Hands

Bleeding knuckles drip
On rotten wood
Like red sweat off a wrinkled head.
Jagged nails rest on scarred fingers
Busted purple at the tip
Like helmets on witless soldiers,
Blithely following commands.
Real bruises remind that the hands
Are fully man’s:
The product of a hammer swinging slip.
I thought that carpentry
Had left my hands just like the Carpenter’s.
But I was wrong.
These are a soldier’s hands.
These knuckles bled as I beat Him.
These nails chipped as I pierced Him.
These hands bruised as I pounded Him
Into the cross.
I won’t make Pilot’s damn mistake.
I can’t
Wash the Carpenter’s blood from my hands.
It’s the only thing that covers my scars.

Antkowiaks are like Oranges or Poem for Morgan

The youngest girl, my Morgan Rae,
Near Eight and blonde and bright.
Her reckless teeth brighten my day,
They flash all bent and white.

Her older sister, fourteen now,
Both beautiful and tall.
And even if my dad allows
I’ll kill the first to call.

Her brother Bran is big and mean
So says one who might dare
But if you pass this grizzly sheen
You find a teddy bear

My mother, goddess of the home,
Both love and grace supplies.
A mighty woman she alone
Cooked food for Bran and I.

Our father kind, the patriarch,
Would bounce me on his knee.
One day I learned his past was dark;
He’d rocked on MTV.

That leaves just me, the second son
No better and no worse,
I did what none thought could be done
Antkowiak in verse.

News

So when reporting the news, just what are "the facts"? At a gay rights parade or abortion rally is evil just as much a fact as the color of the chief organizers shirt? thoughts?

In other news, notice the new blog counter at the bottom of the page. Important numbers will be rewarded.

T

Professor Appel's Eyebrow

We stand upon this barren balding plain,
Our ranks much thinned by craft of fursome foe.
We stand the pale thin vangaurds ‘gainst the rain.
But cannot block the sun or shield from snow.
And who could be the enemy so great?
The self-important foe who drives us back,
He forays north while rests his dext’rous mate.
He flies enraged in self-impressed attack.
Twixt jutting ears, above all-seeing eyes
He reigns. Each Tuesday jumping in the air,
Our border ocean creased in pleased surprise
He sails across to make our army bare.
But who are we this eyebrow fills with dread?
We are the hairs that die on Appel’s head.

March 31

My eyes fly open and hit the day like headlights on a dear, the first flicker of the oncoming collision. As my head twists toward the digital alarm clock, the traitor, its sneering face gleefully winks 6:54. Morning Prayer starts at 7:00. I fall up out of bed and trip on yesterday’s shirt. It is black with an orange and white logo. Black hides stains. Yesterday’s shirt just become today’s. The button-down is suitably matched by yesterday’s jeans. I only have to make it through morning prayer after all, where everyone’s hair is still shower wet and everyone’s eyes can barely be seen peeking out of the bags that carry them. I trundle into my study for my brown boots and the wall clock’s long arm ends in what looks like a middle finger somewhere closer to twelve than eleven. My computer reassures me that it’s only 6:56. My watch pronounces an angry 6:59. I run through the dark house back to my bedroom. Grab keys. Grab phone. The stupid little piece of technology idiotically grins 6:58. I certainly don’t have time for a coat. I run outside and slam headfirst into the new day and six inches of spring snow.

Summer was over. Only this Sunday stood between me and the cavernous abyss that is the eighth grade. Fellowship dinner had drawn to a close and everyone except the Boswells had gone home. Dr. Boswell, my father, Brandon and I sat on my back porch, weathered and worn to a splintered gray, in the cool September air, with four glasses of wine, in four groaning green lawn chairs that shot creaking reproaches every time we shifted our weight. Dr. Boswell was wearing a blue oxford shirt. His belly fell over his belt like a blue oxford wave over a khaki beach. My father’s tenor voice said something that I was too busy poking Brandon to hear, and the good doctors epicurean eyes lit up and he nodded in grateful assent. My father walked inside past the busted screen door leaning at ease against the house. He returned as Prometheus, a wooden box tucked under his arm. The box. The humidor. It was red like blood and smelled like heaven. He handed Dr. Boswell a thick robusto. But he was not done. He put his hand in the humidor again and pulled out two light thin cigars. Six inches long and three quarters of an inch in diameter. A fitting first. Its blond tan hue laughed at my red sun-kissed hands. Its wrapper was thick with veins and smooth as felt. It tasted like chocolate and leather and fire and earth and summer. It was six inches of summer: three months of summer tightly rolled and laid in my hand.

Recess

The grass was soft. It felt like running your hand over your father’s best ties. Ten years later, when I graduated, this patch of heaven had been reduced to yellow stubble by ten more classes of glow in the dark sneakers. But back then the grass was as young as I. God’s green earth met man’s black asphault. We could get close enough to Indian landing Road to feel the wind from the cars push us back on to grass. Then Miss Brophy would yell for us to be safe. I was smaller then. As close to cute as I ever will be. I had a bowl cut. It was tag, and red shirts were it. I had a red shirt. Matt had a white shirt. Ready. Go. He was made of matchsticks. I was made of logs. It was not the fairest of chases. I grazed his shirt. He didn’t believe me, so we both kept running. As we jumped roots I shortened the gap. My legs were longer. He turned his coconut head to see just how close I was. I gave him a tag that was more like a push. He turned and his head hit a low thick branch like a softball on a Louisville slugger. He fell to the ground alternately crying and laughing. The giant knot on his head felt like a stress ball. We were young enough to worry and old enough to laugh. The perfect Godsmack.