Four Poems

Poetry ~ William Conelly

EVEN
 
Even the rain is hot,
Even the rain,
as if it took by tumult
through these asphalt clouds
some measure of the fusion
searing endlessly beyond.
 
A house fan merely stirs
such heat, blends it with
the waters of that river
where we all shall bathe
—oh, currents of forgetfulness--
the future our next breath.
~

BEACHED
 
Call this place you’re waiting
nowhere:  your mind gone
simple, your body bent to suit 
the waiting’s rigid chair. 
 
And where's the hire car 
you phoned five years ago?  
Turned scrap along the ways
your journey might have taken?
 
From silver plane to silver 
coach to a disobliging chair,
sequestered some damn where,
each seating’s further shrunken
in the fuming tidal air
forgotten selves have chosen. 
~

LOWER COASTER
 
The silver mines went bust.
The ore carts left on rails
five fathoms underground
became cool rides for kids
hot Saturdays in town,
a squealing steel train trip
sparking black passageways
—g-forces pitching slant--
corkscrewing hollows down.
 
Ore carts aren’t built for dates:
you hunch and dodge along
a twelve-inch aisle then cram
in one per wooden seat.
No belt.  No padded jamb.
A use-slick rail to grip
while bouncing off the frame,
some lead car teener braving
her descent--no hands! --
 
white silk blouse flaring wind…
You surge onto blank flats,
emerge, roll sunlit blocks
of pastel cottages
before an aspen copse
marks the re-entry hole.
A barker dares more kids
to free wheel cool black chutes
in silver mountain tops--
 
she’s good at what she does:
mining a conga line
of restless souls for dough,
summoning all aboard.
I pay for some young schmoe.
Spark up, kid.  Roil the dark.
Have some skull-cracking fun.
I’ve gone pit free.  Pastels
are all I care for now.
~

ELEVEN FLOORS
 
Do bourgeois crowds applaud
your late life’s work below?
No?  Then why climb further
up a public precipice?
The best of journeys slow.
Your grip is languorous.
Dismal winds course by.
Just go ahead and fly.
                                    Nicolas de Staël (1914-1955)
~

After Military Service, William Conelly took a Master's Degree in English from UC Santa Barbara. Unrelated work in research and composition followed before he returned to academia in 2000.  The Able Muse publishes a collection of his earlier verse under title Uncontested Grounds, and it may be reviewed at their website or via Amazon.  A dual citizen of the US and UK, retired from teaching, Conelly resides with his wife in the West Midlands town of Warwick, England.

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