Daily Archives: September 1, 2013

September 1, 2013

Dragonflies In The Face Of Logic

By Tony Brown

I’m all about 
logic these days — it comes from

working so hard to forget that moment
four dragonflies landed near me

as I sat with a stranger
and mourned four dead people

on the anniversary of their death.
He hadn’t moved on and I kept thinking

we had little in common, I had no need to move on now,
really, I’d moved on almost completely

except for the one bad memory
I was here to exorcise.

When the dragonflies landed,
one at a time,

on the bench next to us,
I held my breath and pointed them out

to him and put an arm around his shoulder
as he cried, as I did not; if it made him feel better

that was good though it meant nothing to me, really,
it might have once but now, nothing, really.

Insects, avatars, signs from on high;
agreements the universe seems to offer you:

steer clear if you don’t want to faint in public
all the time from the barrage of messages.

Stick with logic.  They died, they’re dead,
you’re here, they’re not.  Dragonflies are 

useful for pest control.  Lovely
to look at and plentiful, if you look.

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September 1, 2013

In Favor Of Growing

By Tony Brown

that night
the way you reached across to me
simple stars above us
the half-moon
(we could not decide
was it waxing or waning)
ease of the kiss 
and the kiss itself

did you imagine this
did you imagine this into being that night as I did
was this a shared spell cast that night

we came down that night in favor of the moon waxing
in favor of increase
in favor of growing

did we imagine this season into place

I only question because
I want to know how we did it
how we made it
how to make it again

how to favor the growing

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September 1, 2013

This poem is a test of a new blogging app

By Tony Brown

Had it been an actual poem, it might have had content and form and meter.  
You might have been moved to action or reflection.
You might have been angered or stirred in some unfamiliar way.
The poem might have revolutionized some aspect of reality —

but instead, as with most poems (and certainly as with most poems from this author)

there is
far less here
than meets the eye
on first glance.

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September 1, 2013

She Moved Through The Fair

By Tony Brown

1.
All weekend sharp-faced old Jacqueline
sat way back in her deep dark porch
and watched her grandson park cars on her lawn

for those coming to the big fair,
helping her to pile up the money she lives on all year
in her firetrap near mansion

where the windsock in the colors of the Irish flag
hangs straight up and down, motionless,
from the pole on the post at the ratty porch stairway.

2.
A leather-skinned couple
bickered lightly by a booth
selling straw cowboy hats.

“Whatya want with that –
you ever ride a horse in yer life?”
”No, but I’ve ridden my man plenty.”

I passed by too quickly
to hear all that followed that,
but it started with smoker’s laughter.

3.
Packs of teenagers — is that the right
collective noun? are they ever anything
but a collective noun? — roamed the midway:

4-H T-shirts
and blue hair;
cowboy hats,
(Connecticut cowboys, again!)
cowboy boots.

Unmistakable: the ones made up
of couples in first sexual union
could not let go of each other long enough
to put sugar and syrup on, let alone eat,
their shared funnel cakes.

4.
The cigar in the face
of the woman tending the shooting
at the midway game
never moved the whole time
she was spieling the skeptical
passers-by.

5.
If the nymph
described in that old song
was ever at this fair

it was not tonight –
I did not see her
among the jostling throngs.

Perhaps the song was written
about sharp faced Jacqueline
as she once was,

and her yard full of cars
is the sequel?  ”They moved
to the fair.”  Or maybe

any woman can be a song
with the right cowboy hat
and the right eyes to see her.

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