Two Poems by Rick Hartwell

Leftovers

 

Unmown grass, marble slabs,

markers for the perpetually lost,

and found amongst all of this,

yet one more funeral,

leftover from a war

which just won’t be forgotten;

revisited annually by some,

remembered daily by others.

 

Observing the old guard,

fresh dirt, drooping flags,

platitudes, and drops of tears:

remains of another day’s internment;

twenty-one guns in staccato fire

and taps played weakly with an

expiring breath of dead flowers

and a fading memory.

 

 

 

Jolt

 

One inch of Espresso in a three-dollar cup.

A double jolt for the morning as I try to wake up.

Another day elongated after a plastered evening.

I’m bent over and staring at the dregs of my being.

 

Is there is a deeper meaning to Plaster of Paris?

 

 

 

Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school (remember, the hormonally-challenged?) English teacher living in Moreno Valley, California. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large; and, like the Transcendentalists and William Blake, that the instant contains eternity. Given his “druthers,” if he’s not writing, Rick would rather still be tailing plywood in a mill in Oregon.