Ponderable polemics, poetic

WordPress site of poet Mark Lucker

middle age

  • Taking a concession stand

    I hate it when somebody states they are ‘making concessions’ to middle age I find mid-life to be a wonderful carnival the only concessions those to be purchased to quench a thirst sate a hunger I stroll the middle age midway impervious to the shill’s siren-call of con-men barkers offering relief enhancement and release me, Read more

  • Crisis averted

    I watch my peers unsteadily trampling middle age sitting on various benchmarks when they need to or when they just want to watch older, we are, most certainly wiser is a tougher read for those denying the need for glasses or just out of myopic stubbornness when, what, why, how, where the cryptic mysteries of Read more

  • 33 (For Johnny)*

    Twenty-one years was not nearly enough; we had just embarked when you left. Thirty-three years is not nearly enough to erase what is indelibly sketched not a pencil caricature, a dimly recollected photographic snapshot or grainy home movie just you, at nineteen, before illness rudely smudged and dog-eared the picture you are smiling, damn it Read more

  • Renovating

    Vestiges of then subtly shade the now today is decorated with yesterday’s hues accenting modern life with retro-chic shades life-makeovers via t.v. show gurus who use family tschotskes as odd focal points visual statements from an old magazine viewed in current settings; obligatory oohing-and-ahhing at the big reveal fading into jaundiced indifference once the show Read more

  • Self. Centered.

    I love to walk alone in the rain and snow the colder the wetter the better I hear, understand nature, myself, my perosnal nature a whole lot better character building personal challenge; to prevail against the cold, the wet, implies some sort of adversarial relationship we do not partake the colder the wetter the better Read more

  • “Portrait de Madonna; mère de mes fils, vendredi soir” (Madonna portrait; mother of my sons, Friday night)

    After some ongoing, sad-eyed cajoling you agreed to a Friday night date night not of your choosing or comprehension posing for nervous artist and sketch pad you acquiesced to your best black pumps, resolute: no clenching of rose in teeth – concession gladly made by your love-struck middle-aged, middle-class, modicum talent Renoir with shaky charcoal Read more

  • Culture shocks

    The ‘Beat Generation’ now needs a pacemaker; they can still Howl – but it’s mostly in discomfort Hippies now take a drag, teeter on artificial joints Peace, love, rock-and-roll? Viagra, naps, Metamucil Culture they unleashed now subjected to leash laws yet I admire their restraint in not pandering to regret Read more

  • Advancement

    I eschew sex. Firmly entrenched in middle age I have found the act wanting, boring the physicality dull, unimaginative old hat Sex has lost its interest in me shunning sex, I have discovered making love It is the side effect of experience the residue of having love, lost, found I am the artist who has Read more

  • Refraction

    Looking in the mirror I see the faces of a lifetime in midstream sometimes it’s a group photo – staged formality that doesn’t fit there are candid shot mornings and wide-angle shots that distort while others crowd everyone together but not everybody fits in the frame but the picture gets taken anyway. Looking in the Read more