Don’t know why

Hi everyone,

I don’t know why I thought of this poem. It’s not one of my best ones. The event happened 79 years ago, when I was a little boy living in Ajo, Arizona. I don’t usually write about such matters, but my editor for CONNECTING DOTS, WENDY MURRAY, wanted me to write about things close to the bone, incidents that meant something to me. This was one of them.

I’m 7. Darting among the large pillars that support the roof, my friend Rosemary and I make it down the long, covered walkway in front of the town's single block of stores. The bar sits at the far end.

LATE AT NIGHT


Rumors pull kids
down the walk, 
to the place we’re not
supposed to go,
to the bar
where they say
a man got killed last night,

to see a stain
they say is there,
by the door 
where two guys fought.

We go to see,
but not too close.
The air smells damp,
dangerous.
The stain is dark like blood,
but could be dirt.

I wonder why
some men think 
they have to fight,
fall on a sidewalk
late at night.

Dirt or blood,
I've seen enough.
I want to go.


(c) 2003 David L. Harrison, all rights reserved

Because I think it’s pretty

Hi everyone,

Several years ago I wrote a poem about a dead wasp I found on a windowsill in our kitchen. My editor, Wendy Murray, liked it and asked me to write a book with poems with that much feeling. The collection became CONNECTING DOTS. I know I’ve told you about this before and posted the poem, which I’m doing again here.

DEATH OF A WASP
Bumping at the windowpane
He fought against the solid air
That held him as a prisoner there,
But all his struggles were in vain.

Never comprehending glass
Clear as air that stopped him hard
And blocked his freedom to the yard,
Repeatedly he tried to pass.

Eventually he lost his fight
And perished on a sunny sill
Facing toward his freedom still,
Wings awry in broken flight.

He had a name, Trypoxylon,
A small but vibrant living thing
Who came in by the door in spring
And in a day or two was gone.

(c) by David L. Harrison
from CONNECTING DOTS
Boyds Mills Press, 2004

What prompted today’s post was this picture.

This dead wasp was floating in my pool, a careless victim of its need to snatch a drink of water. However you might feel about wasps in general or this one in particular, I like the pattern in the water. Meanwhile the sky matched the scene.