Counting Thumb
This poem has a completely different vibe to it. It is currently in the editing stage, a stage in which I stare at a poem and try to figure out what is wrong with it. At a certain point, I am forced to make it a read only file and put a password on the file that consists of numbers tapped randomly (in a sequence that I can do with my eyes shut so I can type the password the required two times). Over modification has killed more than one of my poems. Here goes.
counting thumbMy French office is on the second floor.
Second if you count like the French
with your thumb as one
starting on the second floor
saying it’s the first.
I’m there now. Or rather here.
Not there where you are, but here where I am
and you are not.
Unless I happen to have gone home
which makes this whole argument irrelevant.
Just like the French way of counting floors.
Second or third, there are still stairs involved
or an elevator I rarely use.
I guess I never liked elevators
especially in buildings with fewer than four floors.
Laws that require elevators seem cruel
Because in the event of a fire
when an elevator can’t be used.
how will the handicapped get down?
The problem could be solved if we learned to fly.
The handicapped would soar above their wheelchairs
and their canes
and our now useless elevators
Just imagine: in the event of a fire
we’d break the glass
then take a flying leap
to soar like sparks out the open window
past our second/third floors
above the distant wail of sirens.
In all honesty it does sound better to say:
My French office is on a floor above which
we would soar
if we could fly.
Gone Home
This poem came about between Autumn 2003 and Winter of 2004. It was originally intended for my poetry class at Capital University, and got some good reactions from my prof and the other students. Since that moment, no one has understood it. Oh well, some poetry works for some people.
gone home?I had a garden gnome in my garden,
because he was a garden gnome,
not a garage gnome or an attic gnome,
but a garden gnome.
He was “guardin’” the garden you could say,
or not say if you didn’t feel like it.
I guess it’s a personal choice.
You may believe all gnomes are equal,
But mine was made in China. I know.
He has it written on the bottom of his left foot.
Had it written… I should say. You see,
I had a garden gnome,
but not since he vanished from the corner,
the one with the carrots and cabbage,
where the rabbits gathered.
That is, if they do indeed “gather”
as if they actually plan something like that,
or, maybe they do.
I went out there once
and found only, “made in China,”
imprinted in the moist dirt,
and close to it, a hole.
Gnome sized,
or rather, rabbit sized.
I got a stick and stuck it in the hole.
It didn’t reach the bottom.
Of course it really wasn’t a big stick.
Funny.
For a moment,
I’d actually wondered:
Did he go back home?
What to expect
Not too much. It goes without saying that this is a hidden file within a practically hidden blog, so you are probably the only one looking at this... ever...
However, if you do find this sort of thing amusing, do leave a note from time to time, or send me your suggestions. I'm always open for fun. Oh and one more thing that I must do if I'm to keep my sanity.
All materials on this site may someday appear in some sort of a book (if I get all my ducks lined up and my manuscript skills in gear) so all material is therefore mine (Copyright 2005 under the name Andrew W. Anderson) unless otherwise attributed.
I trust you, but I trust no one. It's part of my paranoid lifestyle.
Okay. Let's go.
Bard Anderson
