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Tag Archives: Gary Bowers

the skull in the ribcage

March 12, 2025
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i am imagining/expanding my horizon as a sculptor/by sculpting the more than two hundred individual bones/of a human skeleton

and having done that/have the bones be three-dee scanned/and fabricated in porcelain/with a three-dee printer/in enormous quantity/and variety of sizes

and with this huge number of hellish tinkertoys/assemble odd dioramas/such as a bone house/surrounded by a picket fence/made of femurs/connected by clavicles

or a portrait of lincoln/with tiny carpal bones/assembled into his beard/and eyebrows/and a little patella/for his wart

the bones could make anything/from petunias to starships

but what has indelibly seared its image into my brain/is a ribcage and upper spine assembly/within which/is a heart-sized skull

the skull would be made not of porcelain but silicone

and via interior bones and a small motor/and maglev tech/would beat like a heart/faster if excited/slower if asleep

and could travel within the ribcage/peering out of the cage of the ribs/with its eye sockets

imprisoned and wildly free/at the same time

Carrot Salad

March 11, 2025
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Carrot salad parts enmesh

Shreds of carrot dabs of mayo

Raisins soaked and near-grape fresh

Milk or cream for gum/paste kayo

Mix and taste and change the mixture

Dare to add an odd ingredient

Fold and sweeten free from stricture

Take your time be inexpedient

Take your time to eat it also

Savor each cascading morsel

Chakra zings and doom rings false–O

Certain treats do Life ensorcel!

testing: one, two, me

March 10, 2025
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“Why are you here to have your memory tested?” “I forgot. –Joking!” Beginning of interview phase of neuropsychological testing for patient Gary Bowers, March 10, 2025

we had my pal marty on speakerphone/so he could give input on my cognitive issues

i described blanking out on names and forgetting i had done things

marty confirmed my argumentativeness/but said he’d learned to be more understanding/and i added “we both have”/and we agreed that my directional dyslexia/is nothing new

we bid marty farewell and thanks/i ended the call/ and dr. m commenced the testing

she did stuff like read a list of words/and have me recall as many as i could/in any particular order

then some numbers in strings progressively long

there was one segment involving making a sort of cryptogram transcription/of random-order letters of the alphabet

the worst i did was the test where i was shown an array of six shapes for ten seconds/and asked to draw them from memory

i sucked at that one

then she turned me over to her assistant e/who told me two stories and asked me to retell them/as accurately as i could

had me use blocks to reproduce two-colored designs

read me a list of paired words like “ice°cream” and “wood°fire” and then another list/and asked me which words had been on the first list

there was another list of paired words/and i was asked to describe how they were similar

“habit” and “tradition” were one of the pairs

and there was plenty of other stuff/and somewhere in there i found out/that I don’t know what the hell “pavid” means

the last and most fun thing was simply reading a list of words/that were increasingly unlike the way they were pronounced/and i was proud to give “hyperbole” the four-syllable treatment/and to add some french nasality to “piquant”

but the last word was a mideast (i think) doozy/whose last three letters were i d h/and i am sure i mispronounced it/but equally sure/that none of my fellow glendale high school class of 72 graduated/would get it right either

.

after the testing came feedback from dr. m/that filled me with jazzy joyous comfort

six words were especially thrilling

“there is no indication of dementia”

Laugh, Emoji, Laugh

March 9, 2025
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Laugh, Emoji, Laugh

In the lively arena of Social Media political discussion

Someone might post something that espouses a viewpoint you abhor, and you counter their point with facts and logic, thinking your response beyond reproach and repercussion,

But behold, there are those who don’t like what you say and therefore don’t like you and they are happy to let you know

That you are the Scum of the Earth and you are The Problem and why don’t you crawl back under the rock you crawled under or make like a tree and leave or hang your head in shame and go.

Your logic, your facts, your reasoning cut no ice with certain true believers

Who think beliefs are like votes and once they have voted they are forever devoted and instead of counter-logic and superior reason they reach for pitchforks and torches and meat cleavers,

And one more tool in their arsenal is a favorite of passive-aggressives who have nothing to say because lazy or cowardly but oh gee

Behold a way to mark the territory: the insidious Laugh Emoji.

It is the weapon of choice for those too ineloquent to speak but with an urge to mock

And don’t want to take the time to comment, preferring to hit and run, deride and dash, with the subtlety of a caveman’s club rather than the finesse of the nerve pinch of Mr. Spock,

But when you ask What’s So Funny? they like as not use another Laugh Emoji, wiggling away easily

In the manner of the passive-aggressive, just effing with you with minimum effort, quickly and weaselly.

But, Friends, please keep on speaking your truths and taking your stands, because it is vital to oppose this Rush Limbaugh and that Tucker Carlson and other Bull Connor,

And if you get a Laugh Emoji, realize it says more about them than about you, and wear it like a badge of honor.

.

Grateful acknowledgement to the spirit of Ogden Nash for the use of his style.

now smelt snowmelt

March 9, 2025
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the tilt of the planet offers up the north to the sun/and new warmth turns crystal to flow

the new heat activates an earthy redolence/activates hormonal response in creatures

and in the smelters of certain minds/the metal of new resolve is refined

hope shakes off sleep and rises

The Ethical Executioner

March 8, 2025
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Once upon a time there was a land that retained an executioner.

It was an elected position. The person was always known to the public, never wore a mask, and had final say over who was to die or be exiled.

Executions were rare and exiles uncommon. The probing questions posed, and the answers given, if any, were always transcribed and put on public display. Below the transcription were analytical comments. All citizens were invited to comment.

They had about ten executions a year on average. The executioner, who was popular as any rock star of later days, offered all those condemned to death a variety of lethal exits, from a never-wake-up sleep potion to head-chopping to defenestration for the more theatrical. An accomplished chef, the executioner lavished expense and attention on the last meal, and a favorite request was “surprise me.” Legend has it that he created the first Chef’s Surprise, and the diner died smiling hours before his execution was scheduled to take place.

One fateful day an attempt was made on the King’s life. The suspect was the executioner’s own mother. The trial took but two days, the old woman offering no defense nor explanation except “I felt it was in our best interest to dethrone the King.”

After a brief interview with his mother, the executioner announced that her death by guillotine would take place at dawn the next day, and he would ask the King himself to pull the lever to release the blade. “I am able to delegate the task, but am ethically constrained not to do it myself.”

Near dawn, the lady was offered last words. She shook her head and went to her knees, positioning her neck so that her throat rested gently on the slot guiding the blade.

The King burst into tears.

“By Royal decree,” said the King, “I spare this woman’s life. I offer my own life instead. My only stipulation is that she keep her silence as to why she tried to kill me.”

Soon the King assumed the position. But the executioner did not pull the lever, instead nodding to his mother, who solemnly stepped up and ended the King’s life.

What happened afterward is another story.

ends

March 7, 2025
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the garlic bread end beckoned/murmuring that seven oven minutes at threefifty/would make it perfect/and so it was

as i munched i realized/that the frequency of nocturnal bathroom visits/was increasing/and the next visit to the urologist/might be dire/and naturally my hypochondriacal imagination/leapt forward to end-of-life issues/stark as the zipper-sound/of a body bag

dancing away from such morbid musings/i thought happily of the weekend now imminent/and the poetry I would hear/the friends I would see/and the meal after the reading

but for some bizarre reason/the image of a scottish terrier’s hindquarters/with a furiously wagging tail/tugging the tender flesh of the perineum hither and yon/popped into my head/and won’t unpop

time to go back to a bedpartnerless bed

where my garlic breath will not offend

We Interrupt This Villanelle

March 6, 2025
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The Clay at times transcends decor and pottery

With shape and decoration proving timeless.

The potter wins the artisanal lottery

.

And though some day time makes her feebly doddery

The work she’s done endures in realms not chimeless.

The Clay at times transcends–

.

Now hold on just a second, Buster. You have set yourself up for failure. Sure, you will find more rhymes for Pottery and Timeless, but soon you’ll resort to Snottery and Slimeless and even worse, and the Poetry Gods will mock you dismissively. You’ve got the easy-rhyming Clay and the not-bad Potter and the even-better Pot to work with. Start over!

But–but–I wanted to do something with words no one has used before…

Sometimes there’s a reason for things never being done before, Bud. Here’s what you do. Go back to the potter’s wheel and MAKE that ‘timeless’ thing. It might take you a year, but it will be time well spent. Give the world something to marvel at, THEN write about it.

Yeah, that makes sense. But that’s doing things the hard way, isn’t it?

No, fella. That’s doing things the infinitely more rewarding way.

You’re right, dammit.

Now Get Crackin’!!

inci sion

March 5, 2025
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“stick…burn” the surgeon warned/as he injected yellow fluid into the hand

the local numbing agent acted quickly

an incision was made and spreaders made of it/a pair of conjoined parentheses

the surgeon deftly sliced compartmental tissue/that had impeded nerve transmission

soon he was satisfied with the loose weave/of the tissue

bound the parentheses back into a line/with internal stitches that were flesh-entombed

and two strips of surgical tape were crisscrossed over the cut

and gauze and an ace bandage completed the wrapture

.

nine days later here we are/and on the hand is a rorschach test of sorts

you may see a petroglyph of a coyote/or the trickster himself

it could be a pond in winter/or an ideogram meaning “desolation”

or a bridge or pier

but the patient sees “slow healing”/and reminds himself

to be a patient patient