Miracle on 34th Street at the PWPL

Holiday Train Show

New York Botanical Garden

Saturday, November 30, 2024

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Thanksgiving Minus One

Thanksgiving Day

In the family kitchen

A cradle of holiday spices

Roast turkey, sage, pumpkin pie

Grateful fragrances

Sweeten the air

This house

Once a lively hub

Now feels somber, quiet

Four gather

Where five voices

Once bantered

Now silence hovers

Over the chair

He left behind

Mother stirs the gravy

Counter-clockwise

As if her hand

Could whisk back time

Her thoughts adrift

Between the now and then

Father carves the bird

With practiced care

Each slice, a gesture

Weighed down by loss

A ritual grown heavier

The eldest daughter

Sets the table

Fingers brushing

The untouched plate

Chills race up her hand

Each knife, each fork

A shard of memory

She turns away

From the empty seat

Afraid to meet

The ache it bears

Heads bowed

The father's voice

Burdened with sorrow

Utters the orison:

Dear Lord

We come to You

With saddened hearts

Yet thankful

For Your presence

As we gather

Around this table

We ask for Your comfort

Surround this family

With Your peace

Amen

The prayer

A fragile flame

Rises gracefully

For a moment

Time halts

The room listens

As if waiting

For a knock at the door

For him to return

With his hearty greeting

His familiar grin

But only the wind

Presses its sighs

Against the window

Bold enough

To break the quiet

The younger daughter recalls

Her brother's Thanksgiving idea:

To deep fry the turkey

But the oil, too hot

Nearly set the garage

Ablaze

Her voice

Though soft

Sparks a glow

Faces lift

Smiles spread slowly

“He was always trying something new”

The father adds, chuckling

A hint of mirth

Slips into the den

And for a fleeting breath

He lives again

In their words

Each bite they take

Threaded with the past

They feast

On the flavor

Of memory

~@~

Night drapes softly

And the dishes clear away

The hearth mutters

Its amber glow

Mother moves toward the photograph

His face, a sunbeam locked in time

“Happy Thanksgiving, love”

She whispers

Her words dissolving

Like mist in firelight

The family lingers

By the empty chair

His absence heavy

Yet there's something more—

A sense that even loss holds light

That bonds, though distant

Never fade

Together they sit

Quiet, grateful

Not healed, but whole

Outside

Frost tickles the glass

But on this Thanksgiving Day

There's warmth within

In time, the cold will wane

For now, they cling to one another

Knowing that even

In the longest nights—

Love remains

Dance Hailu: Act IX (Fishing Edition)

Scene 1

Sailing out to sea

Sunrise lights the horizon

Restless fishermen

Scene 2

Hooks baited with crab

Dropping deep into the brine

Waiting for the bite

Scene 3

A jolt on the line

Excitation of the catch

Reeling in a fluke

Miracle On 34th Street

~@~

A Quiet Bloom

U

N

D

E

R

Ink-streaked skies

The city hums in hushed rhythms

Rain softening the edges

Of a world that turns away

She moves

Through the quiet

Steps slowed by the damp

A shopping cart creaking beside her—

Vessel of fragments

Blankets that shield from the cold

Tins wrapped tight in old newspaper

Scraps of a life

Once lived by someone else

Her tent waits by the bridge

Patched with hope

Threadbare with fatigue

She turns down an alley

Behind the florist’s shop

Where refuse sprawls

Around overstuffed garbage cans

Among the littered remnants of discarded days

She spies it—

A rose

Petals wilted

Edges brown

But still, in the heart

Of the bloom

There is red

It clings—

To its color

Its scent

Its story

She reaches out

Fingers rough and trembling

Lifting the flower from the trash

Careful, as though it might break

Under the weight of the world

A flower tossed aside

Forgotten

She cradles it close

As if to say, I see you

I know what it is to be left behind

She tucks it into her cart

Nestles it among her treasures

Its modest beauty sparking a flame

Deep in the hollow of her chest

And as she walks back

Toward her tent beneath the bridge

The evening softens around her

And the rose reminds her—

Even in this world's darkest corners

Life refuses to fade

And she, too

Will keep blooming

Majuscule Characters Successive

All along the cobbled bridge

Between the grouted stones

Captured to belie the time

Dust from dreamless bones

Earth and sand, air and wind

Flames on lonely mountain

Ghostly ash, the only gift

Hopes cast in a fountain

Ivy climbs the shaded wall

Just to touch the sun

Knotted into tiny cracks

Lyric yarns unspun

Mingled in the cloying green

No trace of guile finds

Open to the changing breeze

Peace and hope unbinds

Quiddity brings reverie

Respite comes in faith

Silence comes in solitude

Truth, it comes in grace

Upward to the shelter trees

Vie the new-born shoots

Wooden to the corpus come

Xyloid to their roots

Years have yet to find me

Zephyr, please remind me

Goblin Goodies

October

Neighborhood amble

Crunch of dry, brown leaves

Accompanies the clack

Of my footfalls

On nearby lawn

I espy a duo of hags

Engrossed in toil and trouble

Black hats, barbed warts

Broomsticks, a bubbling cauldron

Overseen by an emerald-eyed, ebony cat

From adjacent patio

Pale, shrouded figure beckons me

Toothy Bram-Stoker grin

Eager to share his thirst for mock blood

And a stash of lollipops

In a flowerbed

Gargantuan octoped

Stands centered and steady

On sprawling circular patterns

Of viscous webs

The spidery sentinel

To a realm

Of pumpkins, gourds

Haystacks and chrysanthemums

Down the road

A klatsch of skeletons

Dances to a xylophonic jig

While a tall, lumbering creature

Approaches me

From across the street

To the sound of J. S Bach's

“Toccata and Fugue in D Minor”

Patchwork green flesh

Bejeweled

With glistening neck bolts

And...

Oh my goodness!

It's the Invisible Man!

(Although, I don't know how I know this

I can't actually see him)

This graveyard playground

Of haunted houses, headstones

Horror highlights and hokum

Offers me one reward

Sweetest trick of all

A pillowcase

B

U

L

G

I

N

G

With treats

At the Graveyard Gates

Eerie pall at eventide

Landscape steeped in sepulchral hues

Weathered stones in a lonely graveyard

Mausoleums, crumbling with time

Marble statues stand like silent guards

Sentinels of death, cloaked in moss

I tread the gravel path alone

A solitary figure amidst the gloom

My footfalls echo through the still air

Somber notes in twilight’s fading light

The moon, a pale specter

Veiled by wisps of cloud

Casts its melancholic glow

Then, without warning—

A subtle shift disturbs the air

A whisper of movement, unseen

But felt in the marrow of my bones

Shivers crawl along my spine

A twig snaps—ghostly breath

My heart races, pounding louder

I turn

There she is...

A woman, wraith-like

Obscured in shadow

Her dress tattered

Perfumed by the scent of wilted flowers

Her shoes, time-worn and decayed

She steps forward

Into the pale, silvery dusk

And I see—

She is decapitated!

Gasp

I flee

Heart pounding

Chill rushing through my veins

Each step feels heavier

As if death itself pulls at my heels

I try to extend the fragile distance

Between the living and the dead

But I feel her presence draw closer

Desperation tightens its grip

I race toward the cemetery gates

Her pace doubles mine

A haunting pursuit

Each step, a terrifying harmony

I reach the threshold—

The iron gates

A sanctuary from these haunted grounds

Yet, her chimerical hand reaches out

Grabs me

Enveloped

In her cold embrace

Terror overwhelms me

I wait

For death’s final touch

But—

The fear begins

To ebb...

An unexpected surge—

Of something else

I realize—

I’m not trapped in death’s grip

But cradled

A hug

A silent communion

Between the living and the phantasmal

A brief, poignant understanding

Of our shared solitude

A fleeting moment

Of compassion

Tears trickle down

Softly, quietly

For all the lost souls

Wandering this earth

Homeless

Unseen

With one final caress

She releases me

I watch her form

For one more moment

As she dissolves

Into stardust

Outside the gates

A strange warmth grows within

Tinged with sadness

For a brief encounter

Witnessed only by the resting dead

And for a love

I never thought I'd feel—

For a woman

With no head

Fall Classic: Yankees vs. Dodgers (Triolet)

A battle fierce beneath October's skies

The Yankees face the Dodgers on the field

With every swing, the crowd erupts in cries

A battle fierce beneath October's skies

Where heroes rise and dreams are realized

The tension builds as neither team will yield

A battle fierce beneath October's skies

The Yankees face the Dodgers on the field