Pelican
Pelican watches
sisters and brothers wash up.
It knew waters like blue skies.
Lost flocks linger in his sad eyes.
Sisters and brothers washed up.
Is this the way we live,
spreading wings, no way to fly?
Is this the way we die?
It knew, waters like blue skies
Pontchartrain and the Bayou
grass, rocks and sand,
sheen upon bay and land.
Lost flocks linger in sad eyes,
another memory of what was,
nature tossed aside like swill.
Pelican keeps vigil.
Spanish Moss
The Spanish moss still hangs
from the old cypress trees;
a forgotten friend draped
across arms of the forest.
From the old cypress trees
I climbed barefoot and boyish,
I beheld and ruled my kingdom
until evening fogs rolled in.
A forgotten friend draped
in the imaginative finery
of a king my mirror shows
as I remember Louisiana.
Across arms of the forest
I once spread like fire and fear.
Now I sit with memories
of Spanish moss and you
23 September News Storeom
I wonder if I shall ever love again
without thinking
the lady must not be
named/take after a hellish storm.
Down in the Gulf,
Rita angrily churns.
Maximum sustained winds of 135 mph
and 20-foot storm surge.
How many more?
How many more?
In New Orleans
The hell that was
the Ninth Ward
loses another levee.
Three weeks after Katrina.
Water, more glorious,
God given water.
How high's the water Papa?
waist-deep and rising...
A bus carrying elderly evacuees
Catches fire on
a crowded, stalled highway.
Cruel irony.
Life supporting
oxygen tanks burn so well.
How many more?
How many more?
2 million residents
must evacuate.
A crazy twist,
highways out of Houston,
can't accommodate
a million cars.
Miles and tens of miles
of gridlock.
Once again the National Guard
is providing relief.
This time the other
life giving/taking liquid
gasoline.
On Friday,
Louisiana's death toll
from Hurricane Katrina
rose to 841.
How many more?
How many more?
Yesterday’s Angel
The most beautiful part of a mostly beautiful city,
is kept behind wrought iron gates, with
mini highways traversing throughout,
surrounded by well tended lawns.
The city that knows how to party, knows
how to honor three centuries of dead.
"Down here we bury bodies above ground."
A chill travels the length of my spine
as I look around at the beautiful catacombs.
Mansions of granite or polished marble
built for housing the corpses of New Orleans.
Yesterday's angel slowly winged above
Adams Street Cemetery as Monica gave me
yet another tour of her beautiful city.
We look out of place among dark suited mourners
and the jazz band playing Amazing Grace,
with our Green Day shirts and punk rock hair.
You are only as different as you want to be in New Orleans.
When I die, if there is enough corpse to prepare,
I am not sure I want to be surrounded by rocks and sealed
with my name on a bright plaque for tourists to photograph,
stand, pose and point to file as a memory next to bright beads.
I am pretty sure when what I am now is no more
you can throw me in Lake Pontchartrain in the dark and rain.
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