Scrap Paper Doodles

Occasionally the idea arises that possibly some of the scrap paper doodles in my notebook might have a smidgen of poetic resonance. The kind of words normally coming off my pen aren’t anywhere near what most call poetry, and to that extent I’m no poet. But sometimes the urge comes to play the words in a different way. Here are a couple of pages pulled dogeared and dirty from that notebook.

CHERRY BOWL

Spring piled up in a kitchen bowl—

scooped from ground spread with drifts of pink,

a handful of wind-scattered cherry blossoms

offering a last splash of fragile color

in the space of this Sunday room.

AT DAY’S END

The brown of used up leaves,

spots of dull red

crinkled on garden paths and city curbs.

Faded green

giving way finally

to sere remnants of late autumn.

All stands still

in the cold light of retreating day.

The only movement

a trembling leaf

held to branch by one last breath,

but it too gives up

and falls

a fluttering spiral.

The man next door

burns his heap of leaves,

rake in hand

standing vigil, the smoldering heap.

Smoke-scented air and

overhead two, three

persimmons

speckled with black,

waiting to offer their last

to sharp-eyed crows,

while shiny orange cousins

sit in kitchen bowls

or hang drying on veranda poles

Again and again

a child slides on wilted cardboard,

down down the concrete slope

A scratchy whoosh

Whoosh! repeated repeated.

Mother watches,

or halfway watches,

bored with autumn, the repeated game.

Old-fashioned speakers

high in the shedding trees

begin their call.

Old ballad, old notes calling:

Late afternoon

Time to go.

Mama is waiting

Time for home.

Light fades

curtains shutters

close out the night.

Muted sounds of a quiz show

all that remain

at this day’s end.