Gene McCormick- Three Poems

The Persistence Of Drops

Windshield wipers sweep half-moon circles,

brushing aside rain spatter

before it angles, meanders, wends

to the bottom of the glassy shield,

the wipers in metronomic repetition

no matter the persistence of drops.

Right to left and back creating a clear slate

excepting unfettered raindrops

couched under the arc of the wipers; even more

settling beyond reach of flexible rubber blades.

Gray sky spreads across an ochre platform,

the horizon line unobstructed by glassy beads

but late in the fall the chilling rain doesn’t

green-up grass or trees or shrubs.

Everything is just wet.

The Beauty Behind

The Donut Shop Counter

An attractive thirty-ish émigré from Cambodia

sits on a corner stool behind the shops counter

watching her husband use stainless steel tongs

to pluck donuts from wire shelving

as Sunday morning after-church customers

select sugar-coated preferences.

Cell phone flat against her ear, she

smiles large, revealing small, even teeth

while speaking in her native language.

During the week she works the donut shop alone,

showing off a new lipstick color,

deep red, almost purple,

and bright red platform shoes with yellow straps

complementing toenails painted green.

This is the woman she is when her husband

is not around to serve up confections.

  

Emmit Street

Rubbing the palm of his left hand hard

without looking at it.

Really no point to it, to rubbing it.

Doesn’t itch. Just needs rubbing.

Pushing out of the recliner, Ed walks out of the

upstairs workspace, along the hardwood hallway,

turns right at the stairs, down to the first floor,

crosses the foyer to the family room.

Hooked up to a satellite dish, the sound system

offers any type of music, any time.

Today the choice is old-time rock and roll,

the Stones edging Chuck Berry and The Doors.

Adjusting the sound, he looks around,

opens the bar cabinet, pulls out Jack Daniels.

Jack & Jagger. Jack & Mick. Better rescue than 911.

Listens to Sir Mick rock out; a loose soul.

Fills the glass half full, turns the sound higher,

listens to cars drive by, tires on wet pavement.

It has been raining all day. Need the rain.

Sam the black lab liked rain. Been dead two years.

Clanks a few ice cubes in the glass of Jack,

turns up the Stones tune

just short of window-rattling,

retraces his steps back up the stairs

thinking he should have stayed downstairs.

Wet tires on pavement make a soothing hiss,

and the glass in his hand is near empty.

Fuck the recliner, to himself, I’m not dead yet,

standing by the hall window looking down

on a yard of straw-colored grass.

Yes, we need the rain, he thinks.

Sam would be out there,

chasing, rivulets running off his back and nose.