A Familiar Path
I took my old bones
For a walk today
Among my aging pals
To that Watering Hole
We all love.
I warned the boys
Of the danger:
Not drinking too much
But of licking the salt
Laced with cyanide.
Some bulls are just too thirsty
When they arrive at Hwange’s
They don’t listen to me and
Their tusks are now China dolls.
Siobhán Ó Mócháin Breathnach
10/16/2015
(L.A. Times today reports 40 Elephants poisoned in recent weeks in Zimbabwe, sometimes poached by rangers from Hwange National Park)
Marmalade
Marmalade
remembers
Littering
the dirt strewn alley
Near the highway
truck stop:
His uncanny
birthplace at Jake’s Tavern.
He recalls
fondly Carrie’s sweet smile
When she heard
a squealing voice, found him
Under a
broken Ford hood, picked up only
Slimy him,
none of his five sisters,
Drove him
in a cardboard box
To a huge
cozy space to slurp
white stuff
and lie gazing at the stars
on a
bright red fluffy cushion
Smelling of
lavender.
But, meowouch,
poor Carrie lost her job,
Said with
tears she was sooooo sorry
When she
left him on the doorstep
Where he
loved to sun himself,
His cherished
matching red bowl
Filled
with Purina plus a plastic container
Of water got
him as far as the
Next
truck stop where he stealthily hopped on
Board one
dark and lonesome summer night.
Waking up
the next morning with
Arrowhead
in the Big Bear City Mountains
To meet
Seamus and Siobhan
At the
Corridor Studio and there
Commence
a new life in art.
Sombre, July
2015
Some Morning
When the white ceiling
Above means you are not
Somewhere else
But
Still in the world
Awake.
You see once more
The unfinished story
Of your life
A surreal memory
In that singular dream
Hanging
In the empty air.
Siobhán Ó Mócháin Breathnach
10/16/2015
A Lunatic
Stands at the edge
Of Pragmatism Peak
About to leap
Into the Reality
Of another day
Inside the Empire.
But the Sun arrives
Lighthearted
And she dances instead
Against the shadows.
Siobhán Ó Mócháin Breathnach
10/16/2015
Terra firma
The earth breathes
Its morning after air
In and out,
Heaving memories
Of the night before,
Lying with the moon
While mortal eyes
Look elsewhere to Mars,
That old red-faced dissembler,
Who grabs all the oxygen,
Makes outrageous claims.
The earth ponders,
Turning quietly, faithfully,
Reliably on beat:
How soon, so easily,
Too readily,
They forget.
Siobhán Ó Mócháin Breathnach
10/17/2015
