More summer poems cat, heat, drought

Greye Laster cat

IT'S COOLER DOWN HERE

smart cat!

Rather than rest

in the attic's heat, he

spends his afternoon nap on the

fourth stair.

~~

STRANGE ONE

Strange one

at the birdbath:

stretched out, a foot long, eyes

checking the water. Finally,

he laps.

~~

A FIRST!

After

all these years, Greye

jumped up on the loveseat

in the space between my paper

and me.

Never

has he done such

as that. He reclined in

the small spot, put a gray paw on

my leg.

~~

Storm building in Fairfield Glade, TN on sisters' trip

smelling

rain, but the sun's

shining

~~

ALL THINGS IN THEIR TIMES

Every

time I looked up

at graying clouds, I prayed,

"Please rain. Please rain." Hours later,

spitting.
~~

Yellow

pansy hanging

out of the pot. Could I

hear it gasping, "Too hot! Water!

Water!"?

~~

parched ground somewhere

c 2017 PL dba lovepat press

Birds in the Bush and Tree- poems

LIVE MUSIC
A wren is close
in the holly tree,
a mockingbird farther out,
a robin in the dogwood,
and a cardinal's 'chit-chit'
from the maple.
~~

woodpecker
tapping on the roof
above me
~~

Thrasher
flies to, lands on
a horizontal limb
of the ancient crape myrtle, lost
to sight.
~~

"Killing
me with your song!"
I tell the bird, not six
feet from my ears in the holly
treetop.
~~

Slight breeze
but no wind chime.
Mockingbird takes that role
well enough. Ah! There's a very
soft tone.
~~

I swing,

cooling off from

a spate of afternoon

yard work, while the mockingbird sings

for me.

~~

FROM THE BACK PORCH STEPS

Last call

of the redbird.

As the night bugs waken,

western sky shows only its blues.

I rest.

~~

~~

PL, 2017

Poems from the Past - Cinquains

1996 - ETHICS
"I know
it's not allowed."
Ruth stretches out her trunk
to fenced-out docent. "Goobers taste
so good!"
~~
1998 - DANGER!
My son's
experiment--
the glint in brittle leaves
is sun's reflection through the glass.
"No, NO!"
~~

2003 - FOUND IN AN OLD JOURNAL
I crave
ice cream after
two weeks' deprivation,
and he walks in with a bag of
corn chips.
~~

2005 - OUT OF THE COUNTRY
"Goodnight
for the last time
in 13 days," my boy
says before his school trip to Greece
and Rome.
~~

2006 - 101 DEGREES
Robins,
redbird and squirrel
glean from the shady yard
in grass that is drying up from
the heat.
~~

2009 - TOO BIG
Huge brown
thrasher wobbles
on the column feeder
eating seeds that the smaller birds
ignore.
~~

2012 - SO HOT FOR SO LONG
ACs
turned on at eight-
fifteen a. m. Nearly
80 degrees already this
morning.
~~

2015 - WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?
Five days
after seeing
"Oklahoma," I'm still
mind-singing "People will say we're
in love."
~~

2016 - IF THAT'S ALL WE HAD TO DO
Counting
the unmarked mute
swans on the Thames each year
for their owner, the Queen. What a
great job!
~~

2017 - SOUNDS
Music
of the wind chimes,
drone of the airplane, swish
and hum of passing cars . . . so far,
peace reigns.
~~
~~
PL, posted July 7, 2017

An Edgar A. Guest poem for the holiday

THE BOY AND THE FLAG

Edgar A Guest

I want my boy to love his home,

His Mother, yes, and me:

I want him, wheresoe'er he'll roam,

With us in thought to be.

I want him to love what is fine,

Nor let his standards drag,

But, Oh! I want that boy of mine

To love his country's flag!

I want him when he older grows

To love all things of earth;

And Oh! I want him, when he knows,

To choose the things of worth.

I want him to the heights to climb

Nor let ambition lag;

But, Oh! I want him all the time

To love his country's flag.

I want my boy to know the best,

I want him to be great;

I want him in Life's distant West,

Prepared for any fate.

I want him to be simple, too,

Though clever, ne'er to brag,

But, Oh! I want him, through and through,

To love his country's flag.

I want my boy to be a man,

And yet, in distant years,

I pray that he'll have eyes that can

Not quite keep back the tears

When, coming from some foreign shore

And alien scenes that gag,

Borne on its native breeze, once more

He sees his country's flag.

From Collected verse of EDGAR A. GUEST, published 1934 by Contemporary Books, Inc.

Just in the past few days. . . poems/ photos

First day

of summer, yet

the pansies, though leggy,

still show off their multicolored

faces.

~ ~ ~

Purple
jew coexists
with coreopsis, cone
flower, dianthus, oxalis,
stone crop.
~ ~ ~ ~

Close up
of bronzy 'mums
blooming for the second
year in Mom's ancient concrete porch
planter.
~ ~ ~

c 2017 PL

Sights, sounds, smells - POEMS

Yellow
blooms of lance-leaved
coreopsis litter
the lawn. Son says "Leave them." Brother:
"They're weeds!"
~ ~ ~

Fragrance

of gardenias

another perk of porch-

sitting early in the morning's

coolness.

~ ~ ~

MOM! DAD! HELP!

Its first

trip to the bird-

bath? "Now that I'm here, what

do I do?" It wades in and sips,

then stands.

~ ~ ~

Orange
canna blossom
stands as an overlord
above the mandevilla's two
pink blooms.
~ ~ ~

Bluejay

squawks, "No suet

in this feeder, lady!

and I could use some sustenance."

"Soon, sir."

~ ~ ~

First time

in a long time

I see althea blooms.

Demise of hackberry-tree shade

the cause?

~ ~ ~

Barely
audible this
early, nearly-summer
morning, a freight train trundles toward
Texas.
~ ~ ~
c 2017, PL - dba lovepat press

Memories of a writers retreat experience

 Karen, Carolyn, Deanna at a book signing by Ruth Hawkins

At the Hemingway-Pfeiffer Museum
--a senryu sequence

Hasten, hasten all
writers –you who’re interested
in ‘one true sentence.’

Come to the old barn
where E. H. once wrote
parts of A Farewell . . .

Surrounded by ghosts,
his typewriter, leopard skin
rugs, whispers of lust

we focus efforts
to learn to write like Papa,
stark words, whittled to

the pith, gist and gut.
Imaginations flit, soar,
breaking boundaries

found in home, office,
school. Like doves released, we fly,
fill page upon page,

exult in fatigue:
a story begun, finished.
To Papa! Hear, hear!

 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

[10:24 pm, 1.21.14, Tuesday]

[Pat Laster

To the state critic, 1.16.14

Revised ala critic, 1.21.14]