POEM: Storytelling (1)

Posted 30 August, 2010 in Family, My poems, Poetry

Storytelling

telling stories in our hotel room
keeping my game face on
my Superman fights a giant robot
John’s defeats a huge gorilla
Bernie’s Man of Steel takes on a fire monster
he’s tired so he forgets
sometimes his villain is a robot, too
I’m wearing a necklace made of Kryptonite
my powers are fading
keeping my game face on so they won’t notice
never expected this hotel room
never expected the hurricane
and yes, that’s a metaphor
what kind of kit do you pack for a storm of rejection?

POEM: What I Would Give For What We Had (1)

Posted 27 July, 2010 in Audio Poems, Family, My poems, Poetry

What I Would Give For What We Had

In Lenox, Massachusetts, on the picturesque corner
of Main and Housatonic Streets,
is a building with walls made of butter-yellow brick.

Looking up from the sidewalk to the second floor,
you can see the windows
through which my family used to see the world.

There was a drop ceiling in the den that gave way
under the weight of rainwater,
dousing my grandfather as he removed a sodden panel,

standing on a chair to get a better grip, while lightning
lit the windows of the pharmacy below.
There is a shop that sells art photos and gourmet chocolate

where the garage used to be. “Home again, home again
jiggety jig,” my grandmother would say
every time. Back when she used to ride in the car, back when

she used to have places to go. I am so old I can remember her
driving herself, the modern woman, cigarette
fashionably cradled by elegant fingers, red nails catching

the sun that elsewhere lit trees on our famous hills.
It was only in the leaving that I realized
the loss, only in the black-and-white grandeur of deco

living rooms and dancing at the Crystal Ballroom.
Now I would trade anything for that place,
that time, those days when a street corner was the world
and all I knew was safe and protected within it.

POEM: The Oak Tree (4)

Posted 8 July, 2010 in Audio Poems, Family, My poems, Poetry

Listen to this poem using the player above.

Another poem for my wife.

The Oak Tree
(for Jennifer)

I had already asked you three times
you’d wisely declined
I was too young, too unproven
played the saxophone in a latin jazz band
you repaired houses for the poor
we each made barely enough to pay the rent

the fourth time was under an oak tree
at your mother’s house
you finally agreed, throwing caution
to the Pennsylvania wind
we were back East on a rare trip
to see our families, to display one another

that tree had been there for years and years
since the fields next to the dairy farm
were turned into a housing development
for upwardly mobile college professors
whose daughters spoke two languages
and traveled the world on the way to good lives

no one thought we’d last
they all said I was too young, too unproven
played the saxophone in a latin jazz band
couldn’t provide for you
all those beautiful 1950s sentiments
born of monochrome evenings with the Cleavers

but under that oak tree –
a sign of stability, of permanence –
you agreed to place a bet on the long shot
I held your hands as a stray leaf fell,
like your resistance, to rest
in the lush green grass behind the houses

after you said yes
we traveled north to my parents’ house
my mother gave me a wedding ring
that had been her grandmother’s
granting us her blessing
even though she doubted our future

the oak tree is gone now,
cut down by your mother
all these years I’d thought she hated what it represented
only found out this week that it was damaged
in an ice storm and had to be cut before it fell
so many things misunderstood

Breaking Up The Band, or, We Fought The Economy And The Economy Won (10)

Posted 24 June, 2010 in Family

I may regret all this openness later, but for now a little missive here on the blog seems like the easiest way to answer all the questions that are coming up now and will be sure to come up soon. It’s getting more difficult to come up with plausible stories about what’s happening, so let’s try the truth.

Tomorrow, Jen and Bernie and John (my wife and sons) are moving to State College, PA, to live with Jen’s mom. In a couple weeks, I’m moving into a one-bedroom basement apartment in Albany – even more downtown than I live now. We’re not sure how long the new arrangement will last.

Why is this happening? Primarily because we can’t afford to live together anymore. Jen’s been out of work for 18 months and counting, and I don’t make enough to pay the bills. In fact, my most recent job change was probably the straw that sent to camel to the poor house. I’m thrilled to have my current gig and to work in the world of bicycle advocacy, but it pays what non-profits often pay. We gambled that one of Jen’s many high-scoring civil-service tests would pull our fat out of the fire, but New York State has no budget and isn’t doing much hiring these days, so that gamble didn’t pay off. We lived on fumes (and with the help of our families) for a long time, but the tank is now empty.

This is a very dark time for the rebellion, and there’s no way to sugarcoat that. Our hope, though, is that something will turn up and allow us to get Jen and the boys back in time for school in the fall.

So now you know the rest of the story. Wish us luck, and keep us in your thoughts, along with the thousands and thousands of American families who are going through exactly the same thing.

POEM: Red Truck Elegy (1)

Posted 12 May, 2010 in Audio Poems, Family, My poems, Poetry

Listen to this poem using the player above.

Red Truck Elegy

Dozer, the beefy black lab, wants into the car
he sniffs the air, scenting my son’s watermelon lollipop

just a few feet away sits our red truck, silent, flashers on
a gift from my dad, it’s different from the red truck

my wife and her baseball team would cram into the bed of
back in Oregon, after the game, going to get ice cream

this red truck is smaller, though it’s hauled its share of wood
the bottom is rusted, looking like something you should

discover with a submarine while searching the ocean floor
I performed my only successful automotive surgery on this truck

using the last wire coat hanger in the world to wire up
the muffler and tailpipe, which were grinding against the axle

my dad couldn’t have done much better, because he
doesn’t know anything about cars or trucks either, despite

being much better versed in practical things than I am
and more comfortable with getting his hands dirty

John flits around the garage, moving from mechanic to Dozer
to the two lazy German shepherds who lie at the feet

of an elderly couple on the garage’s only two chairs
eating submarine sandwiches and adding to the local flavor

if the truck is dead, we’ve decided not to resuscitate it
we’ll just cut the cord that anchors it to us and let it sink into memory

captured in the occasional photograph, just like its bigger brother
with my father-in-law’s head poking into the flower-packed bed

I’ve heard enough stories about that truck that it looms in my created past
almost as large as he does, gone just after I met him, gone too soon

this truck, though, was here just long enough to carry us to the top of the hill
and now we’ll walk down the other side on our own

POEM: John, again (5)

Posted 25 April, 2010 in Audio Poems, Family, My poems, Poetry

Listen to this poem using the player above.

A poem for my son John and his grandfather, after whom he was named. John Packard died in April 1996.

John, again
(for my younger son and his grandfather)

he’ll never smell his grandpa’s pipe
never hear him laugh or make a corny joke
he’ll never feel the rumble of the BCS
as it plows up the rich earth for planting
he’ll never sit at the oval table
never pass a bowl of fresh-picked veggies
or watch his grandpa butter warm bread
he’ll never be tickled by a mustache
or smell the sweat on an old t-shirt
never be picked up in a wiry embrace
or put his cheek against rough stubble
but he’ll carry with him the joy in the land
and he’ll walk with solid steps on country lanes
he’ll laugh when laughter is needed
and he’ll stop to help a stranger
he’ll see in his mother’s eyes
the eyes whose gaze he’ll never feel
and he’ll know what it is to be loved

Huzzah for Bernie Crane, poet! (4)

Posted 24 April, 2010 in Albany, Family, Poetry

Photo of Bernie at the 2010 Albany WordFest (Photo by Keith J. Spencer)

My son Bernie (age 7) just found out that his poem “Dance To The Chocolate” won in his age group in the Fair Trade Delmar Chocolate Poetry Contest. He gets a prize, gets to read at the award ceremony, and gets his poem printed in the paper. It’s a good month for poetry in the Crane house. Here’s his winning poem:

Dance To The Chocolate

Dance to the music right?
Wrong! Dance to the chocolate
Dance to the chocolate
Dance to the chooooooocolate
Yay!!!

My son’s poems (3)

Posted 16 April, 2010 in Family, Poetry

My 7-year-old son Bernie has been writing poems for the past year or so. Today he submitted his first poems and tonight he’s attending his second open mic at the 2010 Albany WordFest. I’m so proud of him and I’d like to share some of his work with you.

The first four poems were inspired by a contest being run by Fair Trade Delmar, an advocacy group in a small town near Albany. They’re looking for kids to write poems about chocolate. The prizes will involve chocolate and the winners will also be printed in the town paper. Here’s Bernie’s suite of poems for the contest.

Chocolate Poems

Chocolate

Chocolate chocolate chocolate
Chocolate is all I can say

Dance To The Chocolate

Dance to the music right?
Wrong! Dance to the chocolate
Dance to the chocolate
Dance to the chooooooocolate
Yay!!!

Chocolate Catastrophe

I love chocolate I’d eat
It day and night but
When you find them really
Take a big bite.

You Love It Too

You love chocolate too
Don’t you? Well if not
START LIKING
IT NOW!! Well eat
It now. I guess it’s either
Now or never.

* * *

And here are two more short pieces, the first of which I find both sad and beautiful.

I don’t know why

I don’t know why
I go to school
I don’t know why I eat
I don’t know why I even live
But I do and I know why
I’m me

me me and me

me I love me me you
love me me love me
me play me play me
play games me

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