Hard Work

          

              Hard Work

It’s hellacious work out in the

Extremities of the weather.

When exhales become

Frozen, defined shapes, that’s cold!

It’s killer work when arms,

Protruding from their florescent

Orange or yellow bibs, shine like

They’ve been polished by an invisible

Kiwi or Esquire spirit.

Roberto Clemente

            Made hard look easy.

That’s what artists do.

Tote that barge,

Lift that bale,

You load 16 tons

Workin’ on a chain gang.

With Big Bad John or John Henry,

Working hard is heroic. With

Samson, however, it’s suicide.

Are you working hard?

            Hardly workin’;

Working hard at staying out of hard work.

Trying to use a new

Language is grueling. You

Get tang-toungled. Or tu

Is used when ustedes should

Be. Even in the Mother

Tongue it’s rigorous

Work to stare at the screen, or

Out the window and then

Attempt to frame an idea with words.

Viagra for the Brain

Without exercise, a pump or surgery,

Here's an amazing, rock hard discovery:

Stronger, thicker, and improved performance

Will give your step a frisky bounce.

If you want to be better and have more stamina

And seek a 100% success rate without stress,

This will make you a star, like a benevolent tsarina:

Read a book and your brain will be blest.

Reflections on a Gift of Watermelon Pickle 

Received from a Friend Called Felicity

During that summer
When unicorns were still possible;
When the purpose of knees
Was to be skinned;
When shiny horse chestnuts
    (Hollowed out
    Fitted with straws
    Crammed with tobacco
    Stolen from butts
    In family ashtrays)
Were puffed in green lizard silence
While straddling thick branches
Far above and away
From the softening effects
Of civilization;

During that summer--
Which may never have been at all;
But which has become more real
Than the one that was--
Watermelons ruled.

Thick imperial slices
Melting frigidly on sun-parched tongues
Dribbling from chins;
Leaving the best part,
The black bullet seeds,
To be spit out in rapid fire
Against the wall
Against the wind
Against each other;

And when the ammunition was spent,
There was always another bite:
It was a summer of limitless bites,
Of hungers quickly felt
And quickly forgotten
With the next careless gorging.

The bites are fewer now.
Each one is savored lingeringly,
Swallowed reluctantly.

But in a jar put up by Felicity,
The summer which maybe never was
Has been captured and preserved.
And when we unscrew the lid
And slice off a piece
And let it linger on our tongue:
Unicorns become possible again.

John Tobias