Three Poems by Kenneth Pobo: Sometimes a Poem, Lullabye, Deliberately

Three Poems by Kenneth Pobo

Sometimes a Poem

begins as a simple observation
of the sky. It sounds like
a weather report. By the fifth line,
the poem gets bored—the sky

floats away. A war sneaks in.
The poem jumps up and down,
screams--we’re watching
Dancing with the Stars in one room
Cleveland 4, Detroit 2 in another.

As the tired and hoarse poem
slides toward the last stanza, the sky
blows back in, a grainy gray.
The poem leaves. Above

the paulownia tree, lavender
blossoms smell of roses. Te poem
breathes deeply, looks around.
Is it trembling?

Lullabye

Getting the paper, I pass
a small spot by the sidewalk
where snow is almost gone—

what’s this? Bulbs!
It’s too soon. Scurry back
into your earthy bed. Orny,
these green thumbnails have no
use for my advice--

daffs awaken in winter’s
warm arms, the world
a lullabye sung in a snowflake.

Deliberately

Some things are done deliberately:

scooping hardened ice cream
shoveling ice off the driveway
telling off a munching deer
Thoreau going to the woods.

And some things are done in
a wimbly-wambly way:

strolling among daffodils
sending vague emails
people watching in a mall
Whitman ambling by a stream.

Why choose? Words are coats.
Sometimes you need a heavy woolen one,
sometimes a spring jacket,
and sometimes it’s best to toss
the coat off, toss off all clothing,
and be

deliberately
wimbly-wambly.

Kenneth Pobo won the 2011 Qarrtsiluni poetry chapbook contest for Ice And Gaywings. They published it in November 2011. Also published in 2011 was Tiny Torn Maps, a collection of microfiction, from Deadly Chaps. Forthcoming is Saving My Place from Finishing Line Press. He teaches Creative Writing and English at Widener University in Pennsylvania.

Copyright 2012 Kenneth Pobo . © This work is protected under the U.S. copyright laws. It may not be reproduced, reprinted, reused, or altered without the expressed written permission of the author.