Poetry by Richard Kovac

The First Nice Day
The daffodils grow
outside McDonald's
in a row,
blooming timely
as snow disappears
and yellow
in design
they are puffed.


Gnomon
youth pops up
like a breakfast cereal
and is consumed
in time
by life unreal.


Across Substance
What if your words
could make something
real -
a metaphor
into a material thing?
Who speaks thus?
He of long-suffering
Not me.
Probably not you.


Darling
I wanted
to be the darling
of every heart,
but somebody else,
always got there
before me.
Dismayed by this
I railed against
idolatry
and cried out loud
and joined the crowd.
We are all left out
in the rain,
while the prince
swims in champaign.


Apartment House
To live in the woods,
in a shack with smokestack,
isn't likely to be for me.
But the simple life
has great allure
in the combustion
of today.
The apartment buildings
close in on Walden Pond.
I struggle to hear
silence
without raucous sound.
The survivalist has his place,
of which I've not a trace.
I'm an apartment dweller
and expendable,
but still that
solitary individual.


Toothless Wonders
I also am a toothless
wonder
and still not infallible.
Many of us
are gravely culpable.
We toe the party line,
and have been lions.
Our aggression now is
defanged,
and we hang our mane
in shame.
Now what was the point?
To gain glory and fame?
Neither will transpire.
But, breathless,
we press to the wire.


Hot Pursuit
un appel d'amour
I am being chased
by lines of verse
from long ago,
which I had written
never knowing I'd undergo
a test of truth
for published prosody.
The lines seek to devour.
Sink your teeth deeply
into the apple of love,
the heart,
and tear to pieces
no more
our fragile peaces.


Lux
the very act
of looking
gives light
to the remainder
of your days.


By The Wind Grilled
Her skirt
was the venue
of my eyes
in eight grade.
I loved her much.
It wasn't just sex.
She had a great soul.
I hardly spoke to her,
and when she spoke
it was always apt.
I cherished her
from a distance
throughout
the remaining years,
her face ever before me,
and the later tears
were real as far as that be.



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