Poems
by Michael Neal Morris
The Painted
Grasshopper
originally published in Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review
After the
lot was striped
a variety
of gray, black, blonde
and ash
colored birds came
to get
the morning
grasshoppers that had
wandered
there.
I made my
rounds
and birds
scattered
momentarily.
Insects
waited to
move until
I proved a
real threat.
All but one
plump body,
its
speckled brown and yellow
painted
red, eyes vacant
like one
patiently awaiting
ambulance
or hearse
preferring
neither.
I pushed it
gently
with my
toe. Nothing.
It merely
rolled over
a gaudy,
misplaced ornament.
When rounds
came again
all the
grasshoppers
were gone
-- at least
from the
parking lot.
At first I
thought
the
painted one
had been
taken, but
I found it
a few yards
away on
its back
bent in
half.
On my next
pass through
nothing
remained but a leg
and a
discolored wing.
Assuming
some crow had developed
a taste
for painted insects
I returned
to my post
drank my
soda knowing
I'd never
know where or when
the
poison caught up to the beast.
Jumping to Conclusions
originally published in Concho
River Review
This morning I read about Jephthah
and wondered what you were thinking
letting him make such a rash vow
then allowing him to go through with
it.
How inconsistent you seem.
You keep Abraham from carrying out
the sacrifice you demanded.
Later, you make rules:
“Don’t pass your children through the fire.”
But then the outcast,
hated by his own brothers,
cries out his promise --
his zealous, if foolhardy promise.
And you -- who spoke in the garden and the whirlwind --
were strangely silent in Mizpah.
Now it is afternoon
and I’m watching my own daughter
bounce on a trampoline in her gymnastics
class.
Her pliable, elastic body is one big smile,
her ponytail a whip
that keeps the tiger of evil at bay.
And I’m humbled by her faith.
The idea her legs could break
never enters her mind.
I shudder even at my own boldness
to be angry, self-righteous,
when the reality is I was not there.
That you didn’t consult me
is no indication you said nothing
to or for or about Jephthah.
It’s just that my daughter is leaping toward you
and I know I’m holding her too
tightly,
but please don’t let her go.
What I
want for my birthday
originally published in Illya's Honey
To be
awakened by the morning beach
clear
water slapping sand and air
salted
to taste, gulls seeking breakfast
without
much fuss.
I’d like
the sun to be bright
but
easy to my eyes. My weight
should
be fifty pounds less,
my
nude body trim beneath the sheet.
You
would appear in the doorway then
wearing
nothing but the tray of coffee,
melon
and berries. Your eyes would be
as
they always are: dancing, swaying
above
your smile. You’d be
so
comfortable with your body
that
we’d make love through lunch
drinking
each other like wine
devouring each other like fresh bread.
After a
nap, we’d dress for dinner.
The time
it takes for us to walk
from
beach house to small lake
would
be exactly one sunset.
Someone
who could play Manilow and Brubeck
would
enhance our Mexican supper
and
sing “Happy Birthday” like Sinatra.
We’d
decline dessert and carry our sandals
along
the tide’s caress
stopping
to kiss under the guardian gulls.
At home,
I’d play you a new song
while
you fixed us a drink.
Then
we’d stare at the dark water
until
our clothes fell on the porch
like
old cares.
Before sleeping
I would
kiss your neck
and
listen to the ocean
in
the hollow between your breasts.
Two
Ghosts (for N.W. and H.B.)
originally published in The Distillery: Artistic Spirits
of the South
Two ghosts were playing dominoes.
One said, "It really hurt, I remember,
but what
is pain? It's like I've never
heard the
word."
The other laughed, looked up from his hand,
smiled
agreement.
He pointed a new finger at a man they both knew
(but where?).
"See him now?
He's miserable -- still --
I recognize the face -- he cries at play
sleeps
fitfully and hides in television."
The first nodded.
"He was at my bedside
before I
left, looking at me,
mumbling
prayers only God could understand,
unable to
tell me what he needed to."
"He told me much," the second said,
"but not. . . " His voice
trailed off.
And they both wondered why
the
grown child they watched could say "I love you"
but
found it hard -- close to impossible --
to talk
of heaven.
"Someone ought to tell him," one said.
"He'll find out in time," replied the other.
"Whose turn is it?" the second asked,
fingering one
of the dotted squares.
But the other ghost wasn't listening.
Soon the question disappeared, like smoke,
silencing even
the clinking of ivory,
as they
watched the earthbound boy,
who
waited
for his
return to ash.
For Dave Dravecky (June 18,
1991)
originally published in The Mayo Review
If
the visions I had when I thought like a child
had come
to fruition
then I
might have been an enemy of sorts--
hoping
against the strength of your arm
studying
your moves to keep from being picked off
swinging
for home at your expense.
But
you got lucky.
I
was too asthmatic,
too
bookish, lacked too much talent
to cut
giants down.
How
fortunate did you feel
when the
power of the comeback arm
snapped
at cancer's return?
Hanging,
falling from the mound,
dethroned
and returned to mortality.
might say
you are lucky this morning--
you lose
an arm to the black mass,
but I struggle
with my whole live corpse.
This
suspended moment
under the
anesthesia
I
try to blame the god of science
who takes
swings at the faith of cripples.
Someday,
my daughter
will cry
over what I know is trivial,
and I'll
take my two arms
and
squeeze out the sobs,
but you--
you'll
adjust.
And
maybe I won't be angry forever
at the
dark we wrestle with
at the
light that let this happen.