Category: Responding To Walt Whitman

Restless shapes hover
Colored haze dips
Rises and returns
I pretend a meaning
In the obscure pantomime
The mystery
Beyond the fogged glass

-T. Weeks
(A response to “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d”)

Mute acknowledgement
As I lay on the couch
Family chitter and video games
Lapping against collage cushions
A long day at work melting
Into the evening tide

-T. Weeks
(A response to “To the Leaven’d Soil They Trod”)

On the calendar I see meetings
Tomorrow looks just like today
Yesterday looks the same too
As do they all
Soft-edged rectangles stacked
Annotated and color coded
Geometric slight of hand
Holding my attention
While the future slips quietly on stage
And… POOF!
It’s in the past.

T. Weeks
(A response to “Turn O Libertad”)

I tried a new keyboard
Kind of liked it
Not sure why
It isn’t much better
Maybe new is enough

-T. Weeks
(A response to “Spirit Whose Work Is Done [Washington City, 1865]”

Upstairs is warm
It makes me panic
Like being tied up
In a sleeping bag

The backyard is cool
Like the first breath
After being trapped
In a sleeping bag

-T. Weeks
(A response to “Adieu to a Soldier”)

Urn of ashes marooned
In a room full of sympathy
Solemn cake eaten in whispers
Hidden near the veggie platter
Behind involuntary chuckles

We are each of us unprepared
To mourn the unknown mother
So we chat on and on
Ignoring the waiting urn
Each of us a heartbroken widower

-T. Weeks
(A response to “Lo, Victress on the Peaks”)

Sanding away the seams
Where curiosity germinates
Blunting thought and drive
Paces dull discomfort

A spot in the vision
Always just ahead
Of where the eye is tracking
Incurable distraction

-T. Weeks
(A response to “To a Certain Civilian”)

Farewell to my friends
They will always be my nuts
Just less connected

-T. Weeks
(A response to “Delicate Cluster”)

A bullet killed who we were
Yet here we are
Another will kill who we are
Yet will we be

-T. Weeks
(A response to “How Solemn As One
by One [Washington City, 1865]”)

Digging up through falling bricks
Piling just as fast as I reach
To no end I reply, forward, and file
Just a high-functioning email filter

-T. Weeks
(A response to “Reconciliation”)