Two Time Zones #2

 Two Time Zones #2

Can’t live in two time zones
at once straddling and thinking
straightly, about yourself and also kids.
It appears easy looking back but
the kids eternal now needs protecting
and joining, a joy, towards
this wider spanning so thin of
elder life. Not knowing better
of course, only coiled the same
but refraining and listening differently.
Echoes of ancestors where, on the flat?
I was torn off somewhere. I
should’ve written on the pages
booking it, stick it.

        Open arms again!
        This time with knowledge!
        The bird outside is whirring.

There aren’t the appropriate clothes
to wear any longer. Bring back
suit coats, bowties. Respect
for elders, in every way, because
of secrets, of poisons, of withholdings,
savings. Of things I know not yet.
Stunning things, new color
combinations from black and white
or choral voices in those
longed for chords.
The way my old friend was lying
there, poses natural and undying.
You can have me now,
it might be almost all used up.

The mist rises from the road and around it
marshes and boulders dropped by glaciers
I’m told. The further I go the harder it is to talk
to anyone except the animals. The real me, it seems,
the one without problems. Burdens all from
so far before, they are a dream I barely
remember, modern things explode
with a glowing banality. Flat earth returns steadily
a relative tsunami washing machine over
frightened faces.
Turn that frown
upside down!
Once tattooed
you’re committed to falling through.
Once a poet, always a poet.
Loving a good pen,
keeping pencils with their
tiny rubber eraser nearby.

We always want to say we’re sorry
when it’s too late. The gang
of us. Write smaller then
young Huey.