Stevie's Law

Book Collecting

Remember me?
I haunted the local
library, reading
any book I could reach.

I would sit on a bench
in the park
across the avenue
and read my stack

of books and listen
to the birds sing.
One of the books
was a primer

on book collecting.
Fascinated,
I remembered
that the book shop

across the park
had a lovely set
of Mark Twain for $12.50.
We were poor—

it might as well
have been a million.
Still, I visited the shop
once or twice a week.

In February, as I walked
in the park, I found an envelope
with 18 one-dollar bills in it—
crisp as the day they

were minted.
There was no one around
and soon the set
of books was mine.

Were it not for that envelope
I would have missed out on a hobby
that has enthralled me
for nearly fifty years.

My poem was just published by the Literary Nest. Here is the poem:

Connections

There was a time when
my son would spend hours poring
over our photo albums,

patiently asking the same
question different ways—
who is he to me?

He would peel
back the yellowing
plastic pages and examine

the old photos
from every angle,
one by one.

“This is my chin,”
he might murmur
or “she has my eyes.”

He examined our friends
and wondered out loud
how people

who shared our joys
and sorrows happened
to no longer have a name.

This visit
he took to it again—
perhaps sensing

that at our age
there would soon
be no one to ask.

“Who is she to me
again?” he asked.
That one, the one who has my hair.

Komorebi

Komorebi

I take the path
through the oak grove
as quiet as a Sunday morning.

It’s all uphill,
and I am as drenched
as a child after baptism.

The dappled light
filtered through the leaves
has me stunned—

painted
neither dark nor light,
words fail it.

Is that
the origin
of the holy?

In the current issue of the Write Launch

Saudade
One last trip
on the New Lots Line
that trundles up
from its tunnel

just as the Brooklyn neighborhoods
turn to Brownsville,
turn to near ruin.
The train takes the 90 degree

curve on 98th Street—
where my uncle
and aunt once lived,
and where the train’s screech might

wake the dead
or make you wish
you were,
and deposits me

at the Saratoga Avenue Station.
It’s been more
than 50 years
since I last rode this train

and stepped off at this station.
Slowly, I move down the steps
where my friend Artie
was knifed to death,

and where my mother was held up
twice. I’m here to walk.
Take in what my ancient
senses will allow.

It’s my “not much of a victory tour.”
I look at everything.
Smell, hear everything.
I move at little more than

a geriatric’s pace now.
Remember how I strode these streets
like I owned them?
And in a way,

I suppose I did.
I pass the old elementary school,
the first tenement I lived in—
I bet the people still sleep on the fire escape.

The street names have changed—
as have the people
who live in these crumbling buildings,
worse for 50 more years of wear.

Yet things are much the same—
working people with families
and kids playing stickball
in the schoolyard.

Here is where I left my childhood—
who knew it was so easy to lose?
Wearier but no wiser,
I Uber back to my hotel.

Saudade
One last trip
on the New Lots Line
that trundles up
from its tunnel

just as the Brooklyn neighborhoods
turn to Brownsville,
turn to near ruin.
The train takes the 90 degree

curve on 98th Street—
where my uncle
and aunt once lived,
and where the train’s screech might

wake the dead
or make you wish
you were,
and deposits me

at the Saratoga Avenue Station.
It’s been more
than 50 years
since I last rode this train

and stepped off at this station.
Slowly, I move down the steps
where my friend Artie
was knifed to death,

and where my mother was held up
twice. I’m here to walk.
Take in what my ancient
senses will allow.

It’s my “not much of a victory tour.”
I look at everything.
Smell, hear everything.
I move at little more than

a geriatric’s pace now.
Remember how I strode these streets
like I owned them?
And in a way,

I suppose I did.
I pass the old elementary school,
the first tenement I lived in—
I bet the people still sleep on the fire escape.

The street names have changed—
as have the people
who live in these crumbling buildings,
worse for 50 more years of wear.

Yet things are much the same—
working people with families
and kids playing stickball
in the schoolyard.

Here is where I left my childhood—
who knew it was so easy to lose?
Wearier but no wiser,
I Uber back to my hotel.

I have a poem in the current issue of PA’s Poetic Voices. Here is the poem:

MUDDER

I got 20 to 1
on that donkey—
Muddy Waters,
who hadn’t placed
in three years
and is rapidly
heading to gluetown.

It was my last five
and I’d have to hit
a buddy up for carfare.
Before that last race of the night,
clouds came
in from nowhere,
and it rained.

Not any rain,
but a rain that would’ve had
Noah crowing, “told you so.”
The track turned to mud
gooey, sticky mud,
and my donkey
won going away.

Published on Lothlorien Poetry Journal.

early morning snow

deer tracks through the apple grove

my fireplace crackles

On Lothlorien Poetry Journal.

Last day of Autumn

our path strewn with oak leaves

are you coming home?

On Lothlorien Poetry Journals.

The Arts

And, over time

I began to think

of the bench

as mine.

It sits grey-green

at the edge

of Spring Creek,

in a small park

rarely peopled during the week.

Weeping Willows

temper the sun

and tame the winds.

Last night

the temperature dropped

thirty degrees

and in the early morning

my bench sparkles

with hoar frost.

The park —

my poetry,

The creek —

my music,

and the willows—

my art.

On the Lothlorien Poetry Journal:

Bedding

It is long past time

to put my garden to bed.

Even plants that have

survived two hard frosts

look like patients 

on life support. 

Each year in the first flush

of spring—when I’m digging

in the just thawed earth

wearing a ski coat

and last year’s gloves,

I promise myself

that I will put this garden

to bed properly —

trimming here and there

and yanking dead stuff 

out by their roots

in the dimming daylight

of an icy November.

I never do.

It’s hard to believe

that there is just

one of me,

springing from bed

early each April morning

to plant little green nubs

in the clay soil

with so much

unsupported optimism.

To someone

who can hardly

look out the window

at the limp sadsacks

of the garden remains.

Ah, only six months

till spring.