The RetroLounge Daily Poem Thread (Sat 12/23/06)

[RetroLounge]

Ice Storm

Ours wives don't love us any less than long ago,
just in a different way, like water becomes ice.
Where once there was a calm and wide river full of fish,
the silver of their affection still swims below.
Now we must cut circles through the crust to catch them.
Think of it their way. We were once a sky,
large and clear and bright with the promises of spring,
but we became thunder and rain and then dark clouds
that descended upon them cold and heavy with snow.
My mother would tell a story about a storm in Illinois.
The ice and snow began to fall upon the winding two-lane,
and my father halted to dress the chains in ungloved hands.
Jacking each back tire, quickly adjusting the links,
while chill filled the car and my mother quieted
the girls in the back seat, who had started their whimpering.
God damn, it was cold, but what was he to do?
They weren't a mile down the dangerous road before
suddenly the chains wrapped themselves around the axle
with the roar of bombers and land mines and tommy guns.
They hunkered down on tins of sausage and saltines
while men in thick coats and boots repaired my father's mistakes.
It became the story she told at holiday office parties,
the secretaries' eyes stilled in skilled anticipation,
the eggnog, laced with rum, lifted to the fissures of their lips.
My father filched a smile from some cold place
along a road that took him to his titles and gray suits.
My mother's voice became more liquid with each retelling.
A colleague tells me about her divorce and the settlement.
The husband got the house, the good car, and left her and the kids.
His girlfriend, thin as fishing line, has moved in.
At night in the old bed, the new woman spins dreams
into the air she screamed and cried only six months ago.
The colleague, who tended the laundry of her career
until her children were old enough for school,
is two months behind on her bills, and her husband,
always starched and dry cleaned, is filing suit for her sons.
One happy hour after work, I don't know why I took her there,
I buy us both a scotch, mine straight up, hers on the rocks.
I have nothing to tell her. What am I supposed to tell her?

Lyman Grant

***************

RL

If you have a request for a certain Poet, post their name in the thread and I will find a poem by them and post it...

if you want to see some of my poetry, see the blog at:
http://www.myspace.com/retropaul

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. My dear Retro...........

Wow this is a strange one.......

Just when you think it's going someplace you know........

It changes course, and goes someplace entirely new!

But of course, it's beautiful, and full of meaning.......

But the meanings keep shifting.....

And I don't know where it ends up........

Thank you.......

And........Merry Christmas! :hug:

[cwydro]

2. I don't know if it is meant to be

but that poem strikes me as very sad. And lonely.

[EFerrari]

3. OMFG -- I LOVE this poet.

Thank you, Retro.

:wow:

[RetroLounge]

16. He's new to me...

I'm glad I found him..

RL

[FedUpWithIt All]

4. Damn, that one got me.....

Thanks Retro.

:hug:

[RetroLounge]

5. You are welcome...

:hi:

How's it going?

RL

[FedUpWithIt All]

6. Going ok. Having trouble getting into the spirit...

but doing an ok job faking it. ;)

How are you? All ready?

[RetroLounge]

7. I had 4 more presents to wrap...

and instead I spent this morning at the urgent care clinic with a severely sprained finger. Got it in a splint.

I can barely type as it is, now I can only do it one-handed.

So someone else will need to wrap the presents for me...

RL

[FedUpWithIt All]

8. Damn, i am sorry about your finger.

:( I'd help you wrap them if i could. :hug:

Soooo...are you good at one handed typing? :evilgrin:

[RetroLounge]

9. one handed typing?

I've had a fair amount of practice...

:rofl:

are you offering a hand? :9

RL

[FedUpWithIt All]

10. I bet...

:P


Perhaaaaps. lol

[RetroLounge]

11. I can type right handed...

with a cigarette in my left hand...

What did you think I meant?

:rofl:

RL

[FedUpWithIt All]

12. ....

O8)

Why i was thinking...um....well..

:P

[RetroLounge]

13. Don't get me wrong, I'm open to new ideas...

:9:9:9:9

RL

[FedUpWithIt All]

14. ...

:hug:

[RetroLounge]

15. ...

:hug:

RL