Stephen Sutherlin is a designer, poet and musician. He writes poetry about life in the southwest and enjoys metrical lyricism.
Life’s hard enough
On a wintering Eagle
A war to fight for
Every meal
But when this girl
Gets determined
A brutish male makes
No successful appeal
Stands her frosty
Ground again and again
Until one talon slips in-
to the chest
Of her challenger…
Razor requisite
To back away
Assessing mortal
Potential of this
Violent affair
To our mother,
We must most humbly apologize
We have been bad children. You have provided for us all these good years.
And, we have torn up the
backyard, dug up or
Cut down all the trees;
Stripped out all the copper
Wiring in the house and
Took a crap on your dinner
Table. We’re sorry…hopefully
Our children will treat you better.
PS – Hey, I’m glad at least
One of us is recovering
From the Coronavirus.
Mr. Robins
Takes a bath
He’s not concerned with math
Except perhaps
To count their eggs
Or later how many mouths they’ve fed
But today he’s just getting clean
A deep splash
And shake
Sending water splattering
He takes this
“Bird bath”
Seriously
He pays no mind to you and me.
…
Not until the dog comes out
Does Mr. Robins
Give a shout
No, now that he
Is clean all through
Fly to the nest’s
Alls left to do.
We are the outcomes
of our inputs
limit your sources
stop divergent thinking
mask off your surroundings
and you will collapse into
the feedback loop.
Opening all valves
at once can be overwhelming
when we have time to take it
all in, we can drown
but shut off the flow
and we die of thirst.
A balance is next to impossible
the mechanisms complex and
set to provide for addictive desires
–fear, consume, fear, consume, fear–
that was at least a familiar beat
now only fear fear fear…
The silence blinding
The compass spinning
The purpose transmuting
The desire metamorphic
The future unclear
The sign
It says
“Please stay at Home”
Forget your car
Forget your bones
In their closets
They must stay
All your ambition’s
(Fears) —put away
At least for now
At least today…
——
This first time directive
We can collectively recall
To just do nothing
To sit in our stalls
But these American
Mustangs are getting
Restless
We like to roam
We like it breathless
We just don’t know just what to do
When we’re told to stay home
Until this is through
Nothing
Nothing
Nothing new
These bird’s
songs
These
Poets
This attempt
At some-
thing true
Doesn’t mean
I’ll stop it
Doesn’t mean
You cared
These birds
And this poet
You’ve rarely
Even heard.
But, the song
the song
It carries on
(Even when you
Don’t listen
In your mind)
You
Sing
Along
& We’ve carried
Out our mission.
The geraniums
I brought in to
Stave off frosted night
Red and white
Fireworks
Bursting in the morning light
A common incantation
For better and for worse
A common name —in any
Country, often it can be heard
For so many named their children
After that man from Galilee
As if to predetermine
What good people they could be
Of these fishes and birds he speaks
Comes this lesson for you and me
Be fruitful and do multiply
Sing songs from the tops of the trees
This life is so certainly short
When stacked up to eternity
So waste not time on petty things
Give to the sick, the poor, the needy
If you, yourself are not hungry
Then for someone else do something more
For in the end, when you’ve nothing left
Your deeds will open your last door…
I’m not sure
How these rabbits
Crept in
Off with all
The eggs that
We’ve been makin’
Double time
Before
Easter Day
If in time
We are
To lay
And as
for that
Primordial question
There is
no doubt
It was the chicken
—she works hard everyday
to make that egg
that you just ate
Now to
these rabbits
On Easter Day
Now to the pot
Let stew
Be made
As for us
Chickens
We are happy to stay
Out in
The yard
To continue to lay