FOUR FEATHERS PRESS ONLINE EDITION: CITY LIVING Send up to three poems on the subject of or just using either the words city and/or living totaling up to 150 lines in length in the body of an email message or attached in a Word file to donkingfishercampbell@gmail.com by 11:59 PM PST on February 16th. No PDF's please. Color artwork is also desired. Please send in JPG form. No late submissions accepted. Poets and artists published in Four Feathers Press Online Edition: City Living will be published online and invited to read at the Saturday Afternoon Poetry Zoom meeting on Saturday, February 17th between 3 and 5 pm PST.

Wednesday, February 14, 2024

Don Kingfisher Campbell

Rectangular City

 

four walled clouds

carpet ground

coffee table sidewalk

sofa park

vase sculpture

chair stairs

desk office

bookcase condos

bookstack building

book flats

picture frame advertisements

stereo TV multiplex

dining table food court

wastebasket dump

great lamp fan in the sky




Temple City History

 

It stands 17 feet tall

like a little Washington monument

 

A memorial to a veteran

who died 97 years ago

 

a 22 year old Sergeant

in the Argonne Forest

 

Another plaque is attached

to the side of the base

 

to remember Vietnam dead

and still missing in action

 

The concrete obelisk has stood

for a long lifetime in a park

 

named after the landowner

who bought a Spanish parcel

 

His bronze bust on a pedestal

features peering eyes

 

through round spectacles

and a bristling mustache

 

as you enter the southwest

corner festooned with camellias

 

In the center is a gazebo

bordered by white picket fence

 

where a band can play or

a politician preach people

 

Today two black-haired women

practice Tai-Chi by benches

 

A slow moving man helps

his grand-daughter slide

 

down cobalt blue plastic

onto (I think) American sand

 

I sit at a green picnic table

beside the only dusty hibachi

 

ingest the last half

century all at once



 

Simile City

 

A family of red roses

Cluster together

Like a solar array

 

A pair of parrots

Screech overhead

Like pod racers

 

Two honking cars

Pass in parking lot

Like dogs barking

 

Air conditioners

Hang out windows

Like bored citizens

 

A couple walk their

Pooch on the sidewalk

Vanish like settlers


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