Poetry To Go

Alas! It ended with a crash. Now I'm stuck in Android, and it's like writing in a void. Please bear with me while I compose myself. These poems need somewhere to go. On with the show...

Have run out of paper, computer has crashed,
the tablet I borrowed has saved my a**
work is dangerous, we leave home at our peril,
a virus is lurking, its fiendish aim like an arrow.
aimed at you? aimed at me?
It's too late to close the gate,
it's creeping closer, in for closure.
We are all in this together, risking exposure.
In the house, it's okay, as we face a new day,
still the silence is deafening, waiting for the reckoning.
Seeping in, on our skin
on our touch
on our breath
on our clothes
on our shoes
it's on the carpets
on the floors
on the handles of the doors
it's everywhere, omnificent
the killer air is indifferent
the news has stopped
I'm losing contact.
The gloom has lifted momentarily
I accept this warily.
My head is in the sand, only the pen
to make a stand, every movement must be planned
Wash your hands!
The days are different now, melting into Spring
still, it's not a happy thing, bittersweet
the flowers bloom
I can see them from my room.
I hear the rain, I feel the hours
a marked disdain, no time for flowers.
I fear the people around me are not
taking this thing seriously
the same ones that have
always frightened me, running free
it's anarchy!
Disillusioned, in deep confusion
higher power falling into disrepair
too late for prayer?
Rain is roaring, now at morning.

There's no knowing where it's going,
compass is off kilter.
It's May, but you wouldn't know.

Suddenly everything is slow.
A strange isolation
moving back to basics
back to things you know.

A kind of letting go.

Blue as the breast of a jay (wind-up toy roadrunner)

Resting now in the bough of the flowering cherry.

Warmed by the afternoon sun, air faintly scented.

Puffed into a feathery blue ball, showing it all.

I watch from the open door, I am floored.

It doesn't get all flowery
Looks more like shrubbery
Making a screen where the fence ends
A japonica of some sort
A Japanese import?
Strategically placed to add a touch of civility
Out back behind the house along the forest edge
Nondescript greenery just part of the scenery
Where Lillian planted her store bought potted
Primrose in the ground and puttered around.
This long preamble to suggest the years, the
Many summer seasons that I passed right by
The little tree dragging the hoses
On my way to water the roses
I would stop to water the sweet peas
At it's feet in the summer heat
And took no notice of its slow growing.
Until last summer's end when I was startled to see
That shrub loaded down with fruit
Like little green appples
Even at summer's end still not ripe
Still I picked before the bears' arrival
Not sure even a hungry bear would
choose for his survival.
Left them ripen in the window
Of the furnace room for weeks
When the crisp green took on a faint blush
And yellowed, Lillian said it was time
To make jelly, chopped the small fruit
unpeeled it was all pit, not much meat in it
Boiled hard with sugar until it foamed
And turned bright pink she let me skim
The waxy skin, and pour into hot
jars and seal it
At the kitchen sink.
It's Quince I think.