WIND

Like this morning, crazy with wind

Or just the other day, the bad roads
Even that time, and maybe it was long ago
When we all danced in circles

Take last night, what you said
Take the fire in the ring of rock
Take sun and rain, finally
Pulling frost from earth. A garden

Like falling in and out and in, again
Since the beginning and until
We are very, very old and
Maybe falling in and out, even then

The seasons, I mean, the leaves
The greening and the turning to gold
The rush of it like the sea pulling
The ice and streams of high mountains

Think of that water in the Pacific
Or the rain in Spain if you prefer
Or the little cloud that you are, driven

Like this morning, crazy with wind

~ Ralph Murre

first published in Verse Wisconsin and susequently in my book The Price of Gravity (Auk Ward Editions 2010)

after noon

good afternoon:

a woman in a chair

smiling her smile

~ arem

just ducky

minus orange feet

it arrives at my table

a l 'orange

~ arem

-

I must admit that I found the original photo of the duck on-line, and the photographer was not credited. I then did a bunch of processes to arrive at the digital duck seen above. Not certain of the ethics in this sort of theft . . . but, if it's your duck, thanks! ~RM

'round midnight

catastrophic

and hopeful

as midnight

what you did

or didn't

what you might

~ arem

Workers? Are there still workers?

In Labor

So, you’re still working, but they let you off for Labor Day, like the 4th, like Memorial day, and you have a coupla beers and you char something on the Weber, maybe listen to a ballgame, your team still in the cellar. Your cousin Jimmy comes over with his face-lifted tit-lifted wife and the Gameboy twins.
He drives a new Infiniti. It's gray. Nobody talks about labor except that of delivering the twins and there's some talk of her working on her tan. Your dad was in the strike of '52. Also the big one in '56. All summer.
You pick some tomatoes and corn from the garden. Get salt and pepper. They talk about the food at Aquavit and Blu. Your grandpa rode the rails in '35 and '36, stole chickens. They have to go. Country Day School starts tomorrow. Your grandma was in labor in the back of a Ford in '38. There's a union man talking in the park just a block away. Nobody listening. A skateboard goes by. The plant will close in 3 weeks. You fall asleep in a plastic chair from China, juice of summer harvest on your chin, a few clouds gathering.

~ Ralph Murre

Your Barred Window

In This Prison

I would be a blade of grass
near the wall of the yard
moisture of tears would nourish me
and I would give you my green

or a sparrow on the ledge
of your barred window
you wouldn’t need to feed me much
a few grains of your thoughts
and I would chirp
tales of the outside world

or a blue notebook
in the corner of your cell
I would offer a white page each day
and I would hold what you say
‘til you’re ready
to tell everybody else

because I don’t think you’re the type
to do much writing on the wall

or I might be a hacksaw blade
baked into chocolate cake
or a giant yellow bulldozer
carelessly left in the cellblock
ignition key in place

or maybe I would be the day
they realize their mistake
and set you free

~ Ralph Murre

An old one, first published in Free Verse and subsequently in my book Crude Red Boat (Cross+Roads Press 2007).