Flourishes of Half-dollar renown

Ron Koppelberger

Flourishes of Half Dollar Renown

The sole resemblance of chance and need, wont and waiting freedom, was a struggle in scarlet battles of wine and snakes that shorn confederate passage allow. He considered the wisdom of promise and pose, able arts and existence.
The half dollar fell to the concrete and the wind sang, tiny tempests swirled in the rain tinctured sunshine spears of light. The coin spun on the edge of a grain of sand as the seconds passed. He saw the design of dust and the savor of oaths in ash and dew, in sovereign applause and ether, in affirmed delight and amazing, absolutely amazing taboo. The coin fell still and random wills sighed in relief as the sun whispered and the world continued to revolve. He had half dollar renown and a distant love of life.

Exhaling in Secret Prisons

Ron Koppelberger

Exhaling in Secret Prisons

The floor was dank, mossy and covered with the pitted scars of a thousand before. The walls were granite and rough hewn concrete on all four sides. The ceiling was smoked glass with recessed lighting deep within the heavy glass , just barely discernable and glowing in shaded spectrums of candent nuance.
He touched his raw stubble covered cheeks with the tips of his fingers. “Breath Star, Breath!” he whispered aloud. His heavy exhalations filled the room and he wondered how much air he had left in the claustrophobic confines of the prison; how many inhalations and gasping breaths. The red button on the wall in front of him was the tempter, the will to move ahead. What might happen if he pushed the scarlet button? Perhaps he would find freedom, perhaps a thousand hells, perhaps great grinning deaths in blackened ash and maybe the edge of heaven. Might the walls close in on him smashing him to a pulpy memory.
Wellsprings of water flooding his prison with thirsty swallows of death, what might, what will? Star touched his finger to his lips , “Shhhhhhhhhhh,” he hissed, “Tell me your secret, tell me your secret.” Star grinned “Yer my turn little red……..yer my turn.” he stepped closer to the red button. “Pease god……please!” he prayed.
Star touched the button, smooth and warm, “Push it Star, push it! He shouted at the wall. “PUSH IT!” Star pushed the button and a warm breeze wafted from behind the brick and stone as it slid sideways; there was a tunnel and light, the smell of wheat, saffron assurance near the light, near the light, near the………..
Star opened his eyes and the blurry image of his raven haired wife met him.
“Thank God!” she gasped, “He’s awake, Star’s awake!”
He remembered the car careening into the ditch then blackness. He starred into the fluorescent lights overhead and sighed in relief; the button, he was free, alive in love, in fields of wheat and saffron.

The Next Day

Ron Koppelberger

The Next Day

He was wide awake and beautifully ever again. He had delivered a fulfilling, rolled, milled, sated and assured glass of whiskey wild, wild in alliance to the dreams of slightly sober care, precious bond between yesterday’s twilight and dawn’s replete secret.
He had sat on the front porch rocker the previous evening, comfort and a frosted mug of whiskey in perfect taste with the shadows of the coming darkness. The world had rolled on and the fact called life had made itself known in reflection and muse. He was swaying, gentle savor and the sip of a new beginning. The orange twilight horizon and fresh appreciations of cool indigo evenings in awe filled his eyes with the expectation of a day to come.
The cars dusted the air as the rattled and bumped along the dusty dirt road in front of the house. He could taste the grit as he sipped the cool whiskey, he endured the will of what comes to pass with comfort, with ease, with complacent degrees of sameness.
The whiskey had made a hollow little tempest against the side of the glass as he turned it between his fingers. The frayed edge of evening-tide cloaks and gentle waves of starlight lit the skies in flittering butterfly momentum.
He had raged the afternoon and in raw boned delight, in wonders of toil; the seed in saffron and wheat, in gilded turns of earth and sweet buds of birth he had toiled and turned the soil with sweat and dreams of tomorrow, sunburned and sure, dirty flannel and gray stained blue jeans. In secret touch the half moons of fertile fresh earth between his fingernails felt good and real.
The whiskey had been good. Yesterday he had sewn and the birth of a new day, a fresh crop defined the currents of what would be a courtesy in dawn’s eternal bonnet, the advance of tomorrows morning sunshine spirit.

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Timothy Pilgrim

Ice caving

Snow blows in low,
collapses crackling in fire.

Twigs, blackened,  become
broken arrows of frost,

quivering in cold. We lie pale,
still, hope sparks drift

toward our shared quilt.
I dream a frantic snowbird

beaks ice. Not once,
but twice.  The wind rises,

again unties night,
ropes us together.

We pelt mountain snow
with high-strung fury.

        Timothy Pilgim



       Web mutiny

These flat screens tie off dreams,
pirate eyes while pixeled derrieres

float by, round ghosts awash
in curvy seas of slender light.

Nightmares should wake us,
promise morning, hope, rum in vats,

not more bottoms bobbing past.
To break free, we must mutiny,

seize Web Mistress, take control,
gauge wind, starboard tack --

then, bound for home, torture night,
use her thong to cleat hitch dawn.

We expect no thanks
as she sways to the plank.

            Timothy Pilgrim


            Trek

Fingers trace smooth grooves,
    furrows between your ribs,

from backbone near spine --
    guide meridian of the soul --

to front. The path is steady,
    slow. Each slopes south,

rounds your side, points toward
    the desert, abdomen,

brown, flat -- and beyond.
    I know I should climb ridges,

cross one valley, then another,
    head north to explore,

meld minds, blurt out ideas,
    say something profound.

But, magnetic south,
    draws me down.

            Timothy Pilgrim


Timothy Pilgrim (a journalism professor at Western Washington
University in Bellingham) is a Pacific Northwest poet who has
published over 110 poems, mostly in literary journals and anthologies
of poetry, such as "Idaho's poetry: A Centennial Anthology"
(University of Idaho Press) and “Weathered Pages: The Poetry Pole”
(Blue Begonia Press).

Anthologies Featuring Poetry By Ron Koppelberger (Available at Amazon.com)

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