Valentine

My dear it’s this time once again
when fun should reign all else decline;
chocolate hearts are love tokens, when
sentimental cards are just fine.

We eagerly collected them, fame
enhanced when you have the most
so many lovely friends know your name
declarations of love even come by post.

The sentiments are as sticky as taffy
but a delight to slurp, you know
but still it’s a dreamy time, though daffy
as all of boys and girls share the rosy glow

Now your husband may remember
or not this day of joy as he loves
to tell you over and over, just surrender
because you are his turtle dove

So many lovely cards you’ve saved
drawers heap full of all you craved.

Kent Bowker
14 January 2017

Weather Is

 

Whither weather up or down
this winter I hardly know
I’m a hibernating bear to all intent
for I lurk indoors, avoid the snow,
cold and ice as well it’s internet weather I see
graphs of temperature, wind and probability.
If this woke the bear would he like to know?
Oh hum and back to sleep, lucky bear.

Intellectually, graphs are so appealing.

Spring eventually arrives with fresh airs
when bear wakes craving honey, bunnies abound,
buds open, sweetness wafts away cares.
You rush outside, breath everything’s freshness
soft winds, even enjoy rain, cool nights, warm days,
Then summer and heat, hotter than ever before
with crackling thunderstorms ,cyclones everywhere,
threats of hurricanes, back to the weather reports
and anxiety, until the leaves turn gold.

Then Ursa the great winter bear appears.
Kent Bowker
March 21, 2017

I Wish

I wish to think of other things,
but there’s oppression afoot
as agitation is bad for the soul.
The hopes we’ve had for the future
seem based on a foundation of Jello.
Its become hard to hear birds sing;
Oh, to break this evil trance
fate and anger prepared for us.

It’s a dull winter, birds don’t sing,
owls and hawks frighten their prey.
I want to avoid the news, avoid reality;
keep my head in the many books
I have at hand, to no avail
for the bazaar tweets of his
rattle all of us, like owls freeze their prey.

Kent Bowker
2/2/2017

Signals

 

Whipped by cyclonic whirls, dry wintered oak leaves,
became stuck between the floorboards of my deck,
standing straight up like an array of multi-armed men
sending semaphore signals to unknown observers.
Signals going where? Hard to know, there’s no clue.

Do our messages resonate what they were meant to be?
Our words, when well defined are simple,
but ‘Love’ is not, as hate is sad and simple,
‘Love’ is wildly variable,
when you say ‘I Love You’ what do you mean?

When you say it to your father, who ‘d beaten you,
to your mother you secretly hate, they’re white lies
But when they age, your youthful anger fades,
you begin to understand them, no longer is love a lie.

The oak leaves that signal get eaten, decay,
belay the obscurities, so much we don’t understand,
We too decay, all we’ve said no matter how profound
is crowded out by the tumble of all new sound,
obscure waving gestures by stuck leaves, and…… !

Why don’t we talk with our hands like Italians do.
Kent Bowker
April 4, 2017

Fallacies

 

Impartiality, fake equal views unhinge
as hanging upside down like a bat
is neither here or there, makes one cringe
annuls fervent belief, as piss in a hat.

Composing on the potty, just batty
a time for profound contemplation
vanishing when you’re done, ratty
stuff, simply fragile ego oration..

Normally you have more sense,
but battered by hearing every side,
silly counter arguments, we fence
with barred foils injuring only pride,

More than anything else. Cry avast
a hit, a hit, not like political rants
clogging pundits equal time cast
with enough filth to fill their pants.

Oh, that there would be honest views
held in heart and logic, honest news.

Kent Bowker
April, 11, 2017