Category: poetry

so far from there

Jim KempsterLeave a comment

A well-crafted cradle awaited at home:
masterful hands turned each wood post with care,
expectant love sewn into bedding and quilt.
But the night he arrived, they were so far from there.

Summoned to journey to prove their allegiance 
amidst rumors of vengeful tyrant kings, 
they cleared dung from hay for a bed in a trough
and shelter from what the encroaching night brings.

Family back home would have gathered to welcome
with kettles and blankets of comfort to spare.
But here, only strangers followed cries in the fields 
to a drafty hay barn, oh, so far from there.

This winter my heart is heavy and broken
amidst news of a vengeful tyrant king,
can’t rise to the joy on my twinkling bower
or wish for a chorus of angels to sing.

If I’m wanting for hope or assurance tonight
that the world turns towards peace and all that is fair,
I remember the family huddled in the hay
and all that they’d hoped for, so far from there.

Continue reading “so far from there” →

something real

Jim KempsterLeave a comment
An imageless black square, often used to indicate the subject is somber or not for interpretation.

Airbrushed Ashley’s puffed lips 
ask to be my Meta-friend, daily.
Josh-bot phones me on the hour
about my Medicare A and B.
A.I.’s six-digit hands scramble history 
in Pixar-colored newsfeeds
where my friends used to be.
And, junk pollsters survey if I’m mad
enough to donate more and more.

This old historian 
and humanitarian 
vacillates 
between setting the record, 
comment-by-comment, 
or retreating 
to a good book and 
the dog on my knee.

But I know isolation,
like soulless contact, 
breeds despair, 
and Nero fiddles 
with tariffs
while America burns 
out.

So, I join the struggle,
to write 
something real,
wondering
if the algorithms
will expose 
or bury me.

trepidation

Jim KempsterLeave a comment
An imageless black square, often used to indicate the subject is somber or not for interpretation.

Restaurants, 
comic clips, 
cats and dogs,
don’t make it
to the feed
right now.

I open the news
in trepidation. 

Who have they 
terrorized 
today?
Whose fear 
brought them 
pleasure?
Whose distress 
made them feel 
powerful?

How can the 
church lady 
post 
Disneyland pics
while her heroes
destroy
her neighbor

as herself?

last night, first morning

Jim KempsterLeave a comment

Teetering down 8am street on flimsy heels,
the last-night party sequins clinging 
like spackled glitter to first-morning tatters,
passing among bodega owners sweeping out
the last night, 
the first morning
broken spectacles and trampled hats
emblazoned with the digits of the new year,
monumental on last-night billboards
now first-morning dross, no more than 
assigned numbers to be scrawled in 
checks and forms for the next 365.
The first morning.
The last night.
Brash eleventh-hour promises —
trumpeted on paper horns and traffic jamming
with jazzed yelps from the intoxicated chorus
— now sounding mundane and frail 
on the hiss of dawn’s cold blues.

Continue reading “last night, first morning” →

city leaves

Jim KempsterLeave a comment

City leaves, keep their color 
long into Novembers, 
chartreuse and saffron hues 
still aflutter on the avenues
while country cousins 
dour and rust back home.

City leaves hold on 
into their Decembers,
clinging to brittle leases 
on reaches intended 
for short-term stays
well after they’ve 
crinkled brown 
trying not to 
snap
and
fall. 

Continue reading “city leaves” →

bridalwreath

Jim KempsterLeave a comment

IMG_1195antique lace
skirts garden steps
the train of a gown
still brightly bleached
and pressed
despite palpable dust
on fingertips
and faint fragrance
of ancient talcum

on swayed branches
catching my eye
each year
an unassuming
mid-May surprise
halfway between
the giddy parade of
spring’s confetti blossoms
and summer’s sizzling
thick green canopy
marking the memorial
of my first breath Continue reading “bridalwreath” →