The Abandoned Landfill

It's the final resting place
Of the detritus of life.
Earth to earth.  Dust to dust.  Just like us.
Mementos, meaningful once
Meaningless now, mingle
With the refuse they have become.

Five diaries, the contents of which
Would have shattered families;
Several letters of apology, never sent,
That might have mended them.

Three fetuses, conceived in love
But birthed in fear and swaddled in shame
When delivered in lonely bathrooms.
Disposed of with varying degrees
Of remorse and relief.

The decaying remains of dead pets,
Loved more than the abandoned babes,
But thrown away when life left them
Unable to fawn, to purr, to please.

A couple dozen scrapbooks,
An armload of high school yearbooks,
Galleries of pictures of family and friends
Once cherished, now forgotten.

A box containing a lifetime of Sunday
Sermons delivered, that elicited
Only indifference.
Three unpublished novels,
Authors' dreams deferred,
Disposed of by their heirs
As so much waste paper.
Many books that were published;
Some enjoyed, now all outdated
Unwanted and discarded.

A bleak perspective perhaps,
But it's hard to be positive when one reads
Of civilizations that have flourished, then faded.
Worlds die, and even Suns give out
Either with a bang or a sigh.

All we love, we cherish,
We yearn for, or to become,
Is but a brief flare of a match
In the ever brooding, all devouring
Onslaught of time, that leads to naught
But oblivion's eternal night.

Rules of the Road

Pick your time wisely.
Make sure your feet are healthy,
Your legs and heart strong,
Your soul honed for hardship.
Pack a knife, water, pepper, some biscuits.
Leave the morning of a holiday.
That puts more miles behind you
Before they notice that you're gone.

The star that glows on the bright end
Of the ladle we call "The Little Dipper,"
Is "Polaris,"  the "North Star."
The Lord has set it there as a beacon
You can follow  it north, to freedom.
Need guidance in daytime?
If you're heading north as you ought,
At morning your shadow's to your left.
It moves to your right
During the hot afternoon sun.
No Sun?  Moss grows on the north side
Of a tree.  Keep moving that direction.

Near the Mississippi?
Old Man River flows south,
Keep travelling against the current.
If you reach the Rock River
You can follow it toward Wisconsin.

Travel at night.  Lay low during the day.
Darkness is your friend, your cloak,
Your concealment,
As is a thick morning fog.
Don't steal.  Light no fire.
Do nothing to call attention to yourself.
Keep on looking back, over your shoulder.

You can't outrun dogs, but you can try
To outsmart them.
Wade in streams where your scent won't linger,
But for goodness sake be mindful of snakes.
Rub your feet with pepper, turpentine,
Even wild onions if you can find them.
Anything that will confound a hound's nose.
If you find an old cemetery, some say
That the dust of the dead, stirred into paste,
Gives off a smell that no dog dare follow.
Worse comes to worse you can use your knife
To gut a stubborn hound if one hunts you out.

Tall prairie grass makes good hiding,
But know what poison ivy and oak look like.
Taking a nap in either can lead to pain
Searing as that of an overseer's lash.
Fill up on water whether you're thirsty or not,
'Cause there's sure to come a time when you will be.
Keep on looking back, over your shoulder.

Godspeed on your journey, brave fugitive.
May courage, wisdom, luck
and the assistance of the Divine Savior
Lead you to good people, safe havens
And despite much hardship,  to Freedom.

The Ministry of Loneliness

Britain has set up a Ministry of Loneliness;
No, not like the U. S., where televangelists
Peddle God's love like some magic panacea
For companionship, a pet rock for the soul;
Cold comfort, an empty promise,
A sorry substitute for the  loving reciprocity 
of touch, of warmth, desire and connection
That so many of us desperately crave;
A shakedown for dollars, basically.

No, this is an actual political department,
A ministry set up to seek out and offer help
To “All the lonely people,”  
The Eleanor Rigbys of the world.
Maybe the statisticians can discover
“Where do they all come from”
And find a cure for their affliction.

The irony is that as our population grows
We  become more infected with loneliness.
Isolation spreads like an epidemic as we
Take refuge behind our computer screens,
Hoping that internet pimps such as Our Time,
Match, Farmers Only or E-Harmony.com
Can set us up with a soul-mate,
A chimerical promise that at best suggests

Two halves unlikely ever to become a whole,
Not being able to meld into a couple where
Each brings unique strengths and weaknesses
To a relationship, and through bonding
Their differences, become stronger united.

 Loneliness leaves one hollow, empty to the core.
An existence that's a prison cell, a dark cavern,
An impenetrable jungle or wind whipped desolation,
Even the bustling anonymity of a city
Becomes solitary confinement if one has no one
To talk to, to interact with, to go home to.
it's so sad to see so many yearning for love
In a world of people who are just as lonely.

There are people out there who need love,
Companionship, friendship, or even a kind word,
As much as you may need theirs.
Sure, a Ministry of Love is a nice gesture, a start,
But an effort doomed to failure until the lonely learn
That to be loved they must be ready to offer love.
One opens oneself to rejection, certainly,
 Opening one's heart leaves one vulnerable,
It may lead to heartache and pain
 It could possibly lead though to a lasting love,
A collaboration of two hearts, two minds, two souls
That will be the salvation of them both.

 

Haughty Maiden

Ah, you haughty beauty!
You deflected your father's wrath
By blaming your round belly
On being accosted and ravished
By grim-visaged Ares
While you were out riding
On the Plains of Thessaly.

"My daughter is so beautiful
That she was taken by a God,"
He boasts to whoever will listen.
It's easy to see where your pride comes from.

Perhaps you can find a way to explain
Now that you've given birth to a God's son
Why the infant that you're so lovingly nursing
Bears such a damning resemblance to
Your father's brawny
Yet simple stableboy.

The Temple of Victory

While hunting deep within a distant forest
Mikos came upon a long forgotten glen.
He watched lizards take refuge in the rubble
Of the moss-shrouded ruins of a shrine.
A serpent wriggled its speckled death
Into a crevice in the foundation.
Stone columns lay scattered like jackstraws.
Amidst the shattered wreckage of its roof
The statue of a Goddess lay broken
And wingless amid an embrace of vines.

A man in rags sat upon the altar.
His skin looked cracked and dead as autumn leaves,
His frame driftwood gaunt and his beard ash-grey,
But his eyes blazed with mind-consuming hatred
"Whose temple was this?"  Mikos wondered
Aloud as his eyes surveyed the ruins.
"Goddess Nike's," its guardian snarled contemptuously
"Flush with the pride of victory and youth I raised it
To her to humble and taunt my rival."
Suddenly, a woman's mocking laughter could be heard.

The old man winced.  "While I paid her this homage,
My vanquished foe found new resolve and trained
To challenge me again.  She favored him this time.
The teeth of his rage left me bloodied and defeated.
My joy now is to remain here until I die,
Watching her temple crumble like the dream
That I'd pursued and won, a victory I'd labored
To commemorate with this shrine of stone."
The angry ancient sighed, then scowled as a woman's
Taunting laughter again echoed through the bitter glen.

Salt

Lot's wife disobeyed
A command of God.
She looked back.
Most likely yearning
For a final glimpse of her home,
The land that held her parents' bones,
The land where she fell in love,
Where her children were born.
Her refuge
Her nest
Her garden of memories.

She was turned into salt
A pillar of hardened crystals,
Like the sleep in one's eye
Multiplied from mote to monolith.

How cruel of God to punish one
Simply for choosing to look back
Upon one's roots, home and nest;
The past that made us all what we are.

Don't look back!
How can we help but do so?
To deny our history
Is to deny ourselves.

A sailor asks his messmate
To "pass Lots wife"
As though she's a whore
Hauled up a hawser
To be hidden below deck
To be shared among them.
An old salt's spice of life
Perhaps worth one's salt.


Yeah, pass Lot's wife.
That shaker laden
With tears of regret
Tears of longing
Tears of lamentation
Tears of frustration
Tears of despair,
and rarely, too rarely
Tears of joy..

Any man worth his salt
Knows that the salt of the Earth
Is derived from tears.

Collateral Damage

We were the beasts of your farmyard and fields.
We meant no harm, wanting nothing more
Than to graze on green grass and rest in clean straw.
Why was it necessary to send evil men to steal us,
Or cast thunder, lightning  and fire down upon us
Simply to win a wager with the Devil?
Why should the restoration of our master's fortune;
Twice blessed in beasts and progeny,
Be a cause for us to rejoice?
We who were slain in order for faith to be tested.

We were the sons and daughters of Job.
Looking forward to love, marriage and children.
Why was it necessary to bring forth a great wind
To collapse our eldest brother's home upon us?
Why sacrifice us to prove our father's faith to Satan
Whom you can vanquish at any time, but won't?
How can we help but resent and envy the existence
Of the progeny given later to twice-blest Job?
How can we not yearn unceasingly for the lives
Wrested from us that were bestowed upon them?

I am the chastised wife of Job.
Bereft of our livestock, our riches, our children,
Having to witness my husband's undeserved suffering,
Was it weak of me to question God's plan?
It certainly was not loving of my husband
To reproach me rather than try to console me
In my grief.  Is it wrong for a mother to rage at God
When he takes her children away from her?
Does he think that giving me a new family means
That I won't still love and mourn those whom I lost?

"Have faith and question not the wisdom and works
of the Lord, for his ways are wondrous and strange."
For those of us who suffer his collateral damage,
We pawns sacrificed to further some Divine Plan
That we feel removed from or can't comprehend,
Are we to submit without a protest, without a curse,
Without a raised fist, or at least a questioning "Why?"
Job was well taken care of.  His faith was rewarded.
Why were so many candles extinguished though, their light
Snuffed out, just so his could illuminate more brightly?