Robin will see Dr. Siegel now
whose deft and practiced hands
will dis-veil her clouded vision.

When I see her next and soon
A new portal will open gradually
to show her a world of reborn acuity.

The leaves will sing
With new-found lucidity.
Vivid color and detail
will wash over her horizons
And the world will be
a more dynamic place.

It all begins now
With Dr. Siegel's deft, and very practiced hands.

      Let there be light;
           Let there be color;
                Let there be visual truth!

On a tranquil spring morning
     after the gold-washed rising sun
had yielded to the glow of an azure sky,

     the western peaks crept into view -
their crystaline white-capped peaks
     frosted by a nocturnal snow shower.

While the valley gently awakened,
     a frenetic dance swirled on the heights
choreographed by turbulent winds.

     Billowing clouds gathered like dervishes
whirling violently in a ritual tempest -
     hurling frigid sprays into the dawning sky

Down in the valley, the warming sun
     calmly consumed the remaining flakes  -
while battle raged on the peaks, unabated.

April, 2020

O frabjous day! Callooh Callay

My new book of poems From the Mountain to the Sea is now available from Amazon.com Hope you enjoy it!

Here is a link:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08HJ534Q8/ref=sr11?keywords=From+the+Mountains+to+the+Sea+Howard&qid=1599256110&s=books&sr=1-1

Light bulbs are redundant
When Kayla walks in -
bathing every person and surface
with the flood lamps of her smile.

She smiles when she dances
and smiles when she sings
while two grateful women
who precede her in lineage
draw their bows across the strings.

None would ever suspect
that this fountain of joy
had once wanly trembled
in the valley of shadows.

Yet no matter how vilely
leukemia fought and clawed
to claim her for its own
it never really stood a chance

for Kayla had steps to dance
and songs to sing
and millions of smiles to smile
and would not be denied.

February, 2008
Robert Charles Howard

Rain clouds hover in the night
veiling the crystal moon -
spraying steady showers
on the hills and plains below.

The Missouri stirs from slumber
spreading claws of water up its banks
as rain sheets, lashed to horizontal
saturate the fields and valleys.

Illumined by the misted moon
The river’s shoreline grows
by inches through the night -
stealing into ever higher ground.

Daybreak finds new ponds conjoined
and spilled across low lying roads
and TV teasers sound their alarms.
'Stay tuned, tape at 10: 00.'

Downpours to the west and north
saturate Mississippi valleys and
Saint Louis flood gates rumble closed.
Farmers abandon all hope for harvest.

Our screens chant nightmare litanies
of sandbag crews and second floor rescues,
crumbling levies and sunken vehicles -
a twisting farmhouse claimed for driftwood.

The clouds’ reservoirs at last are spent,
the inland sea recedes to lakes
and our weary cousins stumble home
as the Mississippi quietly relearns it banks.

March, 2008

for Connetta Rosa Maria Franconero

Dear sister, daughter, friend,
beloved global village singer
sing to us your Siren song turned good.

'Meine Liebe, ' 'mio caro, ' 'mon coeur'
do not despair the ashes -
the Phoenix will fly again.

Moonlight and star-shine
pale before the renaissant dawn
of covenants made and kept.
So let it always be, “Senza Fine.”

December, 2008

after Untitled by Ruza Bagaric,1996

The **** on canvas
sits by the window looking out,
bathed by the morning sun -
with all her youthful promise
forever preserved
in the luminous interplay of
of delicate chiaroscuro.

But I wonder if she’ll catch a chill
sitting as she is without a stitch.

    Could I fetch you a blanket, dear
    or a piping cup of Earl Grey tea?

And just what brings me
to her sunlit room?
Am I her groom or lover,
a devoted patron of the arts
or just a passing stranger
come to borrow Ruza’s eyes.

So there she sits
with her raven tresses
collected in a tidy bun.
I wonder what she sees out there.
I doubt I’ll ever know.

December, 2008
Robert Charles Howard

The Milky Way was really quite enough
to trim me down to size
but even so I thought it fine
to spread a quilt beneath the stars
and mark my spot
beside the universal edge.

But then those ****** astronomers
had to rewrite the universe
with stellar maps and Hubble pics
that proved beyond the pale
that those fuzzy little nebulae
are really other galaxies.

Hold enough, I say. That’s most unfair!
Who needs another million Milky Ways?

Well, if that's the way it has to be,
then I'll just fold my blanket up
and go inside.
where I'm ever so much bigger!

August, 2008
Robert Charles Howard

for John Ensworth

Who am I and who on Earth are you?
     In case you wonder too, my friend,
I’ll trade your penny for my thoughts.

On any given day, I check the
    file drawers between my ears
and pluck out mental artifacts
    to craft into action plans
or in short, I THINK and DO.

And as far as reason leads me,
    I must DO to keep my world intact
and THINK to stave off Armageddon
    if you get my drift.
    
I know, I know, these separate hides
    we are destined to preserve
are breach-less firewalls
    that prevent our ever knowing
each other’s sacred mysteries.  
    Still we seek each other out.
Our common fate - our common bond.

The universe whirls crazily
     beyond the shackles of our skins.
so we measure all we can,
     chart the threads of consequence,
wonder at the mountains and
     seek to learn of seas and galaxies.
    
What do you think, my friend, of entropy?
     What is the nature of the God(s)
you choose to heed or disavow
     as you wander this inscrutable Earth?

Know that I love you, my stranger friend
     and lacking any other choice,
I cherish the firewalls that define us -
     that we cannot scale or circumvent.
      
January, 2020

Richard strained his eyes
and watched his deliverer
merge into misty shadows.
Never would he know
whose strong arms had dragged him
from twisted metal and flames
that used to be his Ford.

At first screaming sirens
and glaring lights
the stranger had risen, smiled
and hastened up the hill.

Haloed in photo flashes
Richard shoved the mike aside.
The lady in a blazer asked again, who?
but Richard only shrugged.
Had he known he wouldn’t have said.

July, 2006

“I see no difference between war and ordinary ******” Albert Einstein

From the moon our planet looks unified
Quite dapper in its veil of blue
Pirouetting gracefully about the sun.

Lost in a dream, I see myself as a child –
Innocent in my lawn chair
On the Sea of Tranquility - telescope in hand.

The screen door pounds against its frame
And Father hands me a lemonade
And sinks into the chair beside me.
This is the day HE must tell me.

I start to say how peaceful and kind it all is.
And that I want to go there someday.

Father stops and me, takes a deep breath and begins:
Two thousand years ago I sent
My firstborn there to clean up a terrible mess.

Proud men slashed their neighbors
And stole their goods,
Neither children nor women were spared the sword.
In the end, they hung him on a cross."

I said, “you must be mistaken;
All I can see from here is serenity.
This can’t be: they are all your children.”

Father continued, “It is worse now:
Even prouder and crueler men and women too
Use my name to justify their barbarism.
Children are even killed in schools.
They have made bombs strong enough
To destroy an entire city -
All over boundaries that I neither drew nor intended.”

My head sinks into my hands
And I began to sob uncontrollably.

As I dream on, my wails carry all the way
down to earth where all the children weep with me
LOUDER AND LOUDER AND LOUDER!!

Their mothers run to their sides.
Their fathers smash their AK - 47s
And H bombs against the rocks –
Vowing to relinquish fratricide forever!

I awake with a jolt only to find myself
Back in the nightmare
That the proud refuse to banish.