New Material

New material can be found at the 

Geauga Independent:

https://thegeaugaindependent.blogspot.com/

 

 

 

 

“Precipice”

 

c. 2023 Rod Ice

All rights reserved

(7-23)

 

On the precipice

Peering down into dark depths that await my fall

A place I fear, going forward in time

But also as a memory from my mother

When I was very young, around the age of four

She had just given birth to my brother, her third child

Postpartum depression sent her into isolation

With my maternal grandmother offering care

Father worked 16-hour days

And stood in the pulpit on Sunday

The family coffers stretched thin

So I was sent to Columbus, and our family farm

No longer an active, agricultural spot, in truth

With educators swelling our brood

But a safe space away from the affliction

Which was barely understood in that era of old habits, and convenient fiction

I think of her courage, now

Beloved mater

She told me it took a decade before her wellness returned

And I remember those uncertain episodes

When we were shielded from the struggle

My sire stayed strong, and silent

He never explained or excused

But telltale signs made us whisper and wonder

Mother locked herself in the bathroom once, in Virginia

I still do not know why

Now, when my body grows tired and sore

When aches and woes gather in number

I think of the zone into which she descended

And pray to be spared from the same

Art has always been my refuge

The trouble tree, where I leave my cares

Since that time of youthful exile, I have fled to the comfort of music, drawing, and books

MAD Magazine issues on the reading table

A portal toward deliverance

A flirtation with chance

In years that followed, the paradigm remained set

A medicine, I could not forget

I pause at the keyboard, still

With a similar curiosity about self-help strategies

That made me climb a tall maple

Barely past my infancy

And doodle out cartoon adventures

Amid sprawling branches, and fluttering feathers

Alone, but surrounded all the same

Confident in the continuum

The embrace of an unseen creator

Resonating on a creative wavelength

An unspoken connection bequeathed from my mortal link

Mother singing as she worked at the kitchen sink

Her voice, a treasure to receive

A candle lit to chase away the lingering gloom

To revive, through love

Hope of healing

When my right hand shakes furiously, like a clattering car with bolts coming loose

I hold fast to her ethic

Her determination to survive and grow more able

So that we would be protected

That cause kept her focused and fixed

On defeating the tricks

Of a mind turned upon itself, with drastic results

Godly, and respected, she was, at church and home

Yet likely to trip over loose stones

Scattered across the course of her life

I remember the grace she carried, in meeting challenges, face-to-face

At the precipice, I wait

With her encouragement still in my ear

And a kiss on the forehead

Rather than stumbling on the rocky road, instead

I will choose

To trudge through the maze

To journey toward a better place

One page at a time

Inked-up and registered, line-by-line

A printer’s response to the tempest

Which still makes my insides quiver with need

I never feel completely certain that these storms have abated

While I abjure my stain

Never wanting to walk that path of pain

The one that my mother knew for so many years, while busy with her chores

I feel guilty, in the balance

Yet connected in a wondrous and indelible way

Her broad-winged soar into the sunset was also mine

She flew first in the aerial line

Our fates divided by only by the artificial ticks of a clockwork device

Which now is my metronome

It keeps me in rhythm

As I edge backward from the cliff

Clinging to vines at my feet

When this cycle is complete

I will join her in the cure

Of graduation

 

 

 

“Twenty-Nine”

c. 2023 Rod Ice

All rights reserved

(7-23)

 

On the 29^th day of this month, I pause

In quiet reflection, undeniably lost

Remembering the distant day when friendship failed

And a mystery was born

The old Zenith radio in our back room on North Cayuga Street

Had its vintage vacuum tubes glowing

I had tuned to a station, from Cornell

With light music, and reports

The details made me feel out of sorts

A local man, they said, had slipped into the gorge and out of mortal time

When I heard his name read aloud

My face went numb

The refrain caught me unprepared

I nearly toppled from my folding chair

Mark Lebowitz, in his later 20’s, as I recall

Older than the rest of us

Someone we gifted with admiration and trust

A graduate, a poet, a scholar of the written word

Son of a veterinarian

A hippie contrarian

Once, even on the air

Before coming to our video lair

At Channel 13

He had chosen to end the journey

Though so young and able to inspire

The door closed rudely after he departed

Locked with a skeleton key

And works of brass

I heard it through the loudspeaker cabinet

Clutching my ribs, and covering my mouth

To keep from doubling over with grief

I was only a teenager

Unable to process the turn of events

That sent him leaping over the fence

Into a rocky oblivion, below

July heat revives the hurt

Though softened now, by decades, expired

My friend has long since joined the continuum

Born out of an early death

Ever alive, on the other side

Of a mirror

Distant, so distant

Yet in memory, persistent

I hear his voice still, when dreams let me peer across the divide

And cry

 

(For my friend Mark, who ended his life on July 29, 1980)

“Epitaph” (For Jerry Springer)

 

c. 2023 Rod Ice

All rights reserved

(4-23)

 

How lonely the morning seems

After a night of cosmic showers and moonbeams

I woke to the news of a felled tree in my favorite woods

A diversion I once needed in this rural neighborhood

He was educated in the classics and able to manage wealth

More gifted and promising than myself

Once even an aide to RFK, I read in part

With career shifts that reflected a restless heart

A mayor, and broadcaster

A news maven, and bombast purveyor

Always the sane voice in a circus of the absurd

Finishing each episode with calm, quiet words

When my own journey had run off the rails, reeling

And a 12-pack of beer became my medicine for healing

He kept me grounded, though much was amiss

I took comfort in watching guests swing their fists

Long after midnight, numb and nodding off

I sat on my couch like a swine at the feeding trough

Glad to have my thoughts diverted with a laugh

In that time when divorce tore up the roadmap

We exchanged letters in the years that would follow

I continued to hear his wise conclusions echo

“Take care of yourself, and each other”

An admonition I received gratefully, from this video brother

The Ringmaster

Was often considered to be a televised disaster

Yet I felt an alternate vibe

Went along for the train wreck as a passenger ride

While the ratings soared

And those who took offense righteously implored

The producers to cancel

Write him off with a sharpened pencil

Like a crossed-oot entry on the corporate balance sheet

A desire not reflected on college campuses and urban streets

Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!

Quite boldly brash, and proudly contrary

Trash TV in its infancy

Perhaps with a taste of the junior Morton Downey

A car crash into bricks

With a stripper pole and heavy metal guitar licks

Transsexual revelations giving fooled feelers the fits

KKK midgets and miscreant prophets

A man marrying his horse

Jilted lovers duking out a settlement, of course

Preachers and prostitutes

Salacious habits and a flurry of lawsuits

A pretty John with high heels on

I sat up watching those VHS tapes until dawn

Drunk viewing being the best repose

Sleeping on the sofa, still in my work clothes

That is how I will remember, and remember, I will

The discipline of a rogue, satirically skilled

Was he amused by our enduring attention span?

This gentle and shy, slip of a man

Holding a hi-tech tiger by its tail

A strategy too often destined to fail

But this cheerful chum made it work

He fashioned an empire from scandalous dirt

Then sat at his desk in the dark

Smoking an expensive cigar

Thrilled enough to have entertained, and exited with grace

While other seekers sought to take his place

I will reflect on his memory, and weep

Until my bottles have run empty, and I fall asleep

Good Morrow, Master Springer

Thank you sir, for being a good tidings bringer

Rest well

Be it in Heaven or Hell

Your name still causes me to smile

We will meet again, in the afterwhile