portegys@ihlpg.UUCP (Tom Portegys) (02/25/85)
Filling a Bucket I filled a bucket Not long ago. In a rush, I needed that bucket fast. It was a single letter In a novel I had planned. It was a draft of air In a windstorm I was stirring. It had no right to take so LONG to fill. Half-way full I knew it would never finish. A fiendish illusion had grown real: Water flowed up into the faucet to confound me. It splashed and roiled merrily on, But got no fuller. It was playing a game - It would be no one's thoughtless pawn, No one's fool. And down deep in that well Those laughing liquid curtains fell, So I propped me up on my elbows And watched it fill. His Mother's Eyes I found a gold coin Fallen at my feet And stamped "October". It glittered when I held it up to my son's eyes, The glint showering across his head And catching forever in his hair. A Bumpy Ride Falling asleep on a belly full of dreams And onions The eyelids become translucent Like the cab windshield of the planting machine Behind it sitting the incredulous driver Seeing the mud begin to boil and burp With shadows From the hedge-row He stayed out too late again Should be home by now Plunked behind his TV set With his brother-in-law, wife, And three sleepy kids riding On his knee A cloud of words Poison gas to dreams Seething out the doors and windows Would have kept those nasty things away Would have kept the drumskins soft and flaccid That stretch across his pounding temples Tom Portegys Bell Labs, Naperville, Ill. ...ihnp4!ihlpg!portegys