Poetry Breakfast

BARD
by Mark Jackley

I was going to write some crap about how my maple tree
blooms like an umbrella,
shielding me, oh barf…

when suddenly I remembered
the angry downpour of your words
mashed down on the paper, front and back, several pages

tucked under my windshield wiper,
and I can’t recall a thing
you said but can’t forget the way you made my blood boil

and my heart swell to know
you cared enough to rip me
like a hungry badger. That was poetry,

a scalding rain no blade
could ever wipe away, as if I ever really
wanted to stay dry.

THOUGH LEVON HELM IS DEAD
by Mark Jackley

After nearly losing a finger,
my wife watched the turtle
move to the music
of April beautifully,
slowly,
fiercely,
rocking out
a rhythm
in the wet and glittering
grass toward the pond.

Doors
by Mark Jackley

The box truck said Commercial
and Industrial Doors,
Baltimore, MD. Just think,
a whole truck full of doors:
barriers and gateways,
secret-keepers, sentries
of “You’re fucking kidding me”
or “Hal, we’re letting you go,”
a load of so-called open-door
policies slamming shut
whenever it suits the suits,
a cargo of sly whispers,
“When’s your husband leaving town?”
and “That bitch said what?”
Imagine a thousand janitors
turning off the lights,
the one in a thousand who
leans back in someone’s chair,
fingers the embroidered
“Billy” on his shirt
and dreams of horses barreling
down the stretch, of winning,
as the night swings open,
door flung wide.