Grumpy

Two young adults

Enjoying a bike ride down the oceanside walkway,

Encroached on my side of the path.

I was forced to move from my god-given unmarked lane.

First I smiled by way of suggesting they looked cute.

As they went past I of thought of homicide.

I walk here every day.

Then the thought: I am a dwarf named Grumpy.

Earlier, my neighbor parked outside her garage.

What hutzpah!

Why can’t she park in her garage?

Very insensitive!

Britain is having riots.

Somalia is experiencing mass starvation.

My neighbors kid died in a fall down his stairs...

But I am esthetically disturbed by a car in a driveway?

I’ll blame my thinking on age.

Alternately, it could be my computer’s hiccup.

It’s probably my manic/depressive condition.

I should hang a sign on my door.

“Here lives a bore. Leave money”

Coronado Lights

Small red lights sit atop the eleven condos.

After sunset,

Incoming planes, heading for the Navy airstrip,

Must hold their descent until past the buildings

Off shore a vertical line of white

Silent pinpoints, move south.

Patrolling our pacific coast,

Discouraging illegal passage from Mexico.

The penetrating beam of a search light

Illuminates the grounds

Between the hotel and the ocean.

From my rooftop perch the night appears safe.

There is something of a beautiful lament

Offered by the whispering wavelets 

That oh so gently complete their journey,

Expending their last breath in the sands embrace.

Soon enough day will conquer the dark,

Marking the extinction of the warden’s lights,

The return of Sol,

And the engines that annihilate the quiet.

Sand Castles

Imperial Beach Sand Castle competition

Was an annual event                                                                      

That I had not witnessed,

Despite my four years in the neighborhood.

Sure, I’d seen the videos

Portraying everything from surfers riding cooperative waves 

To war scenes,

All replete with exquisite detail.

The 100 sand sculptures were works of art.

Carved in a most insubstantial medium,

Subject to collapse from the slightest vibration.

Ephemeral by design.

Almost 400,000 people visit 

The two day event.

But few, surely no more than two or three, can report the truth.

It is a phony.

Pictures of people thronging the beach,

Photos of the contesting entrees,

Selection of the best of extraordinary creations

Are all  fake.

We arrived at 11:30,

Only to be told the contest would not begin before two.

Then Saturday morning morphed into Sunday afternoon.

We returned to view the results.

Moving briskly to the first group offerings,

Expecting to be wowed by the brilliance...

Bam, nothing here!

A beach of uninterrupted sand.

Having been cleverly diverted 

By the late starting time was one thing,

But finding no renderings two hours after closing

Lead to an inescapable conclusion: It never happened.

Tribe

 I forwarded a story to Jewish friends.

It isn’t entirely unique:

Felix Zanderman died this year.

He was a holocaust survivor.

Why didn’t I share this story with others?

Why not include friends of fifty years?

I have no religion 

But I do have a tribe.

Italians have tribes; Libyans,

American Indians, Afghanis, likewise.

Membership doesn’t make you special,

It means “you’re one of us”.

We Jews have a badge

That allows us to refer to the Holocaust

As though we have scars 

That confirm our ties to the horror.

Since 1948, along with most tribes, 

We have a point of reference, a “home land”.

Not unlike the Irish, there is a learned response. 

An unspoken pledge.

This connection ends with me.

My sons, barring an anti-Semitic  plague,

Will not be tribal.

Hurray for them?

Maggie in the MIddle

Rose looked at the couch not understanding.

This was all wrong.

Always Mom sits on the edge, Dad in the middle,

And I between them.

This was a matter of tradition.

Ten years we’ve had this arrangement.

Ten years and now this.

My best friend stabs me in the back.

Maggie, Maggie how could you?

And Dad did you forget

All those nights we cuddled on the couch?

Oh how bitter the blow!

Look at Dad in Mom’s seat,

Maggie stretched out in MY space,

And Mom where Dad always sits.

Is nothing sacred?

No space for me.

Yes, I could sit on the far side of Mom,

But it would not be the same,

Not after all we’ve been through.

Not while Maggie usurps

My pavlovian role. 

I’m just going to sit on the floor

And ignore them all!

Ode to the Village Theatre

If Coronado is a community

Self-satisfied, an grounded in the 1950’s

It has exceeded its communal impersonation

With the renovation of the movie house.

A marquee edged in blinking lights

Surrounds the neon promotion

Of  this week’s films,

All promising a bright future.

Both the ticket booth and the lobby

Speak of the simple magic

That engaged my much younger self

Many a Saturday morning.

Cleaner than the Dewey on Coney Island Ave.

And forty times as expensive,

Selling popcorn and candies I remember 

From the days of the Brooklyn trolleys.

Like most of Coronado, the nostalgia 

Engendered by the movie house

Is part of the “lovely” set

That allows no ripped seats or cigarette butts. 

Now the seats are tiered and comfortable, 

The triplex theaters are small, 

Sound surrounds the senses

And 3D films reach out to embrace you.

My cynical nature 

Can not overwhelm 

The reawakened technicolor dream.

If only they’d play an installment of a Flash Gordon.

Retelling of Job

Peter had a good job

Made decent money

And didn’t see his world changing.

But change it did.

Peter paid social security on part-time workers,

He helped out on charity drives,

And had lots of friends.

He also had a dog he loved.

After being arrested when he protested

Our invasion of Vietnam

He was labeled a person of interest

By the FBI. 

When the FBI Interviewed his boss

Peter lost his job.

They shared their belief that Peter was gay,

And might be a communist 

Friends stopped returning his calls, and

Potential employers would not interview him.

Peter’s money soon ran-out, as did his wife.

He moved to a smaller rental.

His new, smaller place did not allow dogs

So Peter gave Cruz to a friend.

Peter was sued by his now ex-wife

For child support, though he had not fathered the boy.

Forced to surrender his apartment

Peter moved in with his drunken father.

Neither was very religious,

But both concluded God must be testing them.

Peter’s car was reclaimed by the finance company.

His father became ill and died.

Peter could not make the rent

And now lives on the street.

He writes to God on street walls,

Demanding an audience.

To date God has not responded.

Peter is cold, hungry and confused.

Crushed

Len wasn’t surprised by his termination.

Charlotte, his new boss, did not like him.

For the past two months Len had been excluded

From meetings that he had previously lead.

It was the silence of the people 

He knew as friends that cut deep.

If the termination letter was to be believed

Some of those friends had signed onto lies.

I guess it made sense.

If you are going to abandon me

It would be awfully hard

To call offering sympathy.

I’m left with my social security check,

And I am not ungrateful when it comes.

But losing the job, after 20 years 

Also meant losing my balance... again.

Ten years ago an earthquake rocked my home,

Leaving me no place to stand.

My complete acceptance of the floor under my feet

Was tested and found wanting.

I am old enough to have experienced

Love and loss.

I believe in recovery.

I will get better... soon.

New York Minute

In an escalator going north, she was going south.

It mattered less to her that it was the wrong direction,

As long as it was moving.

 Speed is rule one in New York.

 Coronaries are not helpful,

 But just potential damage

To be borne.

When the sales manager asked

 “Are you really interested in buying?”

 Its clear he has little time to waste.

 Here comes some fool

 Carrying 2 cardboard cups of coffee,

 A Sunday New York Times,

 And a 400 page novel.

He plans to get all this to his hotel.

Oops, his plan failed!

New York Joy

It doesn’t always play that well.

Sometimes the cacophony overwhelms,

And the pace drives you past the brain’s “alert”.

That and the girls in 6 inch platforms, ouch.

The midtown street level

Home to ubiquitous cellphone,

Insistently reaffirms your singularity,

Shouting into a world monumentally indifferent.

There is a morning symphony

Of jack-hammers

Tearing at the flesh of a building

Too small to meet the competition.

Did I mention the poor, the drugs,

Or the garish facade the city presents?

If all the imperfections do not dissuade...

Welcome to New York!

Below the bullshit level runs the subway.

There is no first class seating. 

Here outrages take the form

Of preforming artists and the crippled.

Not many folks race down the train cars,

And the dress code is whatever you’re wearing.

If you’re old and tired, someone may give you their seat.

A $25,000 watch will elicit suspicion or anger.

If you’re brave, conversation is possible:

Smile and ask directions to the Village.

Even money,  you’ll get an answer.

Odds are 2 to 1 the directions will be wrong.

Central Park is as incongruous 

As a chance trip with Alice through the Looking Glass.

The wonder in a young boy’s eyes at his first Yankee game

Fails when compared to the impossibility of the Park.

Strolling the Poets’ Walk

A lone saxophone plays a sexy lament.

Yards away a road, empty of cars,

Serves bikers, runners, dogs and horse-drawn coaches.

Hot-dog vendors, orthodox Jews,

And a contingent of tourists from Lapland,

Observe the acrobatics of a break-dancer,

Who hopes to make $50.00 before his noon audition.

Ball fields, playgrounds, lakes, gardens,

And the trees tell of the seasons

While keeping the surrounding avarice 

Beyond the Park’s borders.

It is in the order of water walking

That both the free Park

And the not so free Subway work.

They’re the best civilization has to offer.