Poetry
Sometimes I Leave the Mountain Politics
John doesn’t have a drum
to march to any beat. He sits
most mornings out front of
the Stone Village Market,
arranging a few fresh flowers
he’s purchased, along
with a can of Campbell’s soup
and listens to a small battered
radio, but mainly to voices
I will never know. Water water
everywhere
At first I wanted to go over
and leave a dollar on the table,
but he has change each day
for flowers and soup, enough
to sustain some sanity
at the heart of his derangement.
Where have
you gone
Gone the way
Of man
Long dried
on the bone
No clean
air or water
All living has
died
So I sit with my bacon croissant
and Costa Rican coffee, reading
the morning news about
rape in the Congo, a father’s
abuse and a war without end
and think to myself,
John, stay put! The earth
is quiet
George Bristol We talked our
selves to death.
Just rot and
rust And
dust blowing
in the wind
K.B. Whitley
22
Cenizo
First Quarter 2011