My Father's Goose

My Father with his Goose, circa 1985

 Gus

“See he just bought the one and put it under

a bulb and when it hatched it was a 

head taller than the chicks and twice as hungry

so your dad just started feeding him separate.

That little guy used to follow him around ,

with those long legs a his….curious about everything. 

Then one day he was a big 30 pounder and

still thought of Harvey as his mother.

“Your old man couldn’t get in the car what the

goose flapped in after him….wanting to squeeze

in under the steering wheel and be petted,

big ole head hanging over Harvey’s shoulder.

And your daddy would stroke him, talk to him

a good fifteen minutes til he got him out

the car and locked in the pen. Otherwise 

he’d just run down the road after him. 

See ,your dad was a city boy, Richmond.

Didn’t know nothing 'bout raising farm animals. 

To him it was nothing but a love story…

nothing but a goddamned love story. 

When your father passed, that big ole bird

didn’t know what to do with” hisself”,

didn’t even know he was a goose,

kept on moping 'round the yard,

Your ma finally gave him to the farm

down the road where there were lots just like him….

hoping maybe he’d come to understand

that he was a bird. 

I wrote this piece from the point of view of the midwestern farmer who lived near my parents place in Newcastle, California. 

Poet's Club

My photo image showing that you can't quite capture the periwinkle sky I Nice with pixels, 

Poet’s Club

by Mary Payne

Having just read thirty random poems

I feel that I’m not authorized to call myself a poet…

to be in that revered club with Henry VIII 

and his “Some Sayeth Youth Ruleth Me” 

or with modern poets of dark disquiet, 

for I am a sanguine soul 

and I had a happy childhood.

There were three dresses in my closet

that my mother had sewn for me

and on Friday my father drove 

on the road to town with a list…

including a peach and a pear

for each of us, a five cent sherbet cone, and

a trip to the public library.

No gangs threatened our look-alike dwellings.

No rogue uncle roved at night to 

unsettle my sister nor I.

No one even drank!

But I love words too…how they leap

from my head when I least expect it

to explode on the unsuspecting page.

And I am old. Does that count for this club…

senior discount perhaps?

Not many years left

to tell all I want to tell…

about the crab man who runs sideways,  

about the infant gecko with his clown-like grin….

eaten by ants on his third day,

How my father tamed the meanest man

or how the Mediterranean sun

can turn the sky a purple/blue

so rich and full-throated

that it can’t be caught

by either film or pixels 

but perhaps only in a poem.