41
Anything not pure color
is technically a gray.
Off-color if you will.
Like winter. Like old age.
As I open the curtain
new snow on the ground
makes the morning light lucent.
Visions of virtue everywhere.
As far as the I can see.
Light fills our room and
eye blink, squint, refocus.
White, not gray is
the presence of all color.
You glow different today.
Markle~
14January2021
40
I have falling dreams.
Don’t we all?
I fall from trees.
I fall from buildings.
I fall into pits.
I fall in the water.
I fall for it.
I’m older now and afraid of falling.
When I was younger
I used to have flying dreams.
Didn’t we all?
For some reason I always flew feet first.
I can still remember the feeling.
Almost like I was falling up.
Markle-
11January2021
39
And
Today we will dream
that we are trapped
on the second floor
in a building with a
mysterious disease.
While downstairs
the inmates have
taken over the asylum.
Even George Washington
is scared. So much so
that he is thinking
about changing
his name to
Democracy Jones.
Markle~
07/Jan/2021
38
I had that dream again.
The one where we’re children
climbing around on girders
up in the wide open like that old
photograph of the Galway men.
Only we want to get down
and the building rises
faster than we can climb.
Others keep falling off:
Kevin, Jimmy, Jacquie...
Hang on. Stay where you are.
Don’t. Move. I’m coming for you!
I had that dream again.
The one about us getting old.
Markle~
06January2021
37
And geese fly over like the sound of my alarm clock.
While the mysterious sounds of Seneca guns pique
my mind. I wonder have I heard them and am
convinced I have but was unaware they were what
they were. Perhaps I thought it was only a fallen tree.
A deer hunters missed report. The thunderous
applause of a relief package being passed. The gavel
on this horrible year. Deep. Hollow. Distant. Sometimes
lights appear in the distance. Now I am convinced they
have always been a part of my life. There. Looming
just outside of vision. Like geese, flying over.
Like my alarm clock being pounded into the
nightstand. The lamp going over. Well,
that explains the lights anyway.
Markle~
22December2020
36
I am a historian. I knew this would happen.
Just not to me. So, here I am cowering
in my room, writing my memoirs in winter
as fear and dread descends over the land.
This primal time of death and loss seems to
wave at us from the other side of grief.
We spend long scary nights waiting for
the solstice to arrive and light candles to
bring back the Son into our hearts. While
awaiting salvation the hardest thing is trust.
Trust that the balance will shift again even
when we can’t imagine how. The days of
this world will get brighter. So far it always
has. Trust me. I’m a historian.
Markle~
20December2020
35
Jingle smells, mingle smells
Goat cheese on my plate
Chasing sticks, through the field
Laughing all the HA HA HA
Bells on blond tails ring
Making spirits sprightly
What fun it is to play along
an intransitive verb to-
night time is the right time for
away in a mangering no food
for my thoughts, the little lord
fauntleroy down played his sweet
head south young man
head south!
Markle~
16December2020
