Poems
by KJ Hannah Greenberg

 

 

Protecting Your Yahoo

 

Heriots belong in economies’ middens. No widow or orphan ought to be tasked

To sacrifice sheep, clothes, entire homes, to grubby rich folk, who, subsequently,

Damage such spaces; it’s preferable to scoff at their testaments with fine poetry.

 

More exactly, the bereaved ought not to suffer pilfering bosses. Birdlime exists

For humans, too. It’s better to birth obstreperous children, marry skeevy spouses

Than surrender one’s sheets and pillows, pots and pans, one-eyed cats, hounds.

 

Womenfolk, youngins, all vulnerable others, ought not to be harrowed by banks

“Needing” kips, kitchens, garden dahlias, broken washing machines, overflowing

Loos, yards upgraded by defenestrated dolls (fooey on Brobdingnagian attitudes!)

 

On balance, when two-dimensional folks experience duende states or doubtlessly

Engage dilatory bits, tout pataphysics, swim with porpoises, they shouldn’t upset

Via effulgent limbs, shiny smiles, elastic witticisms, mephitic disputes, crassness.

 

 

 

 

That Klaxon Sound on Yom HaShoah

 

Eerie, that klaxon sound, that shrill,

Horrific shriek over Yerushalayim,

This overcast morning of promises.

Today’s grandchildren are ghosted

-kinfolks perished in the Holocaust.

 

No audible tinkle that aide-mémoire

Of camps, ovens, torture, wreckage,

To figure, to essence, to generations

Yet to walk across grass, hear wind

Blow, see grazing cows, hug loves.

 

Not even hammering alike faculties’

Or telephones’ contributions; just a

Salient clatter, a jangle of righteous

Offense, recalling the scores of loss

Remaining unfathomable, ludicrous.

 

So, never mind our pretty dwellings,

Big titles. Annually, we siren clearly

Mystic measures drawn by Hashem.

Star dust’s nothing proportionate to

Our never-ending efforts to service.

 

 

 

 

Long Ago, on a Halfway Hill

 

Long ago, on a halfway hill, I was ‘wandering.

Looking for posies, I do suppose, but then I espied him.

Straight, stern, that singular boy sketching a small bird,

Became my token joy, yet he never heard

My footfall leaving through forbs and grass,

My heart song budding music to last - forever.

 

Long ago, on a halfway hill, I was ‘wandering.

Looking for posies, I do suppose, but then I espied him.

Like gossamer fabric, like dandelion wine,

His countenance tragic, his countenance fine.

The woods gleamed so brightly, the wind lulled so rightly;

I wished naughty kisses on that halfway hill.

 

 

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