Like an alien in the Twilight Zone

                                    

Like an alien in the Twilight Zone,

We stepped off the spaceship with a human cookbook

With recipes all wrong.

Accounts of what's happening on  Earth incorrect.

Contrary to what we thought

Humans know the dinner is them

And except to eat or be eaten,

The last act. Like cannibals,

With no hope of survival.

Either duck soup or just desserts.

Housemates cooked or fried.

Afraid they have to lock up the utensils,

And write down a diary,

For their own health,

So the next generation can find out,

From the ruble

under a snow drift 

After the meltdown in spring.

Write it down to keep heads above water;

Or castigate and flog themselves

To show solidarity with  pained people

Because it would help no one 

But those that write, draw, sing and play

With spirit in their minds,

To know it's not their fault,

That they tried to address it for decades,

Wrote letters, signed petitions, protested and marched,

Even joined direct actions.

So leave them be

to get together right down there

With their fellow workers

Holding on tightly

during the pandemic

Until the rescue mission arrives

With vaccination and on-line shopping

to serve man well.

December 28, 2020

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Copyright © 2020 by David Barry Temple. All rights reserved 

The last true love I’ll ever meet

 

In the best years of our lives,

Without debris obstructing us,

When we rock each other all day long,

Like our backs ain’t got a bone,

with the soft affection,

Only cats offer at home...

How could I not feel blessed?

Lucky because we deserve

To reap what we've grown best.

When the sunshine follows our path,

With dark clouds abounding,

As we climb the stairs of stone,

Holding hands but not alone,

My heart no longer wanders

Why would I want to roam?

When I can have it all,

One at heart and one at home,

Without either missing a beat,

With the last true love I’ll ever meet.

Lying down in sheets of linen, legs entwined,

a million passionate candy kisses,

In another amazing day in azure,

Mellowing our troubled minds,

Good vibrations giving excitation,

Ladled with hot mineral springs,

Everything we wanted and our bird can sing,

Followed by beef Wellington.

December 28, 2020

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Echoes of Ecstasy

 
She's bringing me healthy enticement

No paid massage rubbing me wrong

But millet wine for our brunch on the morrow

Preferring a lovely giving and taking

Without bursting bubbles in a hot spring

Or skating away on a cool winter day in paradise

 

But no blue paradise on the dusky horizon

Behind three to naught in our ecstasy

But we aren't counting on winning or losing

When I fall short without morning magic

But If we’d had a dollar for every deep kiss

We could buy a  Maserati with this

 

Yes, I gentlemanly left it home and childishly suffered

(Or was it the other way around)

Yes. I felt like Costanza’s water shrinkage

With tight sweetness urging me on

But she didn't falter or lose one heartbeat

As we pleased each other, hands down, so to speak

 

We walked in the fog around the lake

Stopping for shots of millet wine joy

Blended with nectar around the misty mountains,

The pine willow reflected in an aquatic dream.

A day to remember with no concern

With steamy wisps of love to burn

 

When Wednesday echoes of ecstasy appear,

If she isn’t the flower that blooms once a year

I’ll give birds the bird and take a chance

Save painted vases and fruit for old folks' homes

With whims of time in sweet secrecy.

Sensuous rendezvous instead of coffee.

December 24, 2020

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Copyright © 2020 by David Barry Temple. All rights reserved 

A Dove Worth Flying

Is this dove worth flying?

Does pidgin English ring a bell?

When the cock crows at dawn,

Will she coo, too?

Or lose her way home?

Not knowing the direction?  

Feeling love from the source,

With a kiss on the lips,

And warmth from the start,

To make my heart race harder.

How much love does she need?

To realize she is a special breed?

With sadness she would be,

An escort without a steed, 

But a turtle dove can fly,

with a stubborn donkey's pride,

with a stallion's seasoned face,

At Belgium racer's pace.

I know why flyers limp,

For when they walk it hurts.

As a lover’s mind limps,

For once her sense was wasted.

But do not fear to fly the horizon;

Take off for the skies unknown!

 Fall in love over a notion (an ocean)

 With a soft landing waiting at home.

December 17, 2020

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An End of a Long Female Friendship

 

I feel love from more sources than detractors.

That can’t take true friends and family away.

With a kiss on the lips and warmth from the heart,

Taking life here now, appreciating it all

Begins with a good back getting better after a fall

After three nights of patches and acupuncture,

Due to a hex from the ghost of a lady friend,

That pained me to show up and leave.

 

It is disappointing to lose an old female friend.

The fifteen minute walk to her car when she left

The only time we spent alone to talk, to tell her

She hadn’t asked me all of fifteen minutes.

But glossed over everything; knew all the answers.

And didn’t care how I was feeling anymore.

When twenty years ago I could rely on her

To feel about what was disturbing my life.

 

She was an ally during that messy affair.

One I could confide in; not any more.

She avoids my request to see her in private

Was my friend before but now she's “ours”,

And when I asked to see her sooner,

She saved her visit till a week before her leave,

She avoided me talking with my wife instead,

In Mandarin, about their health and family.

 

One thought for my children, a throw-away question,

Like which child I loved more blah-blah...  

That’s not what friends are for;

But to be frank with each other, be what may.

She did not ask this time what was on my mind;

(I wanted to tell her what was on my mind)

What could I do? She did not ask,

And I did not tell and burden her.

 

She covered blemishes on her face and life

So I unfollowed her smiling Facebook travels.

Text me if you have anything to say.

I say I should have gone swimming that day,

When she said it was okay if I went;

She didn’t care to chat; did not need me there;

But dinner conversation not even about me,

Though I had asked to spend some time urgently.

 

Alone with her to talk, hit on, or anything that mattered,

Such as my lack of intimacy the past few years.

And that I actually had a brief notion as she slept over,

Of crawling into bed with her at four,

But she would have bolted, scandalously, 

For I am pigeonholed as a satisfied husband.

I am not satisfied.

And she no longer cares to know.

 

She couldn’t do anything about it

It would have been her burden

With cognitive dissonance. No.

She came here to see us together, not me alone.

At least the table was set for our withdrawal

When she asked what I was doing

l could have told of meeting a potential lover

But nothing was left besides idle conversation.

December 17, 2020 

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Love and Friendship

Let's keep our love in sight, 

with friendship, desire and lust, 

contact through love between our hearts and minds,

a belief that we are important  

a true love possible between equals.

a give and take between our self-controls

happening in the erogenous zone

with friendship remaining when desire wears out.  

December 7, 2020

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Fearlessly Flying Bird in Flight

There's a hobbling pigeon being avoided on a busy road,

A statue of Confucius’ head stained with streaked droppings,

A single feather at the threshold of my home,

And what is more, a panel of dispersing doves

Taking flight from a partition in our meeting room. 

 

Do any of these coincidences amount to much?

Without the serendipity of unwrapping a gift? 

Of touching you upon landing from grounded days?

I hear your quarantined heart beating,

In a karaoke club watching a caged bird sing.

 

Let your destiny take flight to a sunny building ledge!

Escape from the pack of circling racers, to me!

Or am I only a pedestrian seated on a lonely park bench?

Scattering crumbs to any bird hungry enough

To take the chance of coming near?

 

Would you fly away if I stood to leave?  

Or remain to thank me with a coo and a nod?

Even follow the path of my crumbs homeward,

For an unlimited supply of desire behind my chamber door,

Or would you sit on a bust of Pallas forevermore?

 

A white bird in a golden cage on a winter’s day in the rain?

You are not.

An albatross riding thermals at my ship’s stern in stormy seas?

You are not.

Screaming at each other unsatisfied like when doves cry?

We are not.

Have you a fear of flying into the fog of erotica?

Hopefully not. 

Be my fearlessly flying bird in flight.  

 

December 6, 2020

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A Poem to Those Who Mock Thanksgiving Turkey

 It often furthers one to go somewhere

but as a guest, not at another's expense,

and so pilgrims arrived in their delusion

away from religious persecution

like-minded baby boomers in another time

their new world manifested

in how they think of what they eat

and find liberation from the old world

in everyone they meet/meat

December 1, 2020 

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How Do I Get There From Here?

See first rendition here

Exchanging pleasantries,

Exchanging consideration,

Compromise and cooperation.

I know how to make the final touches,

A few sharpened lines,

A few brushed flourishes…

One doesn’t need a field guide to know,

And the other doesn’t need warmth for a technical show.  

Perhaps they have both arrived at the place they’re going,

Through commerce they are growing,

As I sit on the riverside ledge, all-knowing.

But where can I step me down to feel the cool water?

How do I  get there from here?

For looking from here is not the same.

Slopes of tall grass obscure a slippery path,

But if my thirst needs quenching,

I would stumble and go.

I’d take my time to touch the wetness,

Before these dry bones turn to ashes,

And the fascination of living passes.

So be one half of my dialectic,

Take the words out of my mouth,

But see me for more than a pigeon race to shore

From a ship, flying, to be seen no more.

Indulge me in non-profit ventures,

In exchange for new adventures,

Steps in journeys without hurry,

Interludes of passion,

And sensual flurry.

 

November 26, 2020

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