The New

I know it has come for a visit
in the way the yellow pine pollen
covers the windshield
in the way the high water
now spreads its white sound
beyond the backyard
where before it was
only heard at the edge of the house
The crabapple trees finally leave
at this altitude
and the bushes across the creek
now raging river
have begun to hide the gray rock wall
we stared at all winter
through the dirty windows
now years passed washing
It is the new that visits us again
as it has year after year day after day
only this time I feel the old beginning
to scratch at my back
sag in my face
slow my thought to a crawl
when trying to find the right word
that memory of a sunny day
or the name of a passing thought
founded in a forced conversation
The new and the old fighting
as they always have
crossing their borders in skirmishes
never settling their aged war
and so we are surprised to discover
that both the new and the old
are the same age
brothers never seeing eye to eye
refusing to loan a shirt
taking back a belt
arguing over the days
unable to divorce themselves
from this continuity of aggravation
that is visible
in the turn from winter to summer


Copyright © 2011 by Barry G. Wick

“Mozart! Mozart!”

(Gustav Mahler's last words)

While my attentions were on a glowing screen
movement on the other side of windows
and suddenly I'm looking at the fast beat of wing
or the dancing of hooves across the creek
today a heron
some little red-headed, yellow-breasted bird
all these and the higher, moving water of spring
on the anniversary of Mahler's death
when all at once the green of this new season
given rain and sun
and the motions of wind and nature
become symphonies and songs
Oh, Alma, you were there for his last words
when a sadness spilled over you wearing you thin
his hand growing cold
And now each time we hear
his love for you
the colors of the outside world
fill us with new notes
as if he wrote this world I see
he composes still
and reminds us
with his dying words
that even he was limited to the palette
of another before him
that he could not achieve such a sunny day
or the life that fills it.
Oh, to be Mahler and think another was greater.
That is essence. That is spirit.
That is the view from my window.


Copyright © 2011 by Barry G. Wick

The King of the Taxis

The King of the Taxis

(a birthday message composed for and dedicated to Bryan Leui, driver, taxi owner extraordinary)

The King of the Taxis has come to the door,
I'm drunk as a skunk and I'm ready for more.
So to the far bar and quick you dumb fool
I'll lay on the back seat and mindlessly drool.
You give me your card and say I should call
Before the bar closes and your list gets too tall,
So, I tell the bartender just five before two
Get me a cab and a quick 'nother brew:
But he won't draw the beer and that makes me mad
so I take all my anger and store it up bad,
then you come to get me as I'm ready to pop
so I pour all my anger on your floor, get a mop.
It's my birthday, I say, as I'm barfing up gore,
“Happy Birthday, dear fare, and to you many more.”

Copyright © 2011 by Barry G. Wick

What a Horse Knows

"I have discovered the fundamental Laws of Time, and I believe that now it will be easy to predict events as to count to three. If people don't want to learn my art of predicting the future . . . I shall teach it to horses."
Velimir Khlebnikov (1885-1922)


People are alright
the ones who stop by to rub noses
and cheeks
without climbing all over
they never know where
they want to go

I love to run in the grass
and roll around in the dust
I hang my head near the fence
because there's nobody to play with

Why do they call us horses
that not what we call ourselves
but we play along

oats with honey or molasses
sometimes I get indigestion

I like to be washed
and have my back scratched
grass isn't all it's cracked up to be
but hay er hey you gotta eat something

I will hide when there are loud noises
and flashes in the sky

belts can be tight

Predicting the future
Oh yes my mother told me
some will have apples and sugar
sometimes carrots
and oats
oats with honey or molasses

She said I'd like to run and I do

hoof toe, hoof toe, slide slide slide

She told me to tell my offspring
about the future
but I can't
that's why my voice is high pitched I guess

All I need is someone to take care of me
inside this fence
or let me out
to run free
I've heard of those places
word gets around you know

I like the ones who give apples and sugar
sometimes carrots

You put a chunk of metal in your mouth
It's not a bit
it's a lot



Copyright © 2011 by Barry G. Wick

After Three

After three in the morning
as someone's guitar gently weeps
over the darkness of a sad moment
when sleep will not return
his love to me
His fickle touch is blamed
for the unreal sounds I've heard
in my imagination
as he leaves my bed
in the bold new light of morning
sound that only I hear
the ringing of a doorbell
the alarm on mother's bed
the phantoms of the past night
that make me jump at nothing
the bumps of fright
that make the black windows
of the hour return
their colorless mourning
My head already dials the number
of my pillow while I pray
at this keyboard for another gem
that will gain my entrance
into the poetic swamp
Nothing pulls me through those waters
and I'm bogged
like a crackers and peanut butter
lump in my throat



Copyright © by Barry G. Wick 2011

Saying Goodnight

The great plains have never been kind to women
yet there they came to settle and bring their culture
their civilizing ways to men, to grass, to gardens.
They sewed their quilts and chatted to themselves
Some could sing and share their voices with others
in their small groups over tea, coffee, and cakes
and so they were with themselves a force and culture
as their men went off to wars or the fields.
They still had themselves and their soft voices praying.

My mother and her mother sang duets for small teas,
small gatherings where women were themselves,
could be with themselves and enjoy the talk and
the sounds they themselves made in the afternoons,
the sounds of singing, the sounds of chattering about
nothing but being women in their strength and weakness,
and they sang for many years and were friends
for many years until time finally separated them
when Grandmother fell and passed a month later.

And now a son takes care of his mother and listens
for every sound she makes even in the dark of night
in the room down the hall filled with old photos;
there are no other women around his mother now
and the son is not suited for this effort.
She hears her mother's voice in the singer on the radio
and quietly says, “Goodnight, Mother” in her lonely bed.
And I leave her room to the light from the yard
and go to a living room so quiet and peaceful and lonely.

And when the time begins to wane for me and for you
and the nights are lonely even when someone may
listen for your soft stirrings in the night in the dark,
who will you be saying goodnight to when your eyes close,
when your eyes close for the final time on the edge
of the last night when all the memories of mother,
of father, of brother, and sisters flood your old gray head,
who will you call to remembering all the times you
sang together, chatted together, who will be with you then.


Copyright © 2011 by Barry G. Wick

Their Time

Is this what we wanted: a self-absorbed youth
parading on camera in their mirrors
in whatever their suit of the moment may be
the tight fitting jeans or the colorful undies
they faun over pop stars and cover their walls
in pictures of people they might never meet
they film every minute of their sexual delight
and pause before all of their seen in the scene
so we must answer the question begun
as war rages everywhere and others are dying
the youth never sees beyond himself into the dark
the rest of the world creates in the light of his star
we answer yes this is what we want to see
whatever it is they want to be in blue or green
or lavender on the screen of a faraway tv
not hindered not edited not voted away
by the popular hate of the day religious intolerant
or bully of the neighborhood with scarred fists
yes we want to see this world unfettered and alive
always alive for the brief time of this: youth



copyright (c)2011 by Barry G. Wick

Winds

there are many ways to travel
across these furtive plains
the choice is always present
for those directed by internal passions
or the wind may blow
its many directions
sending a tumbleweed
spinning its seeds
in a thousand spirals
and when the nearing end
prevails on these watery sacks
does regret appeal to either path
does the chooser say how they
might have wished
a more serendipitous life
or does the wind driven
propose to settle
on just one presumption
of a perfect foible
in which to wrap


copyright (c) by Barry G. Wick

Bird Box

falling off the back of the house
a box for birds
with its base separating
the paint disappears with each storm
alternately
birds and yellow jackets have fought over
this failing human construction
even when the roofers
added one sheet of shingle
there was no improvement
and still
they come year after year
to call it home
to raise their young
to return to where they
were born
where their parents
were home and were born
and I think
of my own children
who have started
their own families
in other boxes
slowly falling
from good to bad repair
as they age
and even with the addition
of a new roof
their homes will fall to the ground
and what children
will want that home one day
to raise their young and can't return
we all want to return home
we all want to be where
the generations
become who we are
flying out to catch a worm
to feed our young
to return next year
to the comfortable old box
that holds our memory


copyright (c) 2010 by Barry G. Wick

The Turkeys

The turkeys cross
the fish road
one at a time
claiming the air
for the short jump
and then they gather
beneath the trees
to search for seed
the leftovers of a thousand deer
and squirrels
who still think
there might be apple up high
they've milled around
outside the south window
not knowing they were watched
and my lips tremble
as they believe in their freedom
their lack of responsibility
without really knowing what they have
on a cold day
And I am behind glass
just enough of a barrier
from the world
feeling ever so frightened
of what is really out there
and knowing it will come for me
one day
that something beyond the glass
without a name or shame
so what if my hand stops my lip
it can't stop the deep shake
that brings me the depth of a browline
and the tightening of my throat
not that I had anything to say out loud
not that I had anything



copyright (c) 2010 by Barry G. Wick