50+ Lifestyles

Max’s Musings

By Max Molleston

Some hot weather coming our way, and why not? It it summer in the midwest. About the time I tried to emphasize rain, it sort of stopped on us. July was much drier than June. It is now time to get busy on my part and send to you a poem that came to the post office box. I like response. I liked it in the radio, TV and farm business, and I like it now for this project on poetry and lifestyle.

Early in April, John W. Williams of Dewitt, Iowa sent me three poems. John and I did some talking to each other a few years back.

Remember about remembering? It gets tougher for many of us. In our conversations, we pass the challenge off saying, “You know who I’m talking about.” John and yours truly do the same thing. I can’t speak for John, but I can give you his poem.

Perils of a Poet

Clever words dance on my ceiling
in the middle of the night,
but like roaches in the pantry
disappear with morning’s light.

I arise and find my notebook.
Now the words should really fly,
There’s a pen between my fingers,
but my ‘thinkwell” has run dry.

I have not involved myself in exercises to try to get the words and phrases, or the folks I know and think I know, to stay right there on the tip of my tongue. Some of us may do the crossword exercises, too. I have worked with words and phrases all my life and still relied on my pals in the
newsrooms to come to the rescue about a place or time to remember, or even how to spell a word I could not shape in my mind’s eye.

Speaking of the mind’s eye, here’s another poem from John W. Williams of Dewitt, Iowa.

Second Thoughts

The faded paint on the once-red barn
tells of days gone long before.
The sagging roof gives further proof
and the tilt of the haymow door.

The windmill wheel is missing blades,
the tower is wrapped in vines.
A rusty plow looks useless now,
like the pitchfork’s broken tines.

Our old house stands just across the yard,
but the years have not been kind.
Its eyes that glowed toward the country
road are boarded up and blind.

I almost wish I had not gone back
to the homestead I once knew.
What used to be just makes me see
I have grown much older, too.

Thanks to you, John W. Williams of Dewitt. Both those are good poetry and deserve a place in this column. Some of you who have hesitated, come on now. Send that verse or two to Max’s Musings at 50+ Lifestyles, P.O. Box 1146, Bettendorf, Iowa 52722.

I hope you have caught a county fair. Due to COVID 19, maybe only in your mind.