Chock·a·block discombobulated poem

for your reading pleasure

dashed off ad hoc

my final literary endeavor before

hour hand affixed

to intricately carved cuckoo clock

displaying carved leaves, birds,

deer heads (Jagdstück design),

other animals, aquatic militia man,

etc feigns firing flintlock

(announcing onset of

daylight savings times)

said French soldier christened Jacque

dipping paddles of oarlock

into time stream

as the sun beats down,

he doth shockingly unfrock.

Once again modest wily word wizard

sports, struts his stuff inarguably

a blinding blizzard

of poetic gumbo mumbo jumbo,

his convoluted crafted vizard

easily misinterpreted as offal

lee batty, quirky, snooty, trippy...

who honestly doesn't know A from izzard.

The ticking seconds will not wait

while yours feebly cobbles etches

across blank figurative slate

lame resultant impasse I narrate

experiencing disappointment

earlier spurt of balderdash,

gibberish, rubbish... which I hate

yet must suffice impossible mission

to complete satisfactory poem does agitate.

Vainglorious idea to employ

daylight savings time

even a mediocre reasonable rhyme

futile effort finds current strife prime

juncture to breakaway

and resume later nighttime or

call writing aspiration quits

crowded house that for being sublime?

Unlikely literary pursuit or aim

will find yours truly a best seller

never experiencing accolades

nor remuneration to claim

truth be told, cuz I haint seeking

neither fortune nor fame.

The principle impetus explaining zeal

to discipline generic human to hone

his ability, where basic blocks of English

language (words) linkedin incorporating

mental cogs and gears mesh

making (mishmash) as figurative wheel

in the sky keeps on turning

perhaps divine intervention

intercedes as yours truly takes

lock, stock, and barrel of himself, one

bumbling, grumbling, tumbling schlemiel

cue hapless characteristic vagrant tramp

as viewed courtesy black and white newsreel

enroute to meet cobbler, cuz worn out heel

actually kind individual stopped to offer hobo

an uber lyft courtesy fancy automobile.

I watched a man fall from the 40th floor today

No one believed me

I could not find the body

I could not find any blood

But, I heard his scream

And still, no one believed me

I watched the people that live in the building

Each one picked up their daily mail

Only one mailbox remained untouched

The mailbox labeled, “Eugene Churchill”

The mailbox of the jumper

That no one believed jumped

I hear his scream every morning

Exactly at 10:07 am

I see him fall every morning

Also at 10:07 am

And it bothers me

That no one believes I am affected so

So I go about my day being somewhere else

Hoping that I may not remember

What I cannot forget

Hoping that Eugene Churchill

Can forget to remember me

At 10:07 am

"What does your Dad do?" Tommy asked, blinking behind thick glasses, consciously, and earnest, waiting for an answer on the shaded driveway in the summer afternoon, as I took a breath and sighed real slow through the teeth.

He wiped the crumbs off the metal from the conveyor with the greasy red terry rag. He'd been within the mortared concrete walls since 06:30. Eight hours plus "bringing lunch," meant he'd be out at 03:00PM. Some would say "a-whole-nother-day-ahead," if thinking in shifts, and disregarding the human.

"...a machine-Operator?" said Tommy, blinking and not fully processing, "That's cool." Tom Senior was 15 years an accountant. Two plus years of Tommy's life, and never quite gripping imagination.

One more hour, one God-have-mercy one, and Friday would be done. Luck was not with him, or maybe it was, as a test of faith and endurance. The film had ended. The thin transparent Saran type plastic that sealed the Variety Pack. The little mini ounce size packages all coming together into a carton, and then into a larger box, and one on top of the other. He measured his days by tons.

"You mean like a forklift?" Tommy continued, inspired. A man behind the wheel of a truck is in the driver seat and might be King. The machine moves the man, and the Man moves things, on command.

Ninety-six pounds was the roll of film. That's ninety-six to his 126. He was the Machine-Operator. Yet the film was to be lifted, overhead, between spindles, with his bare hands. A Herculean effort at any time, but all the more as the clock wound down on the whole week.

"Well what does it lift?" Tommy persisted, as I grew flustered, throat dry.

...Double Stuff, Nut N' Butter, Toblerone, Oreo, the empty calorie was the thing that suddenly weighed so much on legs that stood all day and fought so hard to not be rendered mindless. "Working the line," he would be told, but refused to fool himself, by the assumption of standing around at the conveyor sorting and counting. He counted, thoroughly, and honestly, and not only the standing weight, box after box, that had to be brought to the line, then unpacked, only to be packed up all over again into a more cumbersome block. There was no "standing around." Operating meant keeping the conveyor running, by running around and adjusting the gears that always fell out of alignment as if in silent protest to the manufactory. The long week had its girth not in steps, but in miles. Tons of miles, and now this extra 96-pounds of deadweight film on top of it all, to lock into place, to finish today and prepare for next week. His only comfort in that it would mean a little distance early in the week before he'd lift another one.

"Cookies," I said in a near whisper, tasting the shame.

He took the heavy paneled pallets round back, like giant wafers, at the end of the day, to where the trucks would pick them up, by forklift, at drop off and pick up the next AM. Oak pallets, he learned, because he'd tried to reclaim a few that were broken and the saw tooth only smoldered and burned, refusing to gnaw through the tough wood. He thought he'd cut the boards, into shelves, paint them and sell them to supplement the near minimum wage. Near, because as machine Operator he earned a whole dollar more than anybody else. It earned him respect, and distain, two herniated discs, and intense back pain.

"Cookies?" Tommy said, a corner of his mouth lifting spontaneously, no doubt imagining a lazy hand stealing a mouthful of broken treats as occupational bonus, "What kind?"

"Nabisco," I said, hoarsely, taking a drink from my water bottle, that grew heavier on the heart, as I emptied it... picturing transparent bottle, after bottle, after bottle... pallet after pallet.

2024 FEB 09