Backbone > Poetica
edited by Franci Levine Grater

Dare to have patience and persistence when opportunities are saying "Stop! Stop! Stop!" Use without permission; get the most from choices; continue to light and pray and march for the good smells of bread baking and children's innocence. It is never too late - Franci

Ajetreo

Trapped in an age of anxiety and rage

quality is sacrificed to quantity

in all consuming search for velocity

as people from people totally disengage.

Consuming more products in insecurity

buy bigger homes and their full furnishings

but insecurity lingers languishing

as massive mortgages are signed for surety.

Working to point of madness and exhaustion

day in and day out with one thought in mind

which is the much vaunted one week vacation

which is a brief respite from daily grind.

Trapped in an age of anxiety and rage

barely able to make payment on mortgage.

-Roger Whitson

Rolling In The Aisles

In my little corner of the cosmos confusion reigns

And randomness has taken a rather malicious turn.

Causality has conspired so comically against me

It would make even Shakespeare slap his thighs

And writhe with the most mad and unmanageable mirth.

It would send the audience rolling in the aisles.

But me, I'm feeling rather somber and not the least amused,

For I fail to see the humor of a fortune so befuddled,

Where providence wears the most profoundly puzzled look

Of an old woman standing dazed in the aisle at the local grocery,

Staring silent and stupefied over a stainless steel meat counter,

Unable to speak, all her plans and purposes momentarily forgotten.

-Doug Tanoury

The Rain Said Here

Someone bought something

and suddenly the whole bar was happy

Shoes were thrown

Even the dishwasher was

happy

Outside the rain said

here

so we did

growing warm and older

Clouds came through the

door and we welcomed them

They would change us

we knew but

the rain said here

so we did

-Jeff Garrett