A Lonely Man

A sense of the end
dogs me all around the slope
behind my log house
as I pull slivers
out my dad-blamed body parts
and hear the rooster
crow in his cage built
by Jose for him last spring.
A fine black fellow
is Leo, with eyes
that pierce the hen perfumed air
and his hens stay close.
I have no hen, me.

‎August ‎20, ‎2017 12:18 AM

Reality check... this house is not a log house. The picture of the rooster is not a picture of Leo, the real black rooster in the cage. But Leo's eyes are of a stern quality and he and his hens do not fear us when they are loose in the yard. They are used to their routine and so go in and out the cage easily and do not leave the yard when free.

I actually have no slivers I know of but I would from time to time if this was a log house, I am sure.

The chickens do perfume the air - there is no question about that. A fellow named Jose lives here and he built the chicken run and a very fine chicken house. They are his chickens.

There is a city maintained grassy slope that rises behind our house and at the top beyond the Oregon City Promenade an abrupt drop of ninety feet or so. That slope drains into the driveway of the house across the alley, where there is a sump and pump to deal with what was once a natural swampy pond with no outlet. I would never buy that house. We have sand bags in case of extra high water over there because pump maintenance is very difficult.

We have never really needed the sand bags but before my time here sand bags were needed one winter. We lay the sand bags to block off the doorway to the basement in which I live, because that doorway is the lowest point and all the water high enough to get over the road hump would go into our basement. That would be a bummer. Leo would not like that kind of high water, nor would his harem.

Final reality check: This is a fictional poem. I am not a lonely man.