Two Poems by David LaBounty
America
America
today
you are
grilled meat
and hand
shakes
today
you are
egalitarian
blue skies
and
cold
forgiving
beer
today
you are
the air-
conditioned
Cadillac
idling
at the
light
today
you are
the middle
aged woman
at the
Laundromat
with varicose
veins and
blue jean
shorts
today
you
are the
man
who lives
at the
corner
of
Clarkston
and
Lapeer
his bike
overloaded
with blankets
and
plastic
bags
today
you are
this and
a thousand
other
tree
and
flag-lined
streets
waiting
for another
forgetful
parade
____________
a concern
please
put
the
mercy
bird
back
in its’
cage
I don’t
want
it to
swallow
the
poems
I’ve been
leaving
behind
poems like
bread crumbs
poems
that I’ve
scattered
along
the
path that
leads to
the
near side
of
heaven
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November 19, 2010 at 7:38 am
I love how I can “see” these poems!
November 19, 2010 at 12:09 pm
wonderful writing, david!
November 19, 2010 at 5:17 pm
poignant tellings. thanks…
best, winnie
November 19, 2010 at 7:27 pm
I got to say I always enjoy reading this extreme vertical style, and writing it too. It’s fun, but it can also be poignant. I liked the first one better.
“Cadillac
idling
at the
light”
is nice.
November 19, 2010 at 8:23 pm
ahh, yes… as ever, I love the economy & intensity of your word pictures, David. So very real in the telling. Thank you for sharing.
November 19, 2010 at 9:14 pm
The telling thing about the first poem is that it moves from an anachronism (that still lives in the imagination of the pawns of the powerful) to the reality. From the cadillac to the car-less. Maybe it’s justice that since we forfeited our free speech, we are losing our geopolitical prominence to a nation that never had any.
The second poem speaks to my heart – the bird of time, in my case, will eat the poems I have left/will leave, and will leave only the love that I have longed for. Very evocative, needless to say.
November 20, 2010 at 1:04 am
the first poem is a clear and compassionate,and maybe because of that a soft critical acclaim on this land in which you can simultaneously feel the love you foster for it.
the second poem is a description of the climate in which poems are received,and,knowing some of your personal “credentials”,some take the freedom to then care and nurse and cradle,where only the joyful reception of your intense diaphanous poetry would suffice.
November 20, 2010 at 2:08 pm
You see and speak of things that remind us of what we were, are, and could be. This poem is short…..and Epic.
November 21, 2010 at 4:26 pm
I am already a fan of david’s. terrific work
November 23, 2010 at 2:34 am
i like both of them alot.
November 25, 2010 at 11:02 am
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