Ponderable polemics, poetic

WordPress site of poet Mark Lucker

The Lake

  • No French Cuffs

    Plaid flannel shirts of my Northwoods youth smelled of beer and pine cones boat motor gasoline and fresh caught sunfish wood smoke and filtered Winstons when I was a kid the intertwined, pungent aromas of cervelat salami plumbers’ grease, house paint mingled freely, locked in square-patterned fibers, always-rolled-up sleeves no amount of Fels-Naptha soap could Read more

  • Breezes

    summer comes to a close autumnal breezes waft rustling memories of those days when the close of summer had more definitive endings sun-drenched days of youthful frolic, innocent play, done swimming, playing with frogs in holes dug on sandy beaches at grandparent’s homes; ‘the lake’ summer Xanadus of childhood one year, scenic backdrops for advancing Read more

  • Homage

    I went all Santiago once on a sunfish that weighed nearly a pound it was long before I knew Hemingway, the power of words, the pull of the water I battled the monster as only a nine-year-old could; with every fiber of my being strained to matching tautness of six-pound-test line at the end of Read more

  • First dance

    A ma-and-pa resort, small lake north woods of Minnesota small office behind quaint bar, twelve small cabins dozen aluminum rowboats to use; minnows, worms, leeches for sale amenities, ala Angler’s Edge Joe & Gloria’s place The bar a hangout for township locals grandpa Ivar and I frequented the nicked, cigarette-burn speckled polished, yellow-varnished bar for Read more

  • Winter solace

    These north woods are lovely, bright, and deep glistening with snow and promises to keep Serenity resides in the fresh wonder of the new wintry familiarity, renewal in fresh snowfall I have not trod, of late, these winter woods two years have passed since my last sojourn my longest such time away from this place, Read more

  • Road trip, 1965 –

    When I was a kid we planted trees by the lake 72 pine seedlings hauled north in milk cartons arranged on the back floor of a ’39 Dodge the trees and I were small, green, pliable in need of nurturing the Dodge sits now in a junkyard, the remaining pines scrape the sky I remember Read more

  • Mine

    Beatles songs, baseball cards the aroma of a fresh-mowed lawn, pungent sweetness of burning leaves lake-bottom mud spurting through summer toes Gelatinous frogs. Hot beach sand cool July evenings and the first non-parental hand ever held A specific summer. Tactile youth. You. Read more

  • Gated communities

    Never have I been further from my youth then when I returned to the scene of it places, people, things change time, people, lives elapse Going home is a metaphor smorgasbord; abandoned cabin overgrown with woods, withered by age dirt roads now paved familiar sights still sturdy though showing some age roadside greasy spoons now Read more

  • Campfire poem #49

    A log of pine a mug of coffee and thou Omar, I am not.   – Mark L. Lucker © 2016 http://lrd.to/sxh9jntSbd Read more

  • Campfire poem #71

    Campfire smoke makes a fine aphrodisiac but it lulls my wife to sleep making embers an ambiguous metaphor Read more