Glasses

"Glasses"

  and Other Poems

  by Daniel Hargrove

  Copyright 2014 Daniel Hargrove

  Cover art copyright 2014 Daniel Hargrove

  This book is published for anyone's enjoyment. Authors retain the copyright to their work. Users may read, copy and distribute the work in any medium or format for non-commercial purposes, provided the authors and the journal are appropriately credited. The users are not allowed to remix, transform or build upon the published material.

  Table of Contents

  1) Glasses

  2) Tar

  3) Tap

  4) Stick-Man

  5) Death of a Bluejay

  6) Winning

  7) Opening

  8) In Traveling Late

  9) In Shade of Late Hours

  10) In Words So Blind

  11) No Longer Quiet

  12) The Spell, Aground

  13) Evening

  14) Number

  15) Amber

  16) Phone

  17) Escalator

  18) Banner

  19) Malice of Forethought (w. Sophi Zimmerman)

  20) From Where, Passion?

  21) Fern

  22) Nuthouse

  23) Sewing Kit

  24) The Hot Black Night

  25) Away

  26) As the Sun Has Died

  27) Of All the Pots of Roses

  28) A Bed, Unmade

  29) Egress

  30) At a Distance

  Glasses

  I had seen far too much

  through that fine glass and wire rim

  fashioned by the hand of the optician

  They fit me very well

  and I can see clearly through them

  as I wheel like a hawk

  in the bright blue of sky

  Wearing them every day

  day in and day out

  I pretend I am an owl

  She had told me once

  when I was a young man

  that they made me look bookish...

  cover me with those words

  The sun peeks through them

  till I must close my eyes

  reflected and profane

  You, sand, have fused my thoughts

  into a quiet realm of focus

  I must answer to your slipping

  and I must slip through your fingers

  I threw my glasses down

  and ground them underfoot...

  lenses broken and wire bent as branches

  Tar

  See the dinosaur juggle lemons

  till they drop to the floor and roll away...

  see him pick up an ax

  and chop down young oaks

  See him blindfolded and dancing the waltz

  with a blinded gray poodle on a leash.

  See him list every tinker toy in the toy box

  and motormouth about what they'll build

  See him handcuffed in the prison cell

  with a furry kitten and a tar-baby...

  See him waste his last match

  trying to catch the tar-baby on fire

  Feel the pull of La Brea...

  watch as one leg sinks deep in...

  feel his ferocious but futile struggle

  as he denies it to himself over and over

  Tap

  Slow burn, fire cotton ambulance

  Tar sugar, mold ashen kitten

  Square all corners, danger

  Tap

  Picture cottage owl, tracker

  Word of barter chanced

  Coal I pardon, murder

  Tap

  Cane all crafty, bitter

  Storm breaking, cover

  Stay at working, never

  Tap

  Barking dog deliver

  Pitch are crusted, stolen

  Seal at carts, riven

  Tap

  Stick-Man

  The stick-man was already drawn

  when I picked up the pencil

  Can a stick-man hold a pencil?

  Maybe he drew himself

  Stick-men go three places

  In the hearth

  in the coal mine

  and in the gutter

  Stick-men work for the enemy

  Stick-men have plenty of friends

  not all of whom are both

  of those, or at them, of it

  Stick-men ask me all the time

  what I've got, that they don't have

  so I ask them. What does a stick-man want?

  and I'll ask you

  One time a stick-man told me

  that a friend of his had said

  a stick-man is a lie

  Some friend

  Death of a Bluejay

  In a brief foray with destiny

  I found a jay's end,

  all flap and flutter lashed

  to the grind of that wheel

  That blue flash of feathers

  had been found wheeling skyward

  on a high and fine wind

  that would take him to nowhere

  'Twas the dust of that gray storm

  that had tricked the white static

  into naming on the stone

  the far fetch of talons

  I know not the whole story

  nor where the meager remains

  but I bear the brunt of its telling

  as I am mostly scarecrow

  Winning

  We are given a track;

  A race and a gun;

  Stripes, competitors;

  And a pair of shoes.

  One trick, you know

  is when the gun fires

  run like hell

  until you reach the ribbon

  Hours of training,

  A coach

  with years of experience,

  gives you his advice.

  If you win the race,

  he says,

  don't get a big head.

  You think about that

  and you wonder.

  If I won the race

  would I get a big head?

  If you lose the race,

  he says,

  there's always another one.

  Now, you think about that,

  and you say to yourself,

  He's right.

  But I'm going to win.

  Opening

  Grand opening!

  Sale!

  Half off!

  Marked down!

  Right now!

  Hurry while it lasts!

  Don't wait!

  Save!

  Best prices!

  Low low low!

  Come see us!

  We're insane!

  Great deals!

  Don't miss it!

  Once in a lifetime!

  Today only!

  In Traveling Late

  The streetlamps end

  and down that way

  there's not enough moonlight to see very well...

  I don't want to venture there at all

  but there is where my destination lies,

  through the shadows down the road.

  They'll swallow me up

  in an age of darkness

  and I won't have a tune to whistle...

  I've no one to keep me company there

  and the journey continues for many more miles

  in the shadows down the road.

  A barking dog

  echoes through the trees

  and I can't see to find my way...

  it always seems to turn out this way

  and why do my travels always end

  'neath the shadows down the road?

  The night always comes

  at the end of the day

  and forever finds me unp
repared...

  how to make light without a match,

  no torch to carry along with me

  under shadows down the road

  The hair raises up

  on the back of my neck

  but there's no turning back from the darkness, there...

  I suppose it shows my weakness, but

  whosoever can be so brave

  masked in shadows down the road?

  In Shade of Late Hours

  Bringing stars,

  my lover the beautiful night

  floods the gates of dawn

  with moons and crickets' calls,

  chasing the sun

  around the watery world.

  I swim with the starfish

  under your silvery spray,

  and I will walk up your staircase

  into the embrace of

  morning's warm smile.

  Night, you are still my friend

  after the angry words

  of novas bright

  and the slanders

  of the heat of June and July.

  Yours is the wheel of the heavens,

  and every angel

  must walk your winds

  and sing your songs.

  I am glad of you

  as long as I have a pillow

  and as long as you tempt me

  sweetly and softly to dreams.

  In Words So Blind

  You can blame the pen

  that wrote the lines

  that tore a lover's heart...

  that seized my lady

  from my arms,

  that caught me naked,

  wasting breath,

  trying to account for why

  I did not see

  a sunrise in her eyes...

  you can blame the black and white

  of letters strewn

  in reckless lines

  that tried to piece together

  skies full of stars

  that never shined

  on wishes that the both of us

  wished awhile when we were young...

  you can blame the dictionary

  that kept to itself every word

  that could have mended

  broken poems and broken promises

  some of which

  I know that she believed...

  and every word

  that drops away

  having little to do

  or little to say

  is another gray hair

  in a head full of gray...

  I wish I could've shown her

  how words don't matter

  at all.

  No Longer Quiet

  All in a day,

  and the day was long...

  I was left

  alone and waiting.

  The pictures on the wall

  were not art,

  and what came out

  of the tap

  was not water.

  Tired old men

  still remember

  when spring

  held its promise,

  now wintry snow.

  Birdsong falls to earth

  like rain, and still

  I am not melodic.

  Bells ring out

  every day at noon,

  but worlds will never know

  what for or why,

  or how long the story.

  The Spell, Aground

  Now once again I close the book,

  a flame still flutters in my eyes...

  and all my strength, the telling, took,

  the wish, the wish, like fireflies.

  Her soul, my words will never touch,

  a key, I'm missing, to her heart...

  a deep devotion means so much,

  in tears, I thought we'd never part.

  When stirred, my spirit's rustling winds

  bear a message for her ear...

  too faint, the whisper that it sends,

  she'll never know the truth, I fear.

  In empty eyes she's made her home

  and shines the moon upon her age...

  a hollow seashell for a comb,

  a fist of pills for hourly wage.

  The wish, the wish, its fire burns,

  I've tried to bring her wish to life...

  upon the ice, the skater turns,

  our wishes all asea in strife.

  Evening

  Spoon up a cold stew

  in my sly kitchen

  Feed the dog some

  Fill my wooden bowl

  Tired from hard work

  hungry as a March bear

  Walk the dog back home

  smitten with the young night

  Plow for old man Hodges

  Little joy in turning dirt

  like digging from dawn to dusk

  Not much copper in this mine

  I'll sit on slow Sunday

  while the preacher goes on

  about the long, hard climb

  on up to heaven's gate

  Leave my old walking stick

  stuck upright in the dirt

  and I'll come back tomorrow

  to see if it's still standing

  When I was a boy

  never knew a man could

  do so much work

  Wish I were still a boy

  Number

  I had walked to that place

  where that bright feathered bird had lay dying in the snow

  and found one blue feather

  which I put in my pocket

  to take home to my lover

  She was not at all impressed...

  there are so many feathers to be found, she said

  so I asked her for one.

  She held up empty hands, and said

  I just haven't happened to pick one up...yet

  Her eyes widened and she pointed behind me.

  Look at that snake! It has lost all its feathers!

  obviously confused about their origin.

  It is exactly what I have come to expect from her

  and I gave up counting long ago

  There was still the question of who had killed that bird.

  I had seen a snowman lurking through the woods

  with his broom clutched close to his body.

  My lover had made the snowman yesterday

  for the birds to land on

  True, it was just one bird

  but I think it might have been the last one.

  Though I have shown her the feather

  my lover says the bird never existed

  and she had heard the cry yesterday

  Amber

  The heart

  is the most vital

  of vital organs,

  and when

  it is laid open

  under the surgeon's knife

  it is because of

  dire necessity.

  Have you ever held

  a beating heart

  cupped in your hands?

  Nothing is as true

  as the arrow

  of an archer

  intent on making

  a perfect shot

  straight to the heart

  of his worst enemy

  when his life depends on it.

  Do you remember

  your first taste

  of dry champagne?

  Thank you for reading my book! Any comments or feedback can be given directly to me at [email protected]. I would love to hear from you!