Songs boomerang
in my head
Cock-eyed Optimist vs The Eve of Destruction
There would be time
I imagined NOW
to BE to do
all the unsaid and unrequited.
To burrow into the souls of trees
and drink nectar from now-clear streams
to meditate away
from Samsara pain
to pedal-push sweet lilting lyrics
that would transform the planet.
To paint a masterpiece for forever.
To come to peace with that rascal
Death who stands smiling skeletal
He knows his catch is huge
His nets are bursting
So ready to scoop some more.
But ennui ensues
The couch beckons
screens flicker
Zoom voices
boom like prophets
of Apocalypse
and perhaps
they are.
The blinds are drawn across
the street
The grass high and unattended
No one comes out,
Beyond the raging headlines
the questions the fear
Mistakes pile up like the
lifeless bodies gathered in the dusk
Missing protection missing masks
Health workers working day and night
Exhaustion and fear crease
their souls
Celebrations for those they can save
The lost and losses haunt
the empty sidewalks.
Grief washes down like grey rain.
But here it is still there
Hands pump to restore life
Feet march to deliver food
The young look after the old.
The friend who delivers baby goods
to destitute mothers
The friend who started making free masks
in our town gathering volunteers
all of us making masks
first a few then hundreds
then thousands
one hospital then three
then for everyone everyplace
flying out like doves of peace.
The children sing with balloons
pastels and open faces laughs like
silver bangles
ride in cars past houses
sing Happy Birthdays and Congrats
Thousands march against injustice
risking illness and arrest.
The neighbors children
paint in dayglo colors
LOVE EACH OTHER
FIGHT THE VIRUS
shines and shimmers on the sidewalk
We sit far from one another
and warble our hellos
muttered under masks
Gardens sprout
eating is conscious
savored not gulped.
I live now
in the present, only now
no future, the past hazy
like my dreams.
What meaning in this
new beauty erupting
on the streets roads and forests
Trees like guardian sentries, sparkly water
the sky more blue and clear
And we humble creatures of God,
of Earth of whatever strange Creator
envisioned this
feeble human experiment
We limp on feeling our way
through millennium
repeating endless boomerangs
leaving flotsam and destruction
in striated
layers anger war hate and greed
but there it is there it stays
sneaking through
laughter, hope, beauty, compassion
kindness and love….