Roy Christman
Last day at Weisstock
Get it? It's like Woodstock,
Only this one is in Weissport.
No Joan Baez or Jimi Hendrix here,
But a local band, quite good, on
This cool September night.
Towns that end in "port"
Stood along canals.
The canal that ran through Weissport
Where boats were once repaired
Shut down in the Twenties.
Weisstock runs two days.
This is the last night.
No marijuana here,
No one lights a doobie,
Though opioids are not unknown.
I staff a booth for Carbon County Dems.
You might expect in rural Pennsylvania
I'd get some grief, some nastiness,
But the evening's going well--
They walk by with their kids.
Oh, they're overweight, tattooed,
And badly dressed, but on the whole
They're rather sweet.
And I, in spite of all my efforts,
Am one of them myself.
Visit to a Room Full of Birds at the Everhart Museum
The museum has hundreds of birds in glass cases;
A room full of birds looking slightly disheveled, just a bit tired
From all of those years perching immobile.
Here's birds from New Guinea with fanciful plumes;
Feathers that look like antennae;
Feathers that lack rationale to evolve.
Here you compare a crow to a raven;
Here is an ostrich that fills up its case,
While the wren looks too small to be a real bird.
The intentions were good; good people of Scranton
Knowing robins and sparrows, could see birds of the Congo,
Hawaii, Ceylon. Could marvel in wonder, much as we did.
Just before the dawn
Before we moved back here,
I stayed for weeks in summer,
and slept in my old room.
Bats were living in the eaves,
and some inside the attic.
Just before the dawn
I'd wake to their return;
little squeaks and scratching,
coming back to roost.
Tiny furry Draculas
getting in in time
before the sun rays hit.
©2024 by Roy Christman
