Kenneth P. Gurney: Three Poems

Late Bloomer

I was one of those slow kids

a few years before there was such a word as dyslexia.

My feet were very fast back then

and I won all the schoolyard foot races.

I am told by my doctor 

that I was one of those lefties forced to be right-handed.

My doctor is sure of this 

because I am left footed when kicking a ball.

Though I am six-feet four-inches tall

my basketball potential remains grossly neglected.

The irony that keeps me out of shopping malls

is that clothing stores put the tallest sizes down by the floor.

The earliest part of my youth that I remember clearly

coincides with the one-hundredth anniversary 

of the American Civil War.  Now you understand

my home library’s prejudice and must read my uncle’s book. ¹

I was thirteen when I started exploring rebellion:

I became a Chicago Cubs fan, which drove my south-side mother crazy. ²

The oddity of my education that I am most proud of

is that I graduated four-hundred and second out a high school class

of five hundred students, yet still managed to attain

the top ten percentile in my college entrance exams.

¹ my uncle, Walter Hebert, is the author of the civil war related biography "Fighting Joe Hooker".

² a Chicago south-sider would, by geography, be a White Sox fan, as my mother most definitely was.

Underpainting

If you walk the road 

Dianne paints

to its very end,

you will find

that the blue of the sky

beyond the mountains

is not a hue you expect

or the same as the sky 

you see upon the canvas.

There is a deer

on the back side of the mountain

that she painted two days ago

that changed meadows

that found a field

where the butterflies erupt

from their sleeping places

once the sun clears the eastern ridge

and dries the dew from their wings.

There is a house waiting for you 

beyond the background.

A log cabin that rough brushstrokes 

placed upon the canvas

near the stream that feeds the lake

where you will fish 

and the migratory waterfowl

will land.

But you do not see these things.

You are too focused on the foreground

on the brightly colored images 

as the abstract forms boggle your mind.

Dianne explains how they form

a sky, a mountain range, a road

which viewed from twenty feet back

form a face that is your face.

But you have trouble seeing that image. 

My Sweet Away

It seems you are away again,

but your framed drawings 

nail a sense of you to the wall.

This coordinated abandonment

echoes through the ages

to mother, to the church. 

My old routines become new

without you present in our picture—

become old in two days.

The fanfare of your return 

arrives adjacent to the glitter of bagpipes

and flags and biker patriotism.

Your voice dusts the silence

off your paintings where my eyes

settled in taciturn longing.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Kenneth P. Gurney lives Albuquerque, NM, USA.  He edits the poetry anthology Adobe Walls.
His latest book is This is not Black & White.  For a full listing of his publishing credits and books
visit his website.  http://www.kpgurney.me/Poet/Welcome.html