleman’s game.
Smiling, smiling, smiling, and calculating,
they surrender no mulligans.
I sip my first cup of Irish breakfast tea
and taste my own culpability.
Tan and white beef cattle and sheep graze fields
that corral my heart.
They keep their heads lowed
like their owners at Mass
a few kilometers away.
Like those of field or faith,
Patrick too knew how peace can come
from chewing one’s cud.
Hedge rows and rock walls etch patchwork hillsides.
These strict stretches of woven greenery and stone and time
also keep a tight rein on the bone marrow-narrow roads
that twist and turn like the history
of their travellers.
Stoic, free, and song green as the stanzas of Yeats,
sunlight strides up sky-to-sea-to-sand-to-sod-to-soul.
The crows and golfers are gone now.
One, young robin claims their ground.
Below the surface, we both find what sustains us.
Like a race horse just before a claiming race,
the morning rears up then settles down
to ride or be ridden
by the race.
Sunshine and showers gallop all day
across this sainted island.
Kathy at Midterm (from Overtime)
© 1985 William Tecku
After breakfast, before you leave for work,
I hear something coming
as clear and slow
as the morning train.
When you come home,
I see someone with you.
The quiet page of the spare room
is rewritten by a crib.
And we know our child
will soon be born
as a baby is born
with its soul rising
in its face
suckled by tides
by moon-eyed eyes
these harvest days
when burning wood heats the house,
and your womb warms
a new world.
Walking in Space, 2001 (from Voices)
© 2004 William Tecku
I'm taking a long, long walk in space this morning.
There goes New Deli! Here comes the Great Wall of China! "Susan, when you've got a job to do, and you think you might be getting too preoccupied about what might happen to you while you're doing your job, try thinking about a time when you were with some old boyfirend. Then get back to work!" I remember one of my first astronaut trainers calmly told me when someone in the control room heard my voice start to crack up once in the simulator. Now, that I'm in orbit out here working on Alpha, I'd rather try remembering the parts of speech or which mutual fund Louis Rukeyser said had the most balanced tech stock exposure in the long term.
The noun.
Jim and I have so much hardware to install on Space Station Alpha, so much equipment to relocate that Mission Control, a proper noun because, although it's not a particular person, it is a particular place or thing , figures we'll set a record for time on a space walk. "Houston, tell my mom, 'Happy birthday!' Tell her that I'm having the time of my life!" ("Life" is a common noun. A noun is a person, place, thing. or idea.) In the sentence of life, the verb is love.
The adverb.
Ahead 1,000, 000 cows and pigs and sheep are being burned in the fields of Europe because of hoof-and-mouth disease, and, behind me, Wall Street is free falling into a black hole this quarter. I'd just get really depressed if I spent any amount of time thinking about the past when I was with one of my dumb, old boyfriends down there. ("Now" is an adverb. An adverb can modify a verb, an adjective, or another adverb. How? Where? To what extent or when? are questions adverbs answer.)
The adjective.
I don't want to "space out" over what did or did not happen when I was young, I mean younger, and all I heard some star crazy mornings was moon talk. ("Young" is an adjective. An adjective is a word that modifies a noun or a pronoun.)
The verb.
Forget this once-in-a-lifetime, four-months-in-a-space-station mission! Lovers are the ones who are really sitting on top of the world! Because of their altitude, they can more easily cross the Pacific with one look than I can orbiting a heaven above them. (A verb can express action or a state of being. "Are" is a verb of being. "Love" can be understood as a noun or as an action verb.) In the dirt simple sentence of life the verb is love.
The preposition.
The last crew was right. There are so many lights on earth. "Mission Control, confirm that the Baker-Kelly-Joe cable I'm about to plug in is the right one for docking port orifice Paul-Zebra. It just doesn't look like it's going to fit in there." Must be spring break! Not much on those college kids down on Lake Havasu this afternoon! "Roger that Mission Control. People make mistakes, not computers. Affirmative. The cable is fitting into its orifice just fine now." ("Into" is a preposition. A preposition shows the relationship between a noun or a pronoun and another word in the sentence.)
The pronoun.
Wonder if Mom blew out all the candles on her cake today? I remember the time when we put those candles, the kind you can hardly blow out, on her cake. She really laughed when she finally realized what we did. ("We" is a pronoun. Pronouns are words that can take the place of nouns or other pronouns.)
The conjunction.
There's always a storm brewing somewhere over the Atlantic. They've blown up the last one of the Buddhas of Bamiyam. Some of those giant statues of Buddha were carved into cliffs 200 feet high. They were 2,000 years old and the last ones on earth. ("And" is a conjunction. A conjunction is a word that connects words or groups of words.)
The interjection.
The Afghan Muslim sect in power said they had to destroy the Buddha statues because if they weren't religiously good for them, then they couldn't be good for anyone. Oh! It's so good to know that human beings are smarter than computers. ("Oh!" is an interjection. An interjection expresses strong feeling or emotion.)
"Roger that, Jim. We'll just wait awhile in the cargo bay and see if they need us to do anything else on the docking port."
I forget exactly how old the earth is. It has so many candles burning for it. When he turned fifty, Nick said that he was a little happier, that he was getting to be a little more tolerant, was starting to see that each day of life was a gift. We were laughing together an December 29th. Early New Year's Day, they found his body. He would have given anything to see for one second what I saw at work today. "Grief" is a common noun.
"Affirmative. I copy that Mission Control. We are terminating our walk."
Were we really out there for almost nine hours? It's gonna feel so good to get out of this big, old, balloon suit!
"Thanks, Jim. You did a heck of a job yourself!"
Everything is in motion like all the oceans we floated over today. Everything is a still as the sun's song we sing around. In the earth simple, complex, convoluted, capricious, comical, captivating as each newborn's first breath, serendipitous, scintillating, sweet and sour, surreal, symbotic, unshakled sentence of life the verb is love.
The Junkman Cometh (from Overtime)
© 1985 William Tecku
"Kodak moment! Kodak moment!"
my cousin's children from Kabul teased me,
when I told them you were coming back,
after seventeen years, to again photograph me.
I have my education, since I was a girl in school,
and, in our tent in the refugee camp
where you took pictures of me.
But, "Kodak moment . . ."
what does this mean?
Why are you again here?
To take pictures of my old woman's face?
Must American magazines have such pictures?
This I have not learned.
I have learned that your smart bombs
are as dumb as the Taliban.
Before you came to my school,
I have learned that one's eyes
are the window to one's soul.
Is this why you say so many
have looked at my face?
What can you do to make my life better?
New clothes? No.
Money? No.
A camera like yours? No.
I have dreamed, during the wars,
that some day I could go to Mecca.
And it would please my husband and I
if you could help our three daughters
complete their education more than we.
These things would please us. Yes.
What is it you ask? Do people here say that my eyes
are as green as the green in paradise? No.
For that you must keep looking.
The Minneapolis Blue Boar
(Voices) © 2004 William Tecku
Searching for Intelligent Life
(from Road Jazz!) © 2007 William Tecku
Make a Wish (from Keystones)
© 2003 William Tecku
A Leap of Faith
© 2005 Keystones William Tecku
Beings breathe IS
in a world of WAS,
whereas mighty MIGHTS are deaf
to NOW's split-second opera
ringing in our inner ears
like a dog whistle.
In a world with lips everywhere pursed with WAS,
WERE, or WILL BE, sentient beings suckle
straight shots of IS, or ARE, or AM
like a last, lone grain of rice
begged into a Buddhist begging bowl
blessed with bounty or bodacious emptiness.
Does IS whistle in the dark?
Does the ear of your eyes dawn here?
The temple bell of my TV
begs me back into my pre-recorded not live,
my pre-recorded not LIVE silence.
Feeding time is over for a moment's mouth.
Today, Yesterday declares war on Tomorrow.
Blessed are the peace makers.
Blessed are the beings who BE.
Trees
(from St. Francis Strikes Oil)
© 2009 William Tecku
t . . . r . . . e . . . e . . . s . . .
Are they bending through this trunk of time?
Are they branching through these limbs of mine?
Are they sawing through our gravity?
Are they chopping through the knot of me?
t . . . r . . . e . . . e . . . s . . .
Are they listening like silent forests?
Are they talking like whispering streams?
Are they crying like winds blowing leaves?
Are they laughing like hearts leafing green?
t . . . r . . . e . . . e . . . s . . .
Are they standing for fall’s forgiveness?
Are they falling for winter’s promise?
Are they standing for springtime’s shyness?
Are they falling for summer’s oneness?
t . . . r . . . e . . . e . . . s . . .
Are they deep-rooted in night’s nests huge?
Are they deep-rooted in dew dreams true?
Are they deep-rooted in skies of blue?
Are they deep-rooted like me in you?
t . . . r . . . e . . . e . . . s . . .
A Fox Tale (an excerpt from the story)
(from Morning Stories) © 2004 William Tecku
Spooked by the camera, the deer snapped back their heads in our direction, smartly flagged up their long, trim white tails, and bounded into the woods.
“Those deer always know what’s up. In fact, they usually know what’s up even before it goes down. I mean they knew we’d be here this time of year and we wouldn’t be a threat to them out of season,” I explained to Mike as we sat back down to our game. He started eyeing my queen again, and, at last, decided to move a knight in her direction.
“Dad, animals live and die according to what their instincts tell them. Intuitions, premonitions – that’s stuff none of those animals out there have. I had all that in psychology last semester. Even people might not have much real psychic ability,” he told me in a voice that said he was the teacher and I was the student for a change.
I let my queen side step his attack before I countered, “I’m pretty sure, buddy, that some of those animals out there have a lot more on the ball than we give ’em credit for.” Then I thought of you – you old fox! You knew the moonlight would paw through the dark green underbrush along the river until it finally camouflaged your fiery fur all the way down to its roots. Like a chess master who anticipates move after move after move after move before he moves again, you already knew that once you moved to bed down in your den last night, the moon would rise higher and countermove you one star space at a time, three spaces forward, west across the moving sky board, and funnel its fur soft light, white as a white chess queen’s eyes, down through pine top winds, down the trunks of white pines thick as a black bear’s chest and black as the hairs that run up your short legs.
Twice you circle-walked your thin, two-foot, eight-inch long body, crouching lower and lower with each turn to the right, until your bed of brown pine needles brushed up against your belly and you curled yourself into a ball of fur one-half your daylight size. Before you flicked your bushy, white-tipped tail across your nose you knew the heat lightning that worked down river as a caboose for the coal train last night would move south five star spaces and the owl-eyed air, the star-watered waves, the whippoorwill’s calls would only reach your open ears six or seven more times before your eyes would close slower than a rusty, old leg trap and you would begin fox-trotting into a dream where you would track down one slow-footed rabbit after another, after another, after . . .
Before your blood percolated sideways out of your half-shut mouth and ran twice your length down the black top road above the Eau Claire River bridge, before the last thing your scouting eyes would see would be a rabbit running for its life up the gully just across the road from where an air-colored car or truck would stop you in your tracks, you knew I would come lumbering along in my jalopy around sunrise on my way back from the bait shop where I would have made my best move of the day: a new open-face reel for my son, so we could fish together. You foresaw that my next moves, upon seeing you stretched out in the middle of the road, would be to straddle my tires over you and pump my soft brakes until I could stop on the hillside, back down the hill, pull up my parking brake, leave the motor running and my door open, run back down the hill and lift you off of the road as quickly and carefully as I lifted my son and daughter into their mother’s arms on their first mornings on life’s road.
Moves before moves before moves before moves before moves before moves before moonsets ago you knew I would be surprised by the warm feel of your fur, your cat-like lightness, the limpness of your carcass before the caterpillar crawl of rigor mortis began in you, your full of summer, fall-colored coat that would, with all of its hairs at once, suddenly flare up and open my eyes wider than the road when my face finally arrived less than a rabbit’s length away from you.
Before the sunrise started tracking down the darkness on the west river bank, you knew I would move you into my idling car that held its ground against the gravity of the heavy-hearted hillside skinned open by black top between the freshly-flowered cemetery and the town dump. Before the day dished you up for road kill, you knew I would not let the crows and eagles breakfast on you; yet, for an instant, I would suspect that life’s road still unrolled for you, that a fire still sparked inside you, that I would think you had outfoxed me, that you were stunned but not dead, bloodied and dazed but not . . . that you would scramble up out of my cradling arms and finish your run for that damn rabbit on the other side of the road.