Thru a frosted window view,
an apparition I know.
“2024, is that you?”
With dubious gifts to bestow?
Are you
Chaos or a Bore?
You will
keep us all guessing.
In this
yearly riddle ’24.
Could I
receive a blessing?
Where is
fickle ’23?
The Fates
gave me the year.
Overall,
they let me be.
Wasn’t
that queer!
As time
moves forward:
My memory
hosts the past.
My dreams
are numbered.
2024, “The
die is cast.”
©TPuma/123123
The fare was a Nickel,
each for Mother and me.
To ride the Fulton Street El.
It seems like ancient history.
On to Manhattan.
Flying over Brooklyn canopies.
A view, I wondered then,
Santa Claus would see.
To visit Aunt Laura.
Elizabeth Street, “Little Italy.”
Uncle Gus, an in-law,
and Cousin Mary.
Mary played a new
recording by Tony Bennet.
The first I ever knew,
and I will never forget it.
“I know I’d go from rags to
riches …”
Ave atque vale.
©TPuma/7/21/23
The Wig is the Crown,
it completes the Coronation.
The Girl emerges from a
sub-conscious cocoon.
She slips into a dress,
that caress broad shoulders.
She slips into hi-heels,
not made for broad shoulders.
Make-believe breasts
transform Pecs to Teats.
Make-believe glows to real
with this make-over:
Nip and
tuck/
Dab and
pluck/
A
pocketbook/
A great fresh
look.
The girl with-in questions
the looking glass.
Alice, Dorothy or
Virginia Woolf?
To step outside
to display your inside?
Or...
Sit alone and reflect.
©TPuma/MMXXIII
(For the cast of Casa Valentina)
The pie was Blueberry, warm
ala
mode draping.
The
Malted was Chocolate,
thick,
and as malty as any
German
Lager.
The
Ice Cream Parlor with
chrome
backed seats and
marble
counter, catered to
connoisseurs
and kids alike.
The
Norwegian family
who
owned the place were,
“I
Remember Mamma”
lookalikes.
The
skinny kid who consumed
this
repast, basked in the
calories,
carbs and protein.
The
Confectionary
was concocted in the
Candy
Room, milk chocolate
waft
through the Parlor.
The
Tiffany lamps hung low
over
booths with lighting
softened
by the colored glass.
The
romance in the booths
were
with teenagers,
Ice
Cream Sodas after school.
The
El stop is no longer.
The
Parlor has left for that,
“undiscovered
land.”
The
senses remain.
The
El train rumbles
The
tastes of homemade.
The
aroma of sweets.
The
touching of hands.
The
scene in my, “mind’s eye.”
I
revisit, and they ask,
“Where
have you been?”
©TPuma/MMXXXIII
PFC Barone,
clutching an album.
In green Fatigues,
with a white ascot;
as is his wont.
Dizzy Gillespie,
“The Ebullient Mr. Gillespie.”
Bent horn and puffed cheeks,
“Swing Low, Sweet Cadillac.”
Nineteen Sixty,
returns in a dream.
Sub-conscious rendering.
Conscious remembering.
A sweet moment,
now melancholic.
A faded reminder;
I’d love to relive.
©TPuma/MMXXIII
Brooklyn
Heights.
A
12x16 Studio.
A
walk-up 3 flights.
Where
lived my love, ago.
Brooklyn
Bridge.
Thru
angled window,
stolid,
stoic, solid,
yet,
fluid, with autos,
trains
and people
scurrying
about
in
and on its labyrinth.
Walt
Whitman knew its spirit.
A
Brooklyn Candy Store
where
Dave-the-Bookie,
a
fiduciary, in all sports
speculation,
catered to
Heights
fortune seekers.
The
store flanked by a
French
Patisserie and a
French
Charcuterie.
Some
Trifecta.
Only
in Brooklyn(?)
Brooklyn
Eagle.
Hometown
newspaper.
Waiting,
each afternoon
on
the stoop.
Reporters
and reports
with
a Brooklyn accent.
Filling
the gap of a
sophisticated
city and a
working class borough.
Brookly Navy Yard.
A
short walk to this grimy,
labor
intensive, lovable acreage.
Bars,
outside the Yard, nick-
named,
“Buckets of Blood.”
The
oeuvre of Hart Crane.
The
Promenade.
A
scenic view of Manhattan.
A
Gay gathering place for
cruising
at sunset, an easy
romance
in a romantic setting.
Each
season, Fashionistas strut
their
bespoke designs.
Lovers.
We
spent a year in this scenario.
Emotional people.
Sentimental places.
Affecting remembrances.
Au
revoir mon amour.
©TPuma/MMXXIII
Is 13 your lucky number?
As you relish TGIF.
OR, do you spend this day in
slumber?
With Nightmares of the bereft
Is it a Black Cat?
A misplaced Ladder?
A conical Black Hat?
A Mirror shattered?
Nah, don’t fret,
Just another day in Clover.
Would you take that bet?
Oh, wake me when it’s over.
TP/2023
