All Hallows Eve

On Halloween we shed our normal selves

We dress as ghosts or pirates, kings or queens

Then frolic with the demons and the elves

And fill our bags with colored jelly beans

But Halloween is more than fun and games

This is the night the dead return to life

The witches’ brew is bubbling on the flames

And Dracula is searching for a wife

The children ring the bell in search of treats

They’re clueless as to what awaits their fate

I fear that werewolves prowl the city streets

Perhaps a ghoul digests the flesh he ate

I think I’d just as soon stay home tonight     

This poem puts me in a state of fright

Black T's

      

     

The Goodwill arranges its T-shirts by color

I skip past the white and the gray

I usually thumb through the red and the blue

But it’s black shirts that carry the day 

Black T-shirts, so forceful, so strong

Most thugs never mug a wearer

Even big guys step out of the way

While their kiddies look on in sheer terror 

Black T-shirts remind me of zombies

Of panthers and black bears and rhinos

Tarantulas and scorpions are blacker than night

Many dreaded creatures that cause human woes

Nosferatu and Dracula always wear black

Darth Vader and Lord Voldemort

Plus scary good guys, John Wick, The Dark Knight

James Dean, other rebels of his sort

Black stands for mystery, power and death 

Why I’m drawn to this color is odd

In truth, I am more of a lime green guy

But for fantasy, black’s my facade  

The Social Scientist As Poet

The day he arrived at his quite advanced age

My dear cousin Alfred proceeded to retire 

A true social scientist for forty plus years 

He began writing poetry, a calling much higher

Alfred’s sonnets were informed by his social science training 

The rules: be clear, be accurate and objective 

Stick to the facts, no fantasies, no feelings

Impersonal description, so lyrically effective

Pitfalls that Alfred avoids at all costs:

Flowery language, allusion, ambiguity

The personal, the subjective, the introspective

Metaphors, similes, any hint of incongruity  

Alfred’s quest, you might say, is a radical venture 

He rids his poems of all things poetic 

Our society is much too confusing as is 

Conflict and chaos, distressing, pathetic 

Alfred says that his poems bring light to the darkness

Restoring needed order in a woebegotten time 

His verses bubble over with certainty and structure  

Not to mention fine meter and lines topped with rhyme 

It’s hard to predict what the future will bring

Some scoff at the drabness of Alfred’s new goal

But order and clarity are very dope things 

It doesn’t bother Alfred if he’s lacking in soul 

Letterology: A Book Of Divination For Our Troubled Times

Numerology gets more applause and acclaim

A source of wisdom for two thousand years

But Letterology, a wellspring, if you are seeking

to unravel the psyche, to calm rampant fears 

Letterology interprets the letters from one’s name

In my case, for example, the initials D-C-L 

One probes their meanings in the sacred texts

One’s life course, one’s destiny, Letterology will tell

                  D-C-L: The Readings

D is the image of an Army helmet

          Of a bullet, a quonset hut, a coffin’s end 

The sound of D is duh-duh-duh-duh

          The din of a jackhammer dismantling concrete

D stands for demon, degenerate, depraved

          Also dilettante, dullard, doofus

 Thus D is the Dark side of D-C-L

         And D is in the first place, the foundation, the core 

C is the image of a cup of hot chocolate

          A happy smile, a bowl for chrysanthemums

C sounds like cuh-cuh-cuh-cuh

          The soft song of cicadas at twilight

 C stands for capable, confident, clever

          And chatty, congenial, cordial, chipper

 C is the Creative side of D-C-L

  But sadly C is stuck between D and L

L is the image of a dead end road

          A broken twig, a clock just past midnight

L sounds like luh-luh-luh-luh

          The gibberish of an infant babbling in his crib

 L stands for lazy, lethargic, lackadaisical

          For loony, light-headed, lopsided, lumpy 

 L is the Lamentable side of D-C-L

         L waits in the last place, the guardian of the end

What should I make of this unsettling reading? 

All hope for the future is with the letter C

D-C-L should change his first name to Cramer

When C’s in the first place, one is happy and free