Stopping by my Canadian Drainage Pit on a Rainy Evening

A homage to Robert Frost's "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"

I thought I knew a way to drain

My village house, under water, seemed to need a crane

Every attempt to dig or hoe a trench with my hoe

With each rain I ran to the mop; now my tender foe

Stretching its paws, my little cat must think it uncanny

That I spend hours gazing at a trench

Like a 90 year old nanny

Yet between my house and this giant puddle

The universe is wet and muddled

Then I gave my mop another swipe

Splashed droplets zigzagged down my unshaven face

"Could there be some error in this hole I am digging?"

My efforts went unanswered 

Except for the raindrops that went pinging

A big puddle, dark and lovely, is the joy of a child's soul

And the demon for the one who can not drain

Do you get it? I have given my word

And must dig yonder before I rest

and must dig yonder before I rest.

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

BY ROBERT FROST

Whose woods these are I think I know.   

His house is in the village though;   

He will not see me stopping here   

To watch his woods fill up with snow.   

My little horse must think it queer   

To stop without a farmhouse near   

Between the woods and frozen lake   

The darkest evening of the year.   

He gives his harness bells a shake   

To ask if there is some mistake.   

The only other sound’s the sweep   

Of easy wind and downy flake.   

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.   

But I have promises to keep,   

And miles to go before I sleep,   

And miles to go before I sleep.

Random Justice

Random justice

Avoids 

Pleading parts

That don't fit

Tackling moral, mandatory, laws

Standing

Unabiding 

Fearless

Natural Justice

While some organizations are affirming rights in the Amazon

A generation of trees is earmarked

Like cows in Patagonia
They drop leaving a carbon print to oxide

Meteorological justice
Hurricane Katrina arrives to New Orleans

Gusty arguments are taken to the Supreme Governor 

Sassy, segregated, southern legislators write affidavits in safety
Ignoring  streaming thousands taking shelter in the Superdome
Sweltering on live TV with no food or water

Penitentiary Justice

The shackled convict nods downwards passing his mother
After a 3 day trial

In his cell

The walls and the bars are there to sublimate

A will that is

Never present

Never asking forgiveness

Years pass

The ghost of the prisoner's soul is waiting for parole

A waft of crystal meth is still frozen in his memory

Who will take him, will he find liberty?

Drug-related Justice
The parents of a pot-smoking
Colorado Kid that they can't control
Up in arms after the legalization of marijuana
Despite the fact that the rampant selling grass is now generating tax
revenue to pay for school programs

Lampedusa Justice
For the few who have made the 113 miles from Tunisia without
capsizing the Island
Now littered with encampments
Struggles to net in its former reputation
of a touristic fishing haven
in the face of bodies floating off its shores

There are so many: Equatorial Justice, Media Justice, African Justice
Sexist Justice, Justice in an elevator, Justice that smells,
Peanut Justice, Justice that can be seen
Aging

All stand before bearded Judges in lederhosen

Before lawyers at the bar gyrating erudite language

Shooting Code from the hip

Soliciting the Jury
A case is to be made

A Sentence is hammered

As stiff as a Montecristo drink.

UCS Delivery

"UCS Delivery" in Memory of Michael Dell  10/l4/13

It was summertime

Hot and oppressive

We worked as a team

To find work

To earn some young dollars

Mike took me to that Pearl River Tower

A small idiosyncratic skyscraper in the middle of nowhere

We picked up boxes of contracts

Contracts that needed tedious explaining

Out the revolving door into the car we

Hammered ourselves going

Door to door

Explaining in one minute and 30 seconds

A card, a rebate, a signature.

Michael had sold encyclopedias

He taught me the tricks how to up the tone

And look at the mother or father or both in the eye

To make them thinks twice about their child's education

That summer of l976

We barreled around the suburbs

Sweating it out and laughing it in

Until we came up with a coy scheme

That made Eurika cry for help

I've told this story to many for over 30 years

This story stands as my first summer job and

Like a first love or first of anything 

It will always stand

Today I learned Michael is no longer with us

The chance to sit down with you Michael is gone

But as long as my moon rises piercing the clouds of yonder

Our story will live on.

Of Shutdowns and Twerking

Recently we have witnessed the US government shutdown, but what other shutdowns can we entertain?

Operas, banks theaters, bars, kennels, memorials, forests, computers, hospitals and even trucks can
shutdown, close their doors, stop operating or functioning as before.
Yet a chemical or nuclear plant that shuts down
could also provoke an investor's aorta's valve to
shut down hence causing immediate death.

On the other hand, a chef who insists on preparing eggs
benedict on Wednesday evenings is shutting down on
his or her ability to cope with the need to change.
You, my fellow readers may be shutting down if
you don't consider that twerking has entered the
Oxford English Dictionary this month.
In modern English, originating from 'foot work' or 'twist and jerk'
twerking in fact has its origins in medieval times when Joan of Arc
was reported to have twerked before the Duke of Alencon.

The French army was so invigorated by the sight that they fought, grinding their teeth,
 until their foes fell, ending the 100 Year War.
Today, doctors have noted a new condition called twerkitis,
where a patient's buttocks (often of a female), wobble and jiggle relentlessly
day in and day out.
Sadly, for the moment there is no cure.

Where did I put it?

It was the main key to open the door. On the key ring, a featherless rubber chicken
Many did deplore.
My habit was to squeeze and spin it around my index finger and
When stressed I would bite on the dirty chicken's rubbery feet and sing
"Chicken little, chicken little, hum di dum" to it.

My Credit card is blue and it has a shiny camel hologram
The bank issued it to me in Dubai when I was working as
Head chef of the Louvre.
I like to rub my thumb over the numbers of the card,
Somewhere along the line I know there are three zeros.
I shuffle it in my hand with other cards -not credit cards
Rather doctors cards and the card of my wife's cemetery
Indicating the number and letter of the plot where she has
Taken her new residence.

My car is golden; not sure of the mark. It has a low body
Automatic lights and the air conditioning is always set high.
Everyday I get on the main strip, plug the gas pedal and she
Takes off, pushing my body deep into the comfortable bucket
Seats.
Since I got a replacement, when I veer left I can feel a staple in my right hip
And it touches a nerve, I think, but the main thing is to get to my restaurant.
Today, I don't cook much anymore (with this lousy hip I now use a walker
The kind you drag with two tennis balls at the bottom.)
Every year or so a son comes by and changes the balls. He says the metal tubes have
Worn through them.
Aside from the screeching sound that is out of my hearing range -but I'm told-
It's scratching up the floors all over. Tan pis as they say in French.

Back to my driving: after a big thunderstorm sometime last year, there was such
A puddle that accumulated into a lake, a monstrous lagoon on US1
I hit the water so hard I skidded and almost hit a police car.
He made me get out, the water was up to my ankles and I felt my socks
Rolling down.
The officer saw on my bumper that I belonged to a yoga club
He said his wife belonged to the same one and let me go.

I speak about these things because I lost them, lost them all
Within a week.
I think.
The keys, my credit card and my car.
It can be jarring not to know where they are but
They are just material things;
Immaterial.

Yes there are other things too, I suppose.
There's the hot top with the two broken knobs that I struggle with and
The one double knob that controls a small heating surface if you turn it to the left and
A larger heating surface if you turn it to the right.
Or the other way around.
Just need the right size pot; no plastic.

When my wife used it I just didn't pay attention. Remember I was
A great chef mind you
My hip got in the way
The doctor was so good he said I could cook
But now I prefer to drive because with bouillabaisse you need wine and
That was on the list of things I couldn't touch.
In Dubai they said I was the Best. I have boxes of letters and pictures.
Look at them.

I got a call the other day I don't know from whom.
Maybe it was today.
A woman asked me how I was doing because she saw me
Wearing a two piece suit in the health club.
"What's so special about that?" I barked.
My closet is full of suits that I love and nobody wants them.
So I decided to wear them every day.
They probably have spots, I know, sometimes
Getting gas is a messy business, however,
I get compliments.
"You're looking swell" smirks the cashier or
"I wish I could dress like you" says the pool attendant.
Then I lift a smile that goes up a part of my face .

I stopped playing cards.
Chess was a long time before that. I can't figure to put
Together those demonic flushes and I know I used to
Do it all the time. "Flushy boy" they called me.
All flushes.
Joe, Dean and what's his name -the guy who could
Make drawings like that artist, what's his name that lived, near
Near that river near New York. Well I'll miss them but if I want
I can pick up the phone and call them if I can only find that piece
of paper with all the numbers!

Almost forgot: I have a son who makes me put on this beeping device
Around my neck. He thinks I'm a dog or something. It's all about safety
crap he says. He should talk to MY father I says.
When he's not here I put it in a shoebox with my pictures from Dubai.
The last time I carried it it was beeping in the elevator, I had three people
Trying to find out where it was and I said "Never again!"
Funny, I may not hear the screech but I hear the beep.
Maybe this thing is screeching again.
Where are the tennis balls?

Cheerios Cure

The FDA recommends eating 200 grams of Cheerios a day
will reduce inter-racial hatred sentiments by 30%,
If, however, you're a neo-nazi racist, bigot, or fascist pig with
over 10 years of blood boiling hate in you

Take 3 tablespoons of margarine, 1/2 cup of marshmallows,
1/3 cup of roasted sunflower nuts, 1/2 processed banana and
a cup of Cheerios. Place the ingredients in a glass bowl and
 an anti-mixed marriage slogan over it.
Microwave High for 1 minute and l5 seconds.

Cool one hour before serving. You may not believe your eyes but
after one bite you will be able to attend your first gay mixed marriage
party without quivering a lip or a desire to kill.
Satisfaction guaranteed or your money back!

Paris is haunting me

Paris is haunting me:

I am attempting to move on the Peripherique

Motorcycles are speeding in between the lanes of death

As we ebb like cattle dressed in smog

My retina traps a millipede of tail lights

"qui vont nulle part".

Then I pull off to Versailles

Where I have to vacuum the boudoir of

Marie-Antoinette

She is there, looking out the window

Her hair held up with a diamond pin

My 1789 Hoover delux model P1360-H in Strass

(Today resembling a giant Faberge egg)

Is almost making more "bruit" from the foot pump than

The uproarious chanting from hundreds of women  

Clad in black and peasant attires

Sticks held high pointed at the Chateau

"Dieu rendez-nous nos cartes bancaires!"

Marie gazed at her jardin

Some 800 hectares of vegetation trained

To heel like a dog

She pointed near some botanical acrobatics where

The fountain of Apollo and Diana are caught up in a mud fight

And shouted:

"Vous pouvez planter vos pommes de terres!"

But the cries from the crowd only grew louder

I slipped out pretending to change the Royal satin dust bag

I ran up the banks of the Seine

Fearful of my own shadow

Past the Eiffel Tower I crossed the Pont Neuf and

Sat down for a kebab on the steps of the Pantheon.

Across the street the sign of the Jean-Jacques Rousseau Centre des Photocopies

Flashed with the first "e" letter out making it

"Jan-Jacues Rousseau"

I walked in and asked for a photocopy

"But you cannot buy a photocopie, Monsieur", replied an employee wearing a

Floral patterned dress with a diamond pin in her hair

Then she looked at me with dark eyes that made my neck feel tight

She handed me a blank sheet of paper and I could see,

With a beam of light

It was 120 grams.