June Calender writes

Sick of It

I wanted to write, I truly tried to write
about the tarnished orb of the harvest moon,
the jewel brilliance of burning bushes,
the fat squirrel with his bouncing balloon tail,
the flaring apricot sunrises and gold rimmed clouds,
but my body wanted to cough and cough,
gasp for breath and make my ribs ache;
my voice could only rasp,
and my nose snorted snot.
Then we changed the time again,
a senseless imposition everyone hates.

My thoughts were crackling static on our sick
world, especially the country I want to love
where I grew up in near poverty but no violence.
Now rich old men send ill-educated young men
to wars without a purpose and without an end;
where drug companies have co-opted doctors
to addict people, even unborn babies, to pills
only the dying in their final throes could not abuse;
where men with and without power grab and grope
and otherwise see women as boobs and cunts;
where men whose grandfathers killed most of the bison
eat “buffalo wings” and collect unneeded guns;
where police always shoot to kill, even the unarmed;
where bullying Big Shots threaten nuclear annihilation
and our abundance of home-grown sickos stalk
churches to massacre men, women and children.

These thoughts will not leave my fevered brain;
I don’t get sick often and I don’t have enough tissues.
I need more tea and lemon and honey. I don’t eat
buffalo wings and, hell, I don’t even have a TV
but “the world is too much with me”. It makes me sick
enough to go transgender: I’ve just got to paw the ground
and snort, toss my long horns, gore the cowboy
and write a rant.

Buffalo Cosmos -- Kelly Moore

June Calender writes

Growing Old: a Long View

Because we know about —

or have invented — Time

we understand we will

grow old. Time begets change:

we, and all things on earth will die.

If choice were mine,

I would live the life span

of mountains, grow old

as the Adirondacks and

Appalachians have.

Geologists say they are

old — old beyond Time.

Whereas the grand Himalayas

are mere adolescents,

still growing. I would have loved

to be grandly snow mantled,

kissed by clouds, worshiped.

How fine to feel rough cliffs

and scarps wind-licked like ice cream

cones into softly rounded shapes,

garnished in evergreens and hardwoods

gracious home to deer and bear,

moose, foxes, beavers, birds.

How exciting to have lived eons

watching human civilization

commence and spread.

How woeful now feeling degradation

of atmosphere, earth and waters

and all the beings living here… Even

with abounding life, a surety is

that Earth itself will far outlive

the hungry, manipulating species,

once grand mountains will

become deserts. Time will end

with Life. Earth will remain,

possibly even after

the sun becomes a cinder.

sol H --  Conrad Jon Godly

June Calender writes

Counting in Quarters

The starting buzzer just sounded

for the fourth quarter.

I count in twenty-fives.

Already well into the “bonus years”—

the ones our generation lucked into.

We’re alive, we evaded the horrors

of the twentieth century: wars,

massacres, famines, madmen dictators.

We reap the benefits of medical discoveries,

we of good genes, good habits, sound mind,

not born into poverty, ignorance.

We are the ones who can count to a hundred.

For three quarters I practiced yea saying—

yes to new challenges, yes to exploring

the world, yes to love, sorrow, change.

And learned the power of no—

to fear, traditions, expectations.

I have stories to tell—have begun

to tell in private to some strangers

who are open; many are not.

Echoing Gloria I say, “This is what

[the fourth quarter] looks like.”

["This is what 40 looks like" -- Gloria Steinem on the 40th anniversary of Ms. Magazine] 

Women's Basketball -- Boris Talberg