Split Thought

Split Thought

A fingernail is rough

To my right a large pill bottle

now filled with what

is useful and useless

small scissors

letter opener

small bandages

pink and green paper clips

tweezers

an old key

several metal fingernail files

All inherited from my mother

I retrieve a file

thinking about her

sitting on a flowered loveseat

using this

beside the bay window

looking up the hill at The Rock

I wonder how far

through the family

these items will travel

All this just rattles in my head

as bits of my nail

fall to the carpet

becoming the dust of the world

along with the lives

that fully explain

memory of yesterday

Imaginations of tomorrow

And the mystery of today

Barry G. Wick

Tech Collapse

Tech Collapse

A hard drive, a circuit, something

is dying in my computer

I'm beginning to weep

though it's more about

what phone-fix hell

I'm gonna go through

rather than

an actual fixer

who would show up at my door

taking the system in hand

smashing all conventions

actually fixing something

rather than taking my time

to talk with Malaysia

or the Philippines

nice people

but not an American fixer

with tools

and replacement parts

a box full of replacement parts

like the old guys who

put tubes in black and white

televisions in the 50s

their box of mysteries

at the ready

priests of the tube

as we knelt in awe

waiting for the next opportunity

to let our eyes get too close

to the glow our parents

didn't want us near

fearful of blindness

or too much communist control

kneeling with open mouths

waiting for the electric wafer

to confess our sins

to Captain Kangaroo

Say five Kukla, Fran, and Ollies

wait for “What Time is IT!”

and scream at the screen

knowing Howdy Doody

will personally hear the prayer

as we guzzle sweetened corn flakes

with milk and spoonfuls of sugar

each spoonful roaring like Tony

Barry G. Wick