“The Piles Of ‘Milty’*” Tanka 6690

(October 14, 2024)

the piles of ‘Milty’s’

debris give me back title

and use of front yar

“cheated” on stacking refuse

in gutter, with rain-drain space

*(Last time the city of Sanford, Seminole County, Florida, had such a storm debris pickup, the “claw” equipped six-by truck gougede out a foot deep furrow in my front yard getting to the debris which then filled the open field across from the former Sanford (then Seminole) high school athletic practice fields and now a parking lot across from Sanford Middle School – when I went there it was a 7-8-9th grade junior high – with paid crossing guards to protect the learner-tykes-no-more as their privileged parents chariotted their kids to prison – ooops, school – instead of filling up two and often more residential streets to t he school’s south with a collection of big wheel pickup trucks, wide-body style of course, pricy and also big SUVs based mostly on pickup truck chassis and all other manner of autos parking on both sides of a too-narrow street which used to have “no parking” on both sides of the street signs which found demise at the bumpers of said big rigs piloted by those who would not think of having their progeny walk any further than across busy 18th Street fronting the school’s southern side which also has cars and trucks lining up (some trying to use my driveway as a parking space) and often as not disrespecting private driveways and front-droor walkkways as perfectly fine places to park. The kiddies have to walk in t he streets at least part of the way. On my street there is no sidewalk nor crossing guard. Yet drivers’ convenience dictates when the devils drive cherubs to class, neh? So with almost all of my three lots’ worth od debris and the usual collection of recycle and garbage and the some of a neighbor or five, I get to feed my feral black neon-green eyed cat whilst I shade-sit and read, quaffing good ole Snaffurd allegedly tainted city water. At my parents’ house I drank from a shallow well pump’s hose end when outside and thirsty -just a slight minerally taste with a hint of sulpher I still miss. We all used to drain our used motor oil back in the yard near the alley and we all – okay, mostly boys and sometimes their dads – quenched a non-beery non-sweet tea-ey thirst and not a one of us had three eyes of horns hidinginthe hairline – leastways not recently revealed. Go back and park in the big lot once Sanfor4d has evicted softball, football and, yes, cricket players (once even kickball enthusiasts) to stage all the debris, though Hurricane Milton (of as I prefer Him-A-Cane “Milty”, finally has been hauled off to more appropriate dumpsites, Has none suggested using county prisoners to sort t he trash from the trees and feed the good stuff to incinerators to provide power and valuable potash for community gardens and thus while polluting pristine? air reduce by a large margin an overstressed state existing with our trash dumps? Naah. Nebber Hatchee Hank or Helene, some eco-freakin’ lawyer will put a stop to that!. I go now to get back to my front yard to watch t he trash and recycle trucks went their way trough a probably mostly deserted street, as God and I intended._

“Present Plumbing Problems” Tanka 6447

(April 13, 2024)f

running from both ends

an over-athletic nose

and pinch-hosed ‘Richard’

nozzle-end fine but pee-dammed

at the off-site reservoir

“Present Plumbing Problems” Tanka 6447

(April 13, 2024)

running from both ends

an over-athletic nose

and pinch-hosed ‘Richard’

nozzle-end fine but pee-dammed

at the off-site reservoir

Playing @ Praying?

“A Dial-Done Shirt”

https://free884.wordpress.com/2015/09/14/a-dial-done-shirt/

“My Garbageman’s Worth” Tanka 821

Pay baseball players

big millions – my garbageman

is worth so much more!

 

Politicians, teachers, too;

cops, firemen, medics worth more!

“My Shoes So Un-Knightly” Tanka 816

I never bought shoes

from “Knight’s” store downtown Sanford:

that make me so bad?

 

Old next-door JC Penny’s

with its pneumatic tubes – YES!*

 

  • (Before the now-mostly defunct department store J.C. Penny & Co. moved from America’s downtowns in the late 1960s and early 1970s the iconic store was on First Street in a burg of about 6- to 10-thousand.  The accounting and payables department was in a loft above the brick buildings only floor shopping area.  A clerk would write up the ticket, put the money, check or whatever in the plastic tube and place that tube into a long plastic holder that was hoisted above ground level and pneumatically carried to the loft: the return receipt came back the same way.  So charming.  I remained fascinated enough watching mom and dad endure the ritual that when I was in junior high and high school before the store moved – first to a shopping strip center and much later to a mall well out-of-town – I would make sure two or three times a year to spend some cash at Penny’s.  Sadly, for a Sanford boy bare feet were preferred and yielded Monday through Fridays nine months a year and Sundays – and sometimes Saturdays – on church and special occasions.  And then came basketball, track, tennis and The Beach.  Tennie-pumps and sneakers and Flip Flops!  Flip Flops.  All the more reason to bypass Knight’s and hit good ol’e J.C.!)

“Highly Annoyed, We Two” Tanka 427

Tree-rat annoyed, waves

its bushy tail in rebuke

but stays close to perch!

 

Fearing me, a deadly foe:

and, you know, he’s right!*

 

*(I want to know right now, which of you Jokers told that squirrel I’m all bluff!)

“Tee-n-Shorts Today” Tanka 412

The pre-cold bundled:

it’s not even fifty yet –

I get such strange looks!

 

One androgynous toothpick

look ’bout hypothermic!

“This Pastel Morning” Tanka 355

This pastel morning

the cotton flocks graze across

a pale blue pasture.

 

Their undershot gray bellies

o’erpowered by golden fleece.