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Questions for an Ordinary Day
Why are the birds not rushing to the feeders
placed near the carob tree? (Perhaps the red-tailed hawk
is close.) Where is that man going
who always walks with shoulders slumped and his face
tilted toward the ground? (I’d say Hello
if only he’d look up but I don’t know what more
to say to someone with such sorrow
in his eyes.) When will the bougainvillea regain
the brilliance it lost in the recent frost?
Why does the radio scream
so early in the day? (I switch to music
from the eighteenth century at the risk of summoning
an illusory peace, although peace
in any key seems worthwhile.) Does the black cat
who comes around as a shadow on four legs
belong to anyone other than himself?
Are the appeals for money
that arrive on the same day in the mail sent
according to a coordinated plan? (Their sources are
disparate, yet they stare up at me from the table
with the same pleading expression.)
Why is a man setting himself alight
a more effective revolutionary tool than a well armed
militia? Should we set a trap? (We could begin
setting food out for him.) What passes through
a deposed dictator’s mind when he returns
from exile to his country? (Will there be
a trap set for him?) Would it be more entertaining
to watch commentators argue
with each other on TV? What did anyone argue about
in the eighteenth century? (Maybe the music
of the time was a calming influence.) How many
of the people I passed on the street today
were carrying concealed weapons? (Or listening
to concealed music; perhaps Boccherini.)
In Line
Patience is the coat each person wears
while standing in a line defined by yellow
strips that dip from post to post beginning
at the end and never ending. Arrows
on the ground direct to each next stopping point
where a uniform will ask for their names
then tell them to go to the uniform which
will ask for their numbers, and they obey
by the yard all the way to the hands
that search through their pockets and touch
their obedient souls.
David Chorlton was born in Austria, grew up in England, and spent several
years in Vienna before moving to Phoenix in 1978. He enjoys listening to very old music, birding,
and hiking in the Arizona landscape. Along with poems in magazines, he has a list of chapbook
publications with Places You Can’t Reach (Pudding House Publications, 2006) being the latest,
and recent books: A Normal Day Amazes Us (Kings Estate Press, 2003), Return to Waking Life
(Main Street Rag Publishing Company, 2004), and Waiting for the Quetzal (March Street Press, 2006).
Email: David Chorlton
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