Two Poems by Ron Smith

Snow
 
You feel the cold dry powder
snowflakes tickle lashes in the
coffee-dark morning out the yard
down a hill to pick up the newspapers

Snowflakes tickle lashes in

your imagination inflamed with
down a hill to pick up the newspapers
atypical, real snowstorm – wind

your imagination inflamed with

you feel the cold – confident
atypical, real snowstorm
your business will compel you to shed a scarf, a hat

you feel the cold – confident

coffee-dark morning out the yard
business will compel you to shed a scarf, a hat
you feel the cold dry powder

--Ron Smith

 

Where Bloom the Lilacs

 

But a lad of ten or so

I was called from play with others like me

At some gully or other junction of filth and remoteness

Favored by males of nine to twelve years

Summoned by the police whistle the folks used to call their

Kids home

 

Lilac mist enveloped me

I ran toward the inexorable siren

Away from what and who I truly loved

To those I was condemned to love

Too-tweet, too-tweet the whistle echoed

Parting the lilac mist that tasted of grape

Not the grape of the vine but pop sickly grape

What could it be? Too early for dinner

 

Home, I found the folks unclasped, united:

“Go wash up and return,” said they

when I had and did

they repeated a speech I had heard the day before:

“You must learn to share us now with another much smaller

than you (Mom had been away for a couple of days)

you have a brother, ‘Brad’ we’ll call him.”

 

“Be proud     be joyful     open your heart

do you want to see him?”

“Of course I do,” I replied, receptive,

willingness unlimited I was in a mood to go along with anything

baseball season was coming     I needed a new mitt

without funds where else cold I turn?

“Of course I want to see him!”

the lilacs grew stronger

 

They bowed to me with their treasure

A crimson, sleepy human form with hands in the air

I was overtaken by the cloying essence of lilacs and violets

“Awesome,” I said, already restless

weary of the portentous tone of the moment

“Here,” Mom said, “hold your little brother”

too late to refuse, I did not want to hold a baby

 

No heavier than the cat it grasped my hand with knowing fingers

I was sure I had never been like him

Skin, if you could call it that was composed of a non-living vinylite matter

Glossy with a slick film of petroleum jelly

Fragrant of powders, wipes, puffs and mothering

He seemed to struggle gently against his airless wrapping

 

The lilacs, violets and petroleum jelly were suffocating

“I’ll have someone to go fishing with some day,” I said

trying to match the sentimentality in the air

I handed the bundle back

 

--Ron Smith