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Toppling Over: a poem

I’ve begun to restructure this blog.

Under the title GREAT DEBATE is now a menu with links to the major categories I write about. [(Ha, ha, or lol? Psych-girl, two sessions ago, pointed out to me that I have “a tendency to categorize everything.”) She’s right. She usually is.] So far I’ve listed two. There will be more. Such as Sports, Politics, Colorado. Maybe Poems, too? I used to write poems.

In fact, I took a course in poetry way back in the late 60’s at Colorado State University. Oh my … . I think I got a C. Notwithstanding, I took it up again when I opened a bookstore in Evergreen in 2001. A poetry group, hosted by a retired English professor, would meet there every Tuesday. I joined in, as it was “after hours”.

This poem, Toppling Over, I wrote after I closed the bookstore. It seems appropriate now. Seeing as to the way things are. Or, way worse than you think. Without further ado:

TOPPLING OVER

Throat, eyes, ears itching

Nose running

Breath short

Can’t find what I’m looking for–

A marker, a maker

A friend, a lover,

Purpose or home

Nothing but losses–

One on top of another.

Stacking up like cordwood

the pile is too high

And it’s starting to lean–

One more will do it

Bring the whole damn thing

Down.

Just a random jumble

Of sticks and logs

Untidy and disordered

Hardly matters anymore

It’ll burn just the same

And the ash doesn’t care.

~~~

First published in SOUNDING OFF IN ECHO HILLS (2004)

Cordwood (aka firewood) 2002 Evergreen, Colorado
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