The Baptism: a short story

Available on Twitter @1fjefp or on the Jef Peeples Facebook page.

Senior Poem 2013: 17

Standing on a hill, an arm’s length from the moon,

a small teary boy with a one-eyed bear in hand,

holds a balloon tethered to him by the thinnest string

while his face is pressed against the glass of stars.

A train coos a lullaby in the distance while

questions of truth and diligence babysit him.

Why is there hate? When is there pain?

What is a love? Where is hope?

How is alone?

In an empty room where teaching grew,

the desks face forward,

the lead desk abandoned.

Notes on conspiracies folded in corners of books of

Van Gogh.  Starry Nights became dark when the stars fell from

canvas leaving melancholy swirls.

And I at 17

wander to places

too empty to share with company,

too lonely for invitation,

wondering if he or she this young

has such desolate places,

impoverished nightscapes

where cold winds of youth

rattle deserted cans of doubt,

the grime of lust and betrayal smeared on every building,

the scratches of rats’ feet across broken glass,

cat’s fighting in the

dark.

Cloudy, cloudy nights block

all light so that the neon sight of the gaudy motel

sign is the only guide for me.

There is a cloud which demands following,

a fire burning in the night

across forty year fields,

through emptiness where no IPhone rings or Starbucks grows,

over sandy thirsty hills where the ignorant rule and the

foolish gain power.

Lakes of tears and winds of cries

are stilled.

And there is meaning when there are no answers.

Standing on a hill, a ways from the moon,

a small teary boy, a one-eyed bear in hand,

holds a balloon tethered to him by the thinnest string.

Fingers loosen in release

to allow the prized to

join the stars.

Voice

from female fetus #55 million:

It is her Right.
I am not a woman yet.
I am a choice, and choices can be
reversed with consequences averted.
I am the formless void of what is to come.
I am the immigrant awaiting deportment.

If I had a name like
Amy or Jane
instead of one like
Regret or Tissue,
would it be more difficult to say goodbye before
hello?

You can click all day long on “like” on your Facebook;
You can research ‘till dawn DNA and my makeup;
You can turn away now and pray hard that I’ll shut up,
but you can’t give a voice to me now?

If I were born yesterday,
would I be less naive than to believe I’d be
more real,
more loved?

For Jimmy

It becomes too heavy for one person 

on the back on the arm

across the shoulders

Sometimes not as heavy 

as awkward

but sometimes 

Well sometimes heavy too

until it cuts into the chest to bleed

begging to be unpacked

The contents secret

and in the water it does not 

float but drags like stone.

Cover me at the bottom.

Put sand over my mouth.

Sing until I do not speak. 

Until I cannot hear.

Senior Poem 2012: Song

There is a joyfully solemn, seductive harmony of stars which fell on our worshipping lips at creation like tongues of dew.  The song is the eternal legacy of mortals.  Only parents can sing.  Only children can hear. This is the words made song.


Drawn to  the wooden toy  box past her own validation, she cannot
tell  herself any longer that someday is distant.
Delivered in mystery, varnished with history, each toy of her daughter is a
remembering.

_______
Fathers often, especially before the race of dawn, regret they have spent
much less time on fathering, and many more hours at the office  than
required.  At night the scratch at  their chests is more for what was undone than for what was
done.

_______
Daring to remember is like a lullaby, simple in melody, complex in joy,
mimicked by youth from ancients.
Moving from father, daughter, mother, son. Sometimes like a dove to the ark
returning.

_______
Reborn when it is late at night—so
much late that  it is early—the blue soft
down moon glow blankets the beds where hoping children
dream.

_______
Dreams are the verses, mercy the refrain; grace is the metrical
time. Love is found in gifting the song, when we be and stop
doing, with the aged roughed hands of
release.




_______
Fathers, remember the song of tenderness.
Mothers, sing the song of letting go.
Remember, sons, the song of courage.
Daughters, the song of beauty.




There is a song that cradles us at morning, nurtures us at noon, points us to rest in the evening.  There is a tune that stirs us when we falter, quiets us when we worry, welcomes us when we need home.