Compulsively Aimless

    Time won’t come out to play It won’t bargain for a return trip or make an exchange of …a year, a week, a day For any reason No matter how devout Wrongly condemned prisoners Released after decades Must hate time For not opening up And giving back what everyone agrees should not have been taken Or a persistent old scientist rediscovering a forgotten element He once encountered as a young lab assistant The one that could have made all the difference to his life experiment Killjoy time Has firm rules against a do-over. And I suppose it likes having sayings written about itself… If I knew now what I knew then… Making up for lost time… Since time won’t play along I compensate in the present   Willing as much experience into a single moment   as can be allowed. Take that -- time.

DOUBLE CORNER LOT They’re demolishing the brick colonial The one on the double corner lot That stood for 75 years For two generations of one family. They’re cutting down that 150 year-old maple The one that stands in corner of the double corner lot One tree, 150 rings Shade from spring to fall. The tree goes first It took them all day To chop off its limbs Cut down its trunk And grind up its stump. A perfectly good tree Offering up another generation of green in May To the brick house in the corner of the double corner lot 150 years gone in a day. The house goes second It took them two days To smash its brick and mortar The second floor first The first floor last. A perfectly good brick home Ready to offer shelter to another family On the corner lot 75 years gone in two days.  For more poems see http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html

  A Boy's Lost Instructions There was a final time when you said, “I’m going out to play.” But you never realized it was final...  1.  Parachute Man My Grandfather fell to earth in a WWI parachute fifty years later he taught me how to make a parachute man with a handkerchief, string and a lead sinker You folded the handkerchief in squares and tossed your parachute man into the air Nowadays most men don't carry handkerchiefs. 2.  Talking to Kites My father showed me how to send messages up to kites He used old memo pads with his company logo on them and we'd write notes How are things up there? tear and tape the sheets around the kite string He'd give it a slide up the line and off it would go spinning around till the message was delivered. Today stunt kite flyers would not sit still to send a message. 3.  Burning Buildings In the fall we would burn piles of leaves. Sometimes my father would clean old boxes from th...

                              Lake Michigan Rock Mineral striations of green, red and brown compressed into a sleek shape minding its own business since the Precambrian Era present for the movement of glaciers across the landscape unknown to me until twenty summers ago when I pocketed that formation of history and art and took it home to hold as a paperweight. For more poems go to http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html

                      Photo (c) John Kropf   Two new poems of adventure near and far.     Backyard  Everyone should have a backyard at least once in life You can dig to China Play badminton Tend to your hydrangeas Pitch a tent and camp out with your best friend Mow a lawn Sun bathe with a cool drink and if you wait long enough watch the stars and galaxies reveal themselves You can rake leaves and send them back into the sky by bonfire And if you ever dig all the way to China you could end up in someone's backyard. 042214 __________________________________________________ Lost City To the untrained eye it was nothing But when I heard they found the lost city covered in the sands of the high desert I thought of the last inhabitant on his last night inside the the city walls and how he walked away from its crumbling ruins into the morning sun turning the city into a tomb...

Odyssey at Roslyn Metro Station De-training on the upper platform commuters sprint from the downward escalator Their broken formations rush toward the closing doors of the Orange Line with the same desperation as Greeks storming the walls of ancient Troy My escalator’s steady ascent toward the light converges with three beautiful women who descend opposite like the daughters of Demeter assigned to the Underworld. I could be as Orpheus and rescue them but they don't seem to need rescuing and for that matter I'm not much with a lyre Instead, today is the day when I break the surface enter into the light and know my good fortune is enough to buy that winning lottery ticket. 041014 __________________________________________________   Ask the Help Desk My processor needs a core capacity set to imaginations of Beethoven and Botticelli. Reformat the Operating System to run on the collective soul of humanity. I’ll need ...

                        Desolation Haiku Bag flaps in bare tree white wire hanger in dark closet frontiers of sadness 040314 __________________________________________________ Morning Commute: December 9,  6:38 AM Black at the station Rain in a dark, steady stream Everyone on the platform in layers, hats and hoods A vision out of the Dark Ages congregations of 10th Century Monks in their over-sized cloaks and vestments or battle weary soldiers waiting to board landing craft. Our train arrives door chimes form up under the rain and board in silence assigned to our congregations and battlefields. For more poems go to  http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html

  The Last Day of Childhood  Friends would marvel at two rope swings hung from the rafters One thousand feet of newsprint slung on a spool with a bucket of American Crayons (not Crayola) Supplies to build great structures of the world Legos, Tinker Toys, and Lincoln Logs carried by caravans of Tonka Trucks Superior to the Great Library of Alexandria: picture books on geography, WWII, treasures of the art world American history and Charles Addams cartoons Archives of Donald Duck, Batman and Archie comics         --selected by my sister         --bought by my mother         --read my me         --and hauled away by my father Off in the forbidden realms: my grandfather's workbench and its cast iron vice that clenched and healed dolls, bikes and chairs In the opposing corner whiteness and humming of an ever industrious washer and drier Gurgling and rumbling in dark rivers below lies the crocodile of...

Winter arrives as death but when winter departs does it die? That patch of snow the last one the scab left over from winter’s fight Arriving at night as flurries and fanfare It disappears in the day silently shrunken by the sun I was against it but now I’m for it because I realize it’s the underdog that is destined to lose at the end of the season More poems at Verse-Virtual   http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html 

Everywhere and More A short bus ride away from world’s end and around the block from the empty quarter lies the last strip mall complete with nail salon mattress store dry cleaner. More poems at Verse-Virtual   http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html

   There go those computers and that Internet again. Like Shakespeare shaping the King’s English:      --band-width      --brain-dump      --Google-it      --networking while multi-tasking. Oh yes, resist: but how can you control language when you can see futility of French language police We could take it off-line unplug off the grid. But even then digital bard is programing our tongue.   More poems at http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html

New and Short.  A poem entitled Refund Refund I pay five dollars to watch everyone turn poor I want my money back. http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html

New and short poem on the road of evening shadows. SHADOWS OF THE ROAD Longleaf pines conspire to strike the road with slatted shadows An off kilter picket fence pointing to the setting sun. http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html

One more poem on life in the digital age.  Growing Pains a short commentary to go with Hand Held God. http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html  

The demand of poetry is that it keeps on coming.  Two more -- one for the technology minded and one head scratcher. http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html

Two new poems: Beauty Substitutes and Dark Odyssey.  http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html

A new shipment of poetry.  Asking life's questions--are you mad or bald and who is the future madman.  Enjoy.  F False Dilemma       The gods said examine your head you can either keep your hair or your sanity I kept my hair __________________________________________________ Future Madman Your morning visit with news and coffee Past and Present Three of you here and now but always distractions shadows at the door It's Future -- eternal party crasher “Wait, I’ll be with you in a second.” “Not a chance,” snickers Future running down the street like a Halloween prankster laughing like mad. ©2014 John Kropf

      SEASONAL CHANGE   

In the bungalows of happiness 
householders put up their
 can goods of well-wishes   

Out back
the kids are
 stoking bonfires of resentment 
in derelict steel drums

   Darkness and winter
 are waiting at the end of the street.   NOT MYSELF I’ve been put in this position before. Waking up in the middle of the night to utter phrases not my own (and with no one to hear them).          

http://www.verse-virtual.com/ 2 new poems: You have three memories and a short mystery.

Coffee, Your History Dark redeemer      carrying legends of Sumatra, Arabia, Columbia Creator of cultures      fuel for a Sufi’s whirling dance      drink of protests by patriots       in the days of revolution      drunk in heroic proportions       by Balzac and Beats      made mad by your power Drunk black       by my father       on the troop ship      far side of the Pacific      World War Two      because green skin of slime congealed       on tins of curdled cream The history      of why I drink you as a I do. http://www.verse-virtual.com/john-kropf.html

The End of August In the morning even the sun is a runny red yoke reluctant to rise above the horizon its tired rays bathe the street in sepia and melancholy Your lush green lawn of May is now a patchwork of dead spots and desiccated wisps like the whiskers on an ancient holy man A scattering of scorched brown leaves -- the ones that weren’t strong enough to make it until October -- lie in the backyard like a school of beached Starfish In town the streets are empty public places without any public as if its part of some government experiment vaporizing all signs of life except the white noise of the cicadas Or maybe everyone has gone to the beach to swim and sleep trying to forget the end of summer.

Fellow book lovers, I hope you'll allow a slight diversion after 100 book blog posts.  You might be interested in a new minimalist poetry website--Verse Virtual.  Two poems per poet, no ads and always updating content.   www.verse-virtual.com hope you'll have a look.