Fear of Falling (Revised)

by Brett Rutherford

The man who would be king
avoids high parapets,
hill-tops and cliffs,
lest one swift wind,
or an assisting hand
should tip him over,

a parachute, twice-checked,
is always in reach
of his small hands
when his private jet zooms
from place to place.

In a cold sweat, he dreams
of falling from the stratosphere,
down,     down,     down,
not into some calm sea,
but into the very spot
     where a sink-hole opens,
so eager is Hell to have him. 

 

Preliminary French version:

PEUR DE TOMBER

L'homme qui veut devenir roi
évite les hauts parapets,
les sommets des collines
      et les falaises,

de peur qu'un vent rapide
     ou une main secourable
devrait le renverser,
un parachute,
     doublement vérifié,
est toujours à portée
     de ses petites mains
lorsque son jet privé
virevolte d'un endroit à l'autre.

En sueur froide,
     il rêve de tomber
     de la stratosphère,
     plus bas,
          plus bas,
               plus bas,
non pas dans une mer calme,
mais dans l'endroit précis
où s'ouvre un gouffre;

L'enfer tremble pour le recevoir.

 

By the Number

by Brett Rutherford

knocked down to size

by thirty-four verdicts,

what shall we call him?

 

not forty-five,

those numerals kerned

into a near swastika,

 

not even the ever-

diminishing length

of what, to him,

meant "huge"

 

now he's just two,

the number,

child's signal

of toilet urge

 

and then just one,

an amorphous heap

of tangerine excrement

Up in the Sky

by Brett Rutherford

The octagonal kite
I lost in 1952
has just been downed
by fighter jets
over Lake Huron.

Next, the umbrellas
(I count thirteen)
blown off in storms
will tumble down
from Jet Stream
to some cow-field.

The hat one hurricane
made off with:
include that, too.
The little girl's red
balloon, why not,
while you're at it?

Be sure a missile
obliterates
saucers malevolent,
whose occupants
disturb the herds
and vacuum up
hitch-hikers
for random
molesting.

Clean the skies!
Scramble the jets
when passing
laundry bags,
afloat in clouds,
set off the radar.

Light up the zenith
with fireworks,
and heaven help
high-flying eagles.

DO NOT FEED

by Brett Rutherford

Poets are

the pigeons

of literature.

They cloud about

heroic statues,

take residence

in cathedral spires,

though neither great

nor holy. They are

hungry, always,

needful, nesting

mournful, mating,

more of them

each time a war

memorial springs up,

freighting to

and fro the messages

they claim they get

from the gods themselves.

Arrogant birds!

Pay them no mind!

Worse Every Day

 by Brett Rutherford

Witches and pedophiles
in pizza-shop basements,
Elders of Zion
with bearded Protocols,
rapists at the border
demanding to work
as strawberry pickers,
space lasers igniting
the unswept forests,
teachers conspiring
to teach actual history,
oceans not rising,
mass murders staged,
voting booths tampered
and thermometers, too,
pythons and lantern-flies,
COVID and monkey pox
all hoaxes to frighten you.

So things untrue
are truer than things
that are.
And now, just now,
polio is back,
and Palin, too?

Fear of Falling

 by Brett Rutherford

The man who would be king
avoids high parapets,
hill-tops and cliffs,
lest one swift wind,
or an assisting hand
should tip him over,

a parachute, twice-checked,
is always in reach
of his small hands
when his private jet zooms
from place to place.

He dreams in cold sweat
of a long fall from space,
not to some placid sea,
but to the very spot

where a sink-hole opens
to receive him.
So eager is Hell
to have him.

Some Epigrams and Short Poems

by Brett Rutherford


WHAT’S THE USE?

I am the burr
on the foot of God,
the thorn
on his son's temple,
the thirteenth guest
who was turned away
at the Lord's supper.

I warn of Satan,
Caesar, Judas.
No one ever listens.


THE HUNGER

Life is one thing
that eats another
and continues on.
Every tree wants
to devour the sun;
each blade of grass
wishes to be a razor
deterring all tread;

the appetite of shark,
the vampire lust
of the crouching spider,
the tongue-lick
of advancing mold,

your gourmet dinner —
what life is, is what it wills.




DO NOT EXPLAIN

Defend an epigram? Explain it?
I would as soon expound
a sunrise, or good sex.

The epigram, at least,
outlives the other two,
and clings with hooks
to its intended target.




AT THE SPECKLED EGG

Where two had breakfasted
in splendor, one returns.
"Only one," the host sighs,
as he leads you there,
to that special table, front
facing a blank column,
back to the in-out door
of the restrooms. You know
the rest. A sleepy waiter
looks down on you
as though you had six legs
and intended to infest.

Your order comes last,
as tables for four and six
order and finish in time
for their appointed dayjobs.

The pancakes are cold.
The bacon you ordered
and had the waiter repeat
"Bacon?" "Yes, bacon please,"
is nowhere to be seen.
The iced tea was made
some days ago, and when
you send it back, no offer
of other beverage comes.

You pay, and shuffle off
like the insect you are,
the solitary diner
they hid between
a column and a flushing
toilet. Take care
when you wait on a poet!


KNOWING

Knowledge is always
"knowledge of."

Religion,
concerned with things
that are not
and never were,
is not knowledge.


OUTSIDE IN

We have lived to see
the outer planets,
rings, moons, seas and all;
craters in rich detail, poles
North and South, cracks
into hidden water seas,
bust-outs of frozen gas
into their sparse and fatal
atmospheres.

Oh, but with all those comets
ellipsing in and brushing by,
what if there are eyes
and cameras, convex
antennas and radios
reporting back everything
as they graze near
the warm blue world
with its white blanket
of ominous storm-clouds?

What if the outer planets
look back
and are much displeased?


AMERICAN EDUCATION

Out on the playground
it's cowboys and Indians,
Yanks and Confederates,
soldiers and Viet Cong.
A stick suffices.
"Bang! You're dead!"
is all it takes
to score a point,

the victim obliged
to stage a death,
hand to heart
or belly,
death cry of Aaargh!
or No!
limbs shaking, and then
the stone of rigor mortis.

Back in the classroom,
James raises the stick
and tells the teacher,
"Bang! You're dead!"

No problem. This is
the moment of moments
that Mr. Morrison
has been waiting for.
All in a day's work.

Taking his AR-15
from under the desk,
unlocked and loaded
for just such a threat,
he aims and fires.

One to the head.
Two to the heart —
that's just in case,
you know. James falls.
No Aaargh! or gasp
since the boy's head is gone.
Arms and legs twitch
for lack of instruction.

"Gotcha!" says Mr. Morrison.
"Damn! I love
being a teacher."

EASY WAY OUT

Those who turn to religion
for answers

do not even know
the actual questions.



LATE JULY

It is that time
of year again.
Answer no doorbell.
Turn out your lights
of an early evening.
Park the car elsewhere.

As sure as the bite
of mosquito and gnat,
or the wave
of unwelcome spiders,

a multitude is coming,
car after car, tread
upon tread on the sidewalk;
two buses, even
some will take to reach you.

The menace is green
as seen through peep-hole
or the security cam
and it just keeps on coming
until the first frost
has done its business.

Ring! Ring!
     Do not answer it!
If you forget
and swing the door open,
their anthem rings out,
“Hi there!” and “Gifts we bear!”
“Zucchini from our garden!”



WHAT'S LEFT

Just one dead leaf
from an autumn past,

a single lost arrow
from whom
to who knows where,

a solitary quill
some long-dead porcupine
stuck into a would-be
predator,

an epigram in Greek,
returning an insult
or starting a war,

small things adrift
in the dust of planets.



UNDIAGNOSED

According to the then-prevalent
theories of psychiatry/psychology,
I would have been sent away,

and probably lobotomized
for the protection of society,
before I turned sixteen.

I fooled them
by reading their books first.
Chameleon am I,
master of ink blot
and personality test.

They will never get me,
not like the auntie
who drooled and died
in the state asylum,
or the other, a suicide.

I dwell in my madness,
and not alone --

oh, there are others, others!

WHAT NOT TO SAY

I think I have been
in this bedroom before,

and your cat
knows me.

Politics As Usual

by Brett Rutherford

The antelope runs.
The lion is on the chase.
The jackal is as smug
as a country club Republican.
He looks at his watch
and sips another martini.
Just a little while longer
while fur and flesh
are torn asunder.
The jackal rides out
with cart and caddy
to find the spot
where the steaming carcass
awaits him. Dinner!