taps echoing

(for my uncles, Albert & George Atkins on Memorial Day

Veterans of WWII)

unceremoniously
your photos stand
against the debris of suburban life
garaged with tools
and transportation
wheels and windows
boxes and broken glass

stored here
your photos stand
for the memory of war
the honor of service
the love of country

accidentally remembered
an afterthought of lawn mowing
trimming and hedging
chain sawing
hammering, nailing
do-it-yourself mentality
for fixing up

but not for war

graphic images
of two uncles who went to war
then came home to live

the American Dream

now
both are gone with
no ceremony
no phone call
no visit
no possibility

this poem is hardly enough

Barry DeCarli
Ferrisburgh, VT
Copyright 2009 Barry DeCarli
Revised 05/29/11
Reposted 05/24/12

moving

and winter, on its cold way

doesn’t know things have changed

only people are rearranged

and quietly lost in the play 

blanketed with fallen snow

the landscape really doesn’t know

that its friends have packed and gone

the final caress, gentle footsteps at dawn 

and peeking through the frigid early sky

not the smallest inkling disturbs the sun

for it neither cares or wonders why

we throw it a tearful kiss and run

neither can we know what to perceive

as we sadden at the life we leave 

Barry DeCarli

From Of Sun and Rain

Copyright 1972 Barry DeCarli

cutting the cord

a film may show the cord
being cut
and some suggest the ineptness
of the doctor making an innie or an outie
as if at that point
the belly button matters

the violence of birth
might be
traumatic
preparation for

separation
approaching nearly two decades
in the future

leaving a first home
escaping the full protection of a thin layer of skin
the warmth, the liquid breath
the sanctuary

years later
a June ceremony
setting the stage
for a September departure
a bloodless umbilical severing

an unsure backward glance
a hastening step

away 

Barry DeCarli
March 26, 2010
Copyright 2010 Barry DeCarli

a better truth

feelings
may speak when silence is
the better truth

but what sacrifice is too great
on the altar of tact
there is no apology for beauty

forgiveness may unburden
but the truth remains
unchanged
can a truth be reconciled by contrition
how long can whitewash cover a scar

apology
forgiveness
silence

which is the truer reckoning

Barry DeCarli
November 22, 2006
Copyright 2010 Barry DeCarli

the price of memories

what outside influence

intrudes upon us surreptitiously

stealthily

stealing our breath like carbon monoxide

letting us do something we don’t want to

explain 

as the soaring price of

precious metals seeps into our consciousness

heirlooms have found their way

reversing the gold rush

to pawn shops

coin dealers

hotel lobbies

instead of into jewelry boxes

dresser drawers of nieces

or nephews 

no dust or danger

no pack horse or partner

searching for Sutter’s Mill

just a paved strip mall parking lot

and a sandwich bag of rings, lockets, chains

the remains, the props of the past

the stuff of personal history 

more than gold traded but

the memories weigh easy

on the digital scale

the tipping point, the balance

some logic that someone else

would just stake their claim 

after we’re gone 

Barry DeCarli

April 12, 2012

Copyright 2012 Barry DeCarli

like father, like son

wanting to pour poetry
from a bottle
of Pinot Grigio
to uncork the perfect pairing
of words and emotion
in an untitled document
trying to escape the collision
of headache and hope with
the right metaphor
stoking my muse there in the wine
my poem scrapes against the easiness
of inkjet black on white

he stood unsteadily
the car was his vehicle
driven with a practiced recklessness
he sought to slake a more primal thirst
I never understood
as the bourbon burned his throat
then softly drenched
his drought of dreams
for a while he found forgiveness
fulfillment there in the bottle

his Oldsmobile keyed with barbed wire
while taking out the farmer’s fence

there was nothing easy about his poetry
of rubber and speed
steel and noise

Barry DeCarli
April 15, 2010 (6)
Copyright 2010 Barry DeCarli

like a ghost

like an invisible cloud
I sneak across your life
like a ghost
with no place to haunt
I watch and remember
secret handshakes
and passwords
I gaze through your days
and nights
unseen
I linger just near enough
to dream again
then
like a whisper of wind
I say goodbye unheard
unseen
like a ghost
I'm gone

Barry DeCarli
From Of Sun And Rain
Copyright 1972 Barry DeCarli