Day: February 21, 2018

Whimsical #5

After walking
a couple blocks
through a snowstorm,
climbing several flights of stairs
because the elevator is broken
then realizing
your car is either one or two more floors up…
Once you find your car,
you think the keys are in your pocket
but they’re really buried
in your backpack’s special compartment.
After squeezing yourself like a sardine
into the driver’s seat
because the cars on both sides
parked too close to your doors,
you have to make sure you’re
strapped in because you
already got a ticket for not
wearing your seatbelt.
When you’re actually rolling,
it’s caravan style behind the
cautious driver
who turns too slowly
and brakes too quickly.
Just as you’re about to
exit the garage
the parking pass doesn’t
let you out because you
seriously left that at your desk
and picked up a business card instead.
And the lot attendant isn’t there.
And there’s a line of cars right behind you–

Yeah, it’s that feeling.

Radar array

And you saw how sad I was
Glancing at empty bedrooms
Of kids who already moved away
So you held my hand and said–

Let’s get a dog named Doppler
Dress up your truck with a radar array
Go to weather school during the day
So we can chase storms together

Get associate degrees in meteorology
Learn about the Enhanced-Fujita scale
Get lost in the plains looking for hail
And cumulonimbus as far as the eye can see

Spend our time frequenting truck stops
As we scope out all the best spots
To witness a lowering from the clouds
Traveling the state as much as the gas tank allows

After sending our pictures to the weather guy
We’ll stop for pulled pork and pie
Looking at the sunset in the sky
Like we did before our kids were born

Trajectory

Night after night the dream would come again
Of the tin men who want me to become like them
They gift me instructions as to my functions
And how to operate throughout my lifespan

At ten I am to make many friends
At twenty pursue wealth aplenty
At thirty a life partner must be a certainty
At forty revel in my offspring’s glory–

Every morn I’d wake from my slumber
Only to lumber towards the mirror
And realize I had idolized
Someone else’s trajectory

For what has become of me?
Picky who I associate with
Enough money to live comfortably
But without spouse or kids

The tin men want me to live a blueprint
That I badly wanted but was never meant
Through choices and varying motivations
Side explorations and heeding different voices

So the blueprint remains a trinket
When my steampunk dreams seemed legit
Sometimes revisited like an old home
Whenever a tin man’s idle heart absently roams