Perspective

Late Delivery

~ Byungafallgren ~ 14 Comments

Late Delivery

We’ll call you fifteen minutes before heading
your place, the man on the phone says.
Two new recliners, replacing the old couch,
full of ancient dust and stories, will soon be
the beloved in our living room.
All day I wait for his call. No call. When the twilight
vanishes from the junipers, I close the little gate, draw
the curtains, retire to my room, and read the paper:
A delivery man killed an elderly woman for money…
The phone jingles, splintering the silence in the house.
We’ll be there in twenty minutes, ma’am, says the gruff voice.
He hung up, cutting my urgent plea, come tomorrow.
I look outside the window across the dark street at
the neighbor’s unlit window. The couple must be
in bed by now.
What if…? I shudder at the possible horror, while
alone. He won’t return tonight.
I brave calling the neighbor and tell her the situation.
We’ll watch for you. Her voice, sisterly.
Her window re-lit.
Thank you.
A big van’s headlight creeps up at the corner
of the street, pulls up in front of my house.
Swung out of the van is a short, dark man, followed
by a tall, young man, their faces blurry in the dim light.
The way they lumber toward me menacing enough;
they could be bad wolves, pretending delivery men.
Neighbor’s dark silhouette in the window, assures me.
When, finally, in the light, they reveal their faces,
I sigh; they don’t look like thugs. But thugs don’t
look like thugs, do they?
Calming my heart, I say, are you boys usually work
this late?
Yes, ma’am. Sorry for the late delivery.
They strut back to the van and bring the chairs out,
put them in my living room, and say,
Have a goodnight, ma’am.
Have a goodnight, you two. 
As the van leaves, I wave to the neighbor in the window.
Our smiles, two floating stars, lost in the dark night.

IMG_3857

©Byung A. Fallgren

The View on the side of the Road

~ Byungafallgren ~ 4 Comments

The View on the Side of the Road

Silver sky and the land join in the sea of smog;
submerged, the wind turbines wave their arms,
like drowning octopuses.

Drying lake gives her way to the green invaders,
like old soldiers with no weapons.
The smoke will dwindle with the winter’s arrival;
dried lake will begin to refill
as the irrigation stops
in October.

Nature replenishes what she has lost,
but she cannot revive the perished creatures;
polar bears, beavers, and others may live only
in the children’s story books.
In the smoke, the wind turbines point fingers,
as we panic at the foot of the crumbling hills,
fumbling on the plans on the surface of the sea.

©Byung A Fallgren

Silent Language of the Water and Air

~ Byungafallgren ~ 6 Comments

by Suzanne Cottrell, Eastern painted turttles
Photo by Suzanne Cottrell, Easter Painted turtles 

Silent Language of the Water and Air

We listen to the silent language of 
the water and air around us,
they change moment by moment,
like the river’s flow, with the tailored wisdom
just for each of us, learning the eyes of sky. 

©Byung A. Fallgren

 

At the Son’s House

~ Byungafallgren ~ 2 Comments

At the Son’s House

While their mom visiting her mom
overseas for a month,
take care of the kids.
The old spinster sis put it, Enjoy the grandkids.
Smile. First a few days are okay, doing the chores,
like cooking, doing the laundry, etc.

Nightly prowler out the window; strong smell pricks
the warm night air; white-stripped creature hidden;
what scared it? The smell steals my sleep;
I read a book.

Wind outside rattles the window; a cry of a child.
It’s wee hour and wide-eyed; dawn begins to knock
at the window; time to make breakfast, feed the kids,
and wave them on the bus.
I sit at the kitchen table and massage the temples;
many days are still ahead.
Email the sis: No husband and no kids. Why do you weep?

©Byung A. Fallgren

How I didn’t fall…

~ Byungafallgren ~ 4 Comments

How I didn’t fall a Victim of the Man, (his memory)

I stand still, bewildered,
as my mom hugs me. The same hug she gave me
a long ago seem weird, like a bad witch’s grin.
I let my eyes follow her to her car and vanishes.
In my room, I stare blankly at the computer, pondering
about our a month-long part. Free, at last, from her
yelling; do your work, study, clean your mess.
I run my hand over the arm with ever existing black&blue;
they’ll disappear with her absence, only to return with her back.
Hey, join me, my crony, the missing boy, coxes.
Where are you?
you know the basement, the dark one, the kind man’s.
I dig in my memory of the chat.
My smile mingles with the smoke from my mouth; two elves in the dark outland.

Later, while packing, I saw her at my room door,
startling me. I knew it. she shakes her head. Son, don’t.
Her eyes like those of
a girl’s whose beloved pet is dying.
I left my backpack in the closet, muttering in my mind,
Until someday.

Since when, I don’t know, I hadn’t seen the bruise on my arm;
her voice, rustling bamboos.
That someday came only in my bad dream.

©Byung A. Fallgren

Promise

~ Byungafallgren ~ Leave a comment

Promise 
by Georgia Duglas Johnson

Through the moil and gloom they have issued

To the steps of the up winding hill,
Where the sweet, dulcet pips of tomorrow
In their preluding rhapsodies trill.

With a thud comes a stir in the bosom,
As these stick on the sight from afar,
Through a break of cloud’s coiling shadow
The gleam of a bright morning star!

Promise appeared in Bronze: A Book of Verses (BJ Brimmer
Company, 1922). Ms. Johnson was born in Atlanta , Georgia, in the late
19th Century. Her poetry collections include Bronze: A Book of Verses,
The Heart of a Woman, and others. She died in 1966.