Eleventh Hour

Eleventh Hour

Black-capped Chickadees and plump Robins

Hop about our empty garden,

picking at strewn seeds, on this day of remembrance.

November gusts draw water from my eyes,

forcing me to walk through their swath.

Like our Lee,

in the eighteen-year-old innocence of his life,

forced to face the swath and flak of our enemy.

Shot down over the Mediterranean,

his remains remain in the sheltered sea.

This November day is dark and mournful,

My little boy chases birds and squirrels into the woods.

They too, have disappeared for the moment,

On this eleventh day, of the eleventh month,

remembering those who fought at the eleventh hour.

Like our Bob, set at the helm of a Sherman Tank.

Fighting Rommel in a phalanx of steel, diesel fuel, and gun powder plumes.

Haunted by a memory of once returning after leave to find his friends had fallen.

The knowledge that it could have been him, but was them.

He came home with a permanent limp.

The leaves have fallen from their trees, and the days will grow darker.

Long winter nights bury the remains of the glories of spring.

My breath billows in the cold air, sending up signals.

Our little man has fallen asleep in my arms,

The birds return to feed in peace.

Written by Bateman-Ezra

Copyright 2011

Indigo Bunting

Indigo Bunting

An Indigo Bunting alights on the fence-rail beside me,

Perched and overlooking our late summer wheat.

Two poplars stand abreast, on either side,

Giving one another a wide berth,

Surrounded by an auric sea.

I watch his refracted blue feathers flicker;

He turns to meet my gaze.

Cocking his head to one side,

He rocks slowly, from one leg to another,

As if he was sure about something.

I smile at him for a moment,

Then return my gaze to the undulating waves.

Thermal gusts engulf the four of us.

My friend’s feathers are combed

By fingers in the wind.

The poplar leaves stir to a roaring timbre,

My mind is swept clean,

Responding to sights, sounds, and smells.

The little bunting leaps into a gust, carried away.

Much the same, I expect, for us all.

Written by Bateman-Ezra

Copyright 2011

Water's Edge

Water’s Edge

From the old house,

I look out at

Snow-capped coastal mountains.

This wooden womb where once

My childhood fears

Got the better of me.

Down beyond fall maples,

I watch the sun sinking,

Reflecting off the inlet,

Where once a young cadet stood on the prow.

White-capped, boots black, and sharp creases.

Moored at the water’s edge.

I still smell the boathouse,

Thick with salt,

Thick with sea.

I sometimes sit

On the bench near the water

And read.

My moments there

Are all now

Fast asleep.

Written by Bateman-Ezra

Copyright 2011

Desperate Times

Santa is a neuron

In a lake of meaning.

Ideal forms are the thoughts of God.

A uni - verse.

Nature lost its end for ours;

Disqualification of the cosmos.

Our body bites into the world;

Conscious fireworks.

Matter cannot feel pain;

Mere ontological danglers.

Desperate times

in the philosophy of mind.

Written by Bateman-Ezra

Copyright 2011

This is a quote poem extracted from a lecture given by Robert Doede, Professor of Philosophy at Trinity Western University, on November 10, 2004 at Regent College in Vancouver, BC. This poem does not reflect the beliefs or opinions of Robert Doede. Any similarity to such is purely coincidental. The professor is aware of the poem and approves.

The Reasonable Prophet

The Reasonable Prophet

Three years in the belly

Of this school.

Inoculated

With a weak strain of legal education.

Spit out on the pavement

Like a prophet.

Everyone hoping you will

Say wonderful things, ascending in a chariot.

Great expectations

Are heaped on you like burning coals.

Concocted well-wishing, like coins,

Sinking indefinitely.

Our bloodshot ears;

Plenary pedantry sprinkled over us

Like ritual baptism.

Vaporous information, burned away.

The reasonable man lay dying

Like the Samaritan’s, half dead.

Words twisted in a scandalous fashion

To indulge amorphous ideals.

Fruit bulges from the vine,

Violet grapes of war.

The Cathedral Bell melted down

To a statue of a fist.

Nothing can be saved.

Only warning.

And they will get their prophet.

And their ears will burn.

Written by Bateman-Ezra

Copyright 2011

Holding Back the Night

Once more, September lets go its laurel wreath;

Smoke rises from stone stacks to ashen sky.

Winds frigid and stiff chase little ones indoors.

Dusk stretches out like Kudzu Vine over the valley.

River Birches and Winged Elms chafe in the culling wind;

Midday gales leave a patchwork in the heavens;

A sky of sackcloth and ashes;

The auric sun slides finally over the hills and out of sight.

Eastern Cottontails and Greys bury windfall;

A long darkness lay ahead.

Little caches of life,

Partaken of as remembered.

I sit here perched on a stump of Bitternut Hickory,

Looking across the dale, and homeward.

In the distance, oil lamps bulbous on the windowsills,

Throwing down white sashes, holding back the night.

Written by Bateman-Ezra

Copyright 2011

Old Lady Murphy - Poem

Old Lady Murphy

The tired old house,

Worn out,

Like all the dreams of the children

Who played themselves out in her,

Running home at dusk.

Late October leaves

Lay strewn across the lawn,

Still cut by

A boy up the street who

Never left home.

The veranda swing

Rocks gently in the

Arms of the wind,

Squawking at me,

Wondering where I’ve been.

Through the bay window,

The furniture is covered

In white linen and dust.

Like Havisham’s life,

Frozen in a moment.

No one is home.

I sit on the stoop and see

A mason jar lay wedged under the deck rail.

Upon examination, it’s a bee,

A little girl runs up to me.

“Do you know whose house this is?” she opines.

“Old lady Murphy, …” She answered before I could speak.

A woman’s voice calls out from somewhere down the block,

And off she runs.

Old lady Murphy.

Mom, did you know you were “old lady Murphy”?

You probably did.

The lid on the Mason Jar has initials scratched in under the rust.

They were mine: she must have kept it.

I opened the jar, and let the bee go.

Written by Bateman-Ezra

Copyright 2011