Everything is work
even puttin' on a shirt,
and tearin' off the sleeves
and rehemmin' them to fit
better for your frame
is nothin' but the same
as cicadas leavin' skin
where it once has been...
and change will come to be something
that isnt seen as strange. --------------------------------------------------------
Writing about Writing
Linda Parker Boike
Writing lines alone,
returning to screaming mold—
The festering never gets old.
It’s very much I am controlled
by arcade kid claw machine movements
pawing things
till they are asking to be grabbed
right out of nowhere at all
Through many quarter hours
set up things to pay off for someone in the queue (maybe you!)
tread that path enough, you’ll need to plant new grass, and get new shoes.
You bet that it begets itself.
writing lines is a linear motion
but loopdey loops are spoken
and spirals are a lighthouse
for current chosen trances
deeper and deeper
your belief increase the chances
that you see the next blank page you flip to as not barren,
instead, quite famished --------------------------------------------------------
Passage
Linda Parker Boike
The warm water
in my hair
grows cold
through no fault of my own
and
The fingers tapping
on my thighs
remind me
I’m alive
and
The gray hairs
amidst my brow
seem wrong
I must’ve been
in the shower long.
Sand
Is off my body
Old beach man
has one hobby
but several treasure maps left.
Years give you things that crows give you
Like quarters or rings,
Shells from days meandering.
Hands
Can carry
Splendid cherries
By the stems
And tie them, making
Homemade grapevines,
Chosen family.
Pack a picnic,
Buy some stationary.
--------------------------------------------------------
Playin' Around, Somewhere Bound
Linda Parker Boike
This day is new
as they all come to be,
but a fresh coat of paint is not the morning dew.
Some things take time,
and tryin'
but everything can rhyme
when we know that we're all playing with the same toy.
I'm a dog in the backyard
and language is a stick
that I hold in my mouth till it breaks.
Not everything can be conveyed
through the detailed grunts that I make.
I fake the voice of a person with dignity
and really believe it to be my own after long enough.
Layering, and sharing, and sparing most everyone else
the first draft of a book that they will be proud to display
and say the best bits about
at dinner parties coming up. --------------------------------------------------------
Dog Poem
Linda Parker Boike
I’m a pavlov dog
I come when called,
unless I cannot hear you.
I’d never try to miss my treatie,
but sometimes walls they keep me
all inside, and strengthen
my reserve to break
the windows of the tank
Run to the curb to meet
the mailman by the street
and pledge my ever loving fealty
to the letter that he reads me
and maybe shoot him after all,
if the messenger is greedy,
with pets I mean
he pets my head
like no tomorrow–
slips me
something for my troubles
this guard dog works a double
to see the trashman take the trash,
a system that repeats,
it looks new to me each week --------------------------------------------------------
Paradise Logic
Linda Parker Boike
Calling any place Paradise makes it hard to pin down the bad bits.
I know we live on Earth, but Heaven on Earth resprouts every time
it's time again for unpredictable spring.
For the groundhog stays inside
till some arbitrarily marked day,
till it gasps at what it makes just by being around.
We are all some sundial that smiles at the signs when the time is right.
The seasons are made up of choices that we make in the light of the stage,
find a way to enjoy the play
and the role you were first cast in is not final.
Practice lines and see what sticks,
improvise if it fits.
I think Paradise is endless potential,
not endless bliss --------------------------------------------------------
Become a Local Cryptid
Linda Parker Boike
Start by not belonging—
do not get photographed very often
blend into your surroundings
then do a funny voice in passing
They'll remember all the prickly things you stick out
so don’t do something stuck up
be for the people
Grow fangs
and luck be a lady strung out
from the shadows
you have traveled
to the village
not to pillage
just to preach or actually
more of a ramble
you can handle
the drunk girl at the party
get through the story
because patience is a virtue
and she cannot yet afford to
make sense among the chapel pews
or wine aisle avenue.
Thrive when unencumbered
Do it for the legend
Do it for the conversation starter --------------------------------------------------------
Something 'bout The Moon
Linda Parker Boike
I go and see her every day or two
Always a little different than that last time.
She never expects what shirt I choose.
I like what the bright night brings out in me,
I like what the dark hides too.
Two raised brows, resuscitated sentiments.
I could stay up--but not out--all night.
Just knowing that she's out there...
I hang from doorways and gaudily shout
I run my mouth about what I get to see
every time I turn my head:
A future perfect painting, framed,
a something worth maybe my lingering attention.
Hard to stop and set up my eisel,
when the moment, and my feelings for it are always on a swivel waxing and waning
fraying and craving some special sauce that you cannot just buy at the store
--------------------------------------------------------
What You End Up With
Linda Parker Boike
Is the dishes in the sink
Until you see them through...
We cant just see these oats as practically already sown.
Create holes in the house, like a moth in a sweater
feel a lot better if you have a chunk of drywall
for a snack. I like what I lack.
I look at the world outside of myself
and all I can think is: FRACK, FRACK, FRACK!
I want the marrow! To gather more than enough to share!
O, I hope I am made to feel the pain of fleas I picked up and seized for the crime of finding a home in me...
I want to thank them too
for driving me to plenty of dreams off the top of my head...
I may please god by loving what I'm not,
I hear fish of all kinds sloshing beneath the dock
--------------------------------------------------------
A Rather Proper Conundrum
Linda Parker Boike
A werewolf has landed on the moon
NASA knows not what he will do
Sent there by the soviets
They find it rather funny.
It’s no laughing matter though,
For a conundrum exists.
What will he howl at?
The ground beneath his paws?
The little hills? Horizon lines?
Or look up at the sky
See the earth his home
Far off distant zone
And realize there’s nothing he wants more?
He overshot in how he thought
Just how cool it’d be
To ride in dusty craters
Live like space invaders,
But it was a one way trip.
They wanted rid of him,
And he was sure that it had been his dream...
So he let them load him up,
Here he sits quite stuck,
Within a Mare unknown.
--------------------------------------------------------
I made this when I was like 17, during covid lockdown
The Little Girl Who has Never, Not Once, Heard of an Ambulance
Linda Parker Boike
Ring ring,
the sun is off,
but the ice cream truck is coming.
Changed its tune
no longer June,
a midwinters snack
Is all that I lack,
So kind of them to know.
Rush to the curb,
It veers and it swerves,
Some 4 houses down from mine.
A man with a red stain,
Apparently so deserves ice cream a little bit more than I
He must be important
they seldom do house calls
I know,
I’ve been trying for years.
They gave him a bed
put it on wheels,
gave him a tour of the automobile.
The beautiful sight
he must be seeing now
drew in a crowd,
all weeping and looking,
it must be that good!
The man with the stain rode off in the night,
the people discovered their houses again,
and I remain ice cream-less, but cold,
I shudder.
I really do hope they’ll be back in the summer
--------------------------------------------------------
