MORE THAN MEETS THE EYE

A Hasbro-Takara Zen Koan

Browsing the aisles
Of the local Target
Mine eye takes notice
Of a curious delight
—A Transformer made of single, solid piece of plastic.

No movable parts
And thus manufactured
Without the ability
To transform.

And so, the obvious question arises:
If an Optimus Prime toy
Cannot change into a truck,
Can it rightly be called
A Transformer?

———-

UNPLEASANT THOUGHTS AT TWO IN THE MORNING

What if
Your landlord
Hid surveillance cameras
In all your smoke detectors
And is live streaming
The footage
Right
This
Very
Second?

Sweet Dreams.

———-

THE RHYME OF THE ADJACENT MOURNER

(AKA “THE PATH”)
 
I

From the day my father was laid to rest,
An unexpected ritual was born.
For each day since, he’d have a special guest—
My mother, who’d come visit him each morn.’

In her black Lincoln Town Car, she would drive—
Two miles west and two miles north from the lake.
To Westview Cemetery, she’d arrive
On a pilgrimage only she could take.

Hobbling along the lonely gravel road,
She’d tread across the silky summer grass
To the grave atop a hill, freshly mowed,
There my father lay, finding peace at last.

She’d kiss the portrait of her husband’s face
And tenderly wipe clean the granite stone.
Together in this quiet, sacred space,
My mother was never truly alone.

II

We the children returned at her behest,
Assembled in the February cold.
All four of us had gone and flown the nest,
Children no more, now quickly growing old.

There, we bore witness to such a surprise—
A seeming mirage one dare not believe.
And yet I saw it with my own two eyes:
Mother Nature’s tribute to those who grieve.

If one looks back upon the grassy way,
From the gravel road to the earthen mound,
A makeshift path appears—as plain as day.
A testament to love ‘pon hallowed ground.

This imprint in the yellow winter earth
Trodden every day by her tiny feet
Shows us love’s great cost and its greater worth,
A path she’ll walk until again they meet.

© 2015 Calvin McMillin

The Big Windows Review 6 (Fall 2015)