Ken Hada is a fourth generation Oklahoman, descendant of Danish and Hungarian immigrants: Gypsy poets, barn dance aficionados, art lovers, amateur philosophers, wheat farmers, preachers, teachers and common-sense craftsmen.

“These poems, acting as spare parts themselves, go into the making of one smooth-running, powerful engine.”

 - Diane Glancy

Author of Pushing the Bear

 

August

by J. Don Cook

 

It was one of those days in August

When the yellow sky dripped grease

And the burning wind carried creosote

 

Boiled free from the ties

The rails shimmering

Heated ribbings neath thin

Soles,

 

Balanced, spontaneous bursting

Of superheated acorn, tympanic

Organic accompaniment to the

Overhead cicada choir,

 

When I noticed a limp strand

Of dishwater blonde glued with sweat

To your brow and your trembling

Red-slashed mouth,

 

Which I kissed shocked by it

And the taste of salt.

 

 

I Should Have Paid More Attention

by J. Don Cook

 

That flash of yellow in her mouth

As words wash over her tongue

Words mushy and mellow

Just after breakfast of fried

Eggs and I knew it was a smudge

Of yolk on her crimson gums,

 

In the tropics where hibiscus

Screamed here I am,

 

And I thought of miller’s tropic

Of cancer amid his usual fit

Of existential glee notice with

Authorial alertness a bit of egg

Yolk clinging to his friend’s

French moustache,

 

And gloat, penis in hand, that

He was living in the villa Borghese

And that he was poor and that he

Was the happiest man alive,

 

I should have paid more attention,

 

And of that other ex-pat Papa

Meandering with stub pencil on the

Left bank from table to table scribbling

A great novel remembering a feast

Exclaiming to all who would listen

That it was a good wine, yes, a very

Very good wine,

 

And the great third man, when the

Train churns to a stop and Joseph

Cotton thrust his massive curly

Head from the open window

Suddenly bathed, enveloped by an

Errant burst of steam,

 

And his gleefully expectant face

Breath held for adventure in herringbone

 

And the rising of the haunting zither

 

And my daughters five and six in

Flannel-clad mornings (one dotted with

Sunflowers, the other Winnie the pooh)

Flow from their cots to the ritual

Motherized volume-turned-up-high

Strains of Peter and the wolf

While at the window I stand with

Bitter coffee watching squirrels dash

Among the haughty pines

My precious log house breathing

Around me like a lazy hippo,

 

And when they’re barely out the door

I switch to pepper’s good morning,

Good morning and the raucous

Sound of the barnyard punctuated

By the upbeat drums of the bignosedone.

 

I should have paid more attention,

 

And nights lying between them

Their warm moist bodies oozing

Pretend-fear while I pretend-whisper

A tall goodnight tale of good-once-

Again-overcoming-evil,

 

And finally the rhythmic rise and fall

Of sleep and the smell of little-girl

Shampoo, their stereo breaths

Warming each ear: a bellows,

 

And midnight later on the porch with

A final beer wondering who signed

Me up for this.

 

I should have paid more attention,

 

And later we sat solemn hands folded

Before the judge who said at last

You’re now divorced and you turn

With your always wry and slightly

Ironic wit and say you do know this

Is Valentine’s Day, don’t you?

 

 

Sperm-A-Tozoid

by J. Don Cook

 

sometimes when I’m reading I’ll lay the book across my face

and inhale the musty acid aromas of yellowed paper,

ink and glue,

   that dusty backroom forgotten aisle of ancient tomes

pretending I’m inhaling the words, that heady smell a brief

if minor aphrodisiac, curling my toes, concluding I actually

prefer an older book, these odors ingrained, but even a new

book smells good, the melding of ink and paper, but give me

an old book any day, the dust and ragged edges and moth-wing

residue, the stained

oiled smudges of another’s feverish fingers, leaving (perhaps)

oil of potato chips or mayonnaise, perhaps dripped from

impromptu chicken salad,

 

and the spine, the most human part of a book, shouting

author and title, at once reflecting age and condition and

the care it was given—broken, damaged, arthritic, the pages unravel

and fall out, perhaps reinserted out of order (maddeningly)

and when I see someone rape a book by violently yanking

back its wings, the cracking protest heard across the room,

 

I cringe.

 

but here I must confess an idiosyncratic fascination with

what I call “sperm-a-tazoids,” those meandering

maze-like spaces down a printed page, connecting

sentence to sentence, creating patterns (sometimes it helps

to blur one’s eyes) random, but sometimes not—once I saw

the letter “C” encircling the entire page, a white letter

emblazoned in the type, and once a clear diagonal path

almost the entire length of the page!  (some authors present

more opportunities for sperm-a-tazoids, see Henry Miller

and Faulkner; see page forty-two of Sanctuary)

 

so I mentioned these to Lucas and he gave me a quizzical

glance—cockeyed even—and said he’d never noticed them,

and I said it speaks to patterns in all things, and aren’t

trends and patterns—these well-worn trails, these little

runs—aren’t these important, and he said

perhaps they are.