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There is a virus in the world that’s

Killing people

(there are other things that kill us, too)

 

Some people, many, most in fact

Have responded well

Quietly, not so quietly

Watching after

Each other

Enduring hoarding that is

The villain’s privilege

 

Governments have

Responded, some much

Later than the others

Some are doing well, though the more

Fractious institutions

(not so much the scientific ones,

we hope)

The more the stumping

As if this were a matter more

For Indifferent reelection

Than the health

Of nations, cities, villages, and

Outlying—families, one

Person by one

 

So more will die

And the privileged

Will not take credit for this

 

In the scientific places,

Teams are working hard, to say the least,

The right kind of aggression

Understanding that

There are no politics in molecules,

That a virus doesn’t care

Who gets elected

Who stamps harder in

The podium floor

Like Rumpelstiltskin, until disappearing

 

Molecules don’t care

The molecules of viruses simply

Want to thrive

 

C L Couch

 

 

Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash

Kras-Driven Lung Cancer. Created by Eric Snyder, 2015.

 

6

Play Day Stood in a Hundred-Acre Wood

Play Day Stood in a Hundred-Acre Wood

 

It’s a dark and rainy day

But Christopher Robin wants to play

 

If Pooh and Piglet can find a brolly

Then all will have fun, and all will be jolly

 

They shall have tea and toast and honey

Much more fun than pots of money

 

Then they’ll go home by Mister Sanders

Having good times from all their wanders

 

And England shall have a sunny day

When Christopher Robin will want to play

 

C L Couch

Christopher (Robin) Couch

 

 

Photo by Mary Sill on Unsplash

 

 

2

Want

Want

 

I want a quiet gentle day

I will not have it

Neither will the soldier on the frontline

Nor the persons alleviating pain

While diagnosing

All our ills in hospitals and other,

Medical places

 

Nor those whose designs

For profit

That is profiteering as another verb

Distract away all better drives

And who know peace only

As a cardboard place

Propped up for a time through addictions of

One kind or another

 

Nor will the parents who have

Noisy houses,

Who wouldn’t have it any other way

(nor I)

 

Nor those for whom conflict

Tears apart the skin of life

With open wounds that may

Or may not heal

 

We won’t have a gentle day

Or peaceful

Maybe tomorrow

So much depending on

Convictions that we know

Close as intimacy,

Surprises that we don’t

With what it takes

In between and all together to

Cleanse and keep the wounds

That can get better

Though, mortally speaking,

Will not completely heal

 

We can have peace

The kind that rests

Just fine on scars

 

C L Couch

 

 

I think Want stands next to Ignorance in A Christmas Carol.  Ignorance that is not intelligence, though some would say it must have intelligence, we must have, in order to be un-ignorant.  I disagree.  We see the world, we read a book, we listen to the conversation we are having.  Then we learn.  We grow.  Our ignorance is challenged.

We are trained for a job.  We save.  We grow.  And ignorance again is challenged.  The world becomes more knowing, more prosperous, and peaceful.

Want is challenged this way, too.

 

 

Photo by Carl Cheng on Unsplash

Hong Kong

My dad just finished his eye surgery.

 

0

We Can Play

We Can Play

 

A squirrel and a bird play

In the tree

At least that’s how it looks

And sounds

The bird flies up; the squirrel follows

The sounds of chirping and chittering

Sound friendly,

As if I’d know

Though I know the difference between

A purr and a hiss

Ears up or ears laid back

The growl that leads to the bark

So I’m going to call it

Playing

There is no better way to spend

An early morning

If you’re a squirrel or a bird

So let’s pretend

We are squirrels or birds

 

C L Couch

 

 

Photo by Rowan Heuvel on Unsplash

Unawatuna, Sri Lanka

 

1

Mortals Thinking

Mortals Thinking

 

There’s such pain in my shoulders

I guess I slept too hard

And too briefly

There are noises in the house

Some of which I’m tired of

But in the be-thankful-for-small-favors

Department,

It could be worse—

Does that cancel out philosophies?

 

We should be stuck here in

Willing confinement

‘Til the onslaught of disease has passed

If it’s a wave that only washes once

If it spirals ‘round, what then?

Patchworks of isolation

Until a cure is found

Then distributed with some sense of

Democracy (in oligarchies,

call it equanimity)

 

At least, there’s air

No one is trying to sell

And water from the tap or

Through a filter, while we have one

There’s food, a median between

Hoarding and scarcity

For the moment, shelter is broadening

In possibilities for some places

Hitherto homeless folk entering

Abandoned, government houses

If they’re abandoned, let them stay

Useful government

As a change

 

I don’t know about our attitudes

They’re everywhere, I’d say

The gross rich who are on TV

To say that everything’s fine

Trust us

We don’t

The angry and the righteous

More so (and everyone), there’s

Fear

Of illness and mortality

Reasonable terrors

For the unfaithful

And for those who believe still living inside

Human husks

I know I don’t want to be shed of my shell

Just yet

Today, tomorrow, far into the future

I don’t have

This side of the dark glass

 

C L Couch

 

 

Photo by Grant Durr on Unsplash

 

 

0

Judgment on a House of One

Judgment on a House of One

 

And Herod appeared

Before the crowd

In an arena in Judea, to

Proclaim himself

Messiah to the Jews

And to the world

He wore a splendid robe

Of silver

How it must have shone in

The sun

And then

Herod fell

And soon he died

Wasting disease,

At the last

Consumed by worms inside

That, hungered, had their way

Without

As well

How ugly and how awful

That must have been

Against the silver

 

And is this how it is

With those who think they are

In charge

Know how to lead

Must be resplendent at it

In a hided-over ego

And in other, badged ways

Over vainglorious skin?

 

Leaders, supposed, self-styled, or

Otherwise

Even the right ones

Will be judged twice over

Once upon themselves

A second time for those they built up

Or sent away

Or from whom they

Took away small pieces, one piece

By one,

‘Til for the company there was

Little left

But victim service

 

We might not see this, hear it,

Taste the mortal defeat

Touch the dust they have become

There is a reason why

In older times, the judge was

Called

And is

Immortal, invisible

Only wise

 

C L Couch

 

 

(the death of Herod Agrippa is told in the Christian Acts of the Apostles and other ancient sources

it is fictively told in the chapters of I, Claudius by Robert Graves)

 

I should be judged, too, on whom and how I led, when I have led

 

Photo by Vinicius Amano on Unsplash

São Bernardo do Campo, Brazil

this was a color test I was doing with lighting on RGB colors and how the colors affected a piece of creased aluminum. looks like a mountain for me, what do you guys think?

 

 

2

Guests

Guests

 

There’s the outer skin

And then a mask underneath

Of pain

Then maybe underneath the skull,

Things aren’t so bad

Now in the heart of things,

It’s different

There pain enters and resides

Deeply,

And we must somehow get inside

Like a fantastic voyage

Plumb the depths

To find a source

Of everything that festers

We can’t laser it out

Even a scalpel wouldn’t serve

We have to go in ourselves,

Live with it for a while

Reside beside the pain

To understand

Its texture and its grooves, and finally

Where to touch it best

To hold it for a while

Try a tug or two

But if we stay and warm it long enough,

Part of it will start to rise

Away

 

C L Couch

 

 

(Fantastic Voyage, a novel by Isaac Asimov)

 

 

Photo by Macavei Alex on Unsplash

 

3

Giving Way

 

Giving Away

 

A Christian

Wrote a magic book

Don’t ostracize him for it—

Too late, too many

Praise the work

And the worker

And, yes, in the larger family

 

You might know who I mean

You might know what I mean

It’s everywhere, nowadays

Though the worker

Was confused by

Popularity

 

He was used to saying

What he wondered anyone might

Want to hear

Though it was all required at the school

 

C L Couch

 

 

Photo by eberhard grossgasteiger on Unsplash

 

0

Nothing Cynical Today, Please

Nothing Cynical Today, Please

 

I know we’re all supposed to be

So smart,

And we are

But sometimes don’t you want to take

A breath

Then exhale all kinds of things

That really aren’t necessary

On the inside, anymore

 

Take in something fresh

I know it’s hard in a polluted world

But there’s still enough air out there

And in a breeze

There’s dreaming

Give that some air as well

 

I’m going to close up the dark shop

And risk the outside world

Not to get too close

Just yet

But find a sitting place

(you, too),

Not so far away

To look outside and inside

Consider what to keep

What can be let go at last

 

C L Couch

 

 

Shouse Village, Wolf Trap, United States

Photo by Eric X on Unsplash

 

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