AESRED POEM

If I’d my father’s eye and heart

I would feel the bare branch’s regret

As its last leaf goes dancing away

With a sweet-talking breeze.

LATE NIGHT WONDERING

Perhaps if I’d gone out dancing my feet.

Approving of the use I made of them,

Would not decide to make a home for gout.

Had I given thought to great questions

It might be my head would not be inviting

All the birds of the air to make nests in it.

Had I given my heart the freedom it wanted

Who knows but that, after it ran off,

It might have returned when I grew old?

NOT PLEASING THE COURT

Law school taught me the proper form
To address a bench of judges
"If it please the Court," you begin
(They must hear in your voice
That the C is capitalized and, if possible,
That it is in boldface as well),
"My name is  -- whatever it is --
And I represent -- whoever is paying me."
I have recited this often, hoping
Some judge at last would cry out
"It pleases me not at all! Be John Pashlik
Never again! Represent not the plaintiff
Or the defendant but the aggrieved heart
Which mocks from beneath my robe."

ANOTHER OF AESRED'S

It was too heavy for my chest
So I put my heart in a wagon,
Gave it a tin cup, sent it begging.
Now I find it driving a black car
With vanity plates.
What foolish authorities
Decided it deserved a license?

PERVERSITY

Stubbornness keeps the stone silent
If it wanted, it could sing madrigals.
Let the desire exist for an instant
And the cold heart bursts into flame.
Late nights, when they're off duty, my sins
Mutter over their muddy coffee
That if I'd only repent they could
Enjoy retirement, grow wings, move
To some gated Southern town.

BENEFITS

One of the perquisites of being a priest
Of Cardea, goddess of door hinges,
Is that she makes house calls. Spend years
Leaning to pronounce Huitzilopochtli
And sacrifice thousands of prisoners
With your Aztec flint knife until your wrist aches
And your dreams are filled with beating hearts;
The Sun will not even remember your name.
Serve Cardea and when your door squeaks
There she is, with an oilcan and a screwdriver.

ORIGINALITY

My heart hung all upon a silken dress
But I found the poet Yeats before me.
So I wandered, lonely as a cloud
Only to find I wasn't alone at all;
Damne if Wordsworth wasn't there as well
And, with all the impudence in the world,
Was also wandering lonely as a cloud!
And so it went the whole time
Byron was going no more a roving
Just when I meant to, and by the light
Of the very same moon I'd picked out!
To the library then, planning to take
All knowledge for my province
Only to have Francis Bacon -- Francis Bacon
Of all men!  --had popped in ahead of me
And taken all knowledge for his province.
Even in sleep there was no escape
When I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls
Alfred Bunn was in the bed already.

SO FAR THE STORY

The wizard, tired at last of life, went looking for his heart
Thinking to be mortal once more. He crossed the desert
Long deemed uncrossable, climbed the glass mountain,
Tricked the faithsworn demon into leaving his post,
Coming at last to the ruins of the tower where --
An unimaginable number of years before --
He had been raised and beneath which was a cavern
Whose darkest corner hid his heart which adamantly

Refused to return to the hollow in his chest.

"Ever were you stubborn," said the wizard,
"Ever did you stand against me, keeping me awake
With your witless, steady beating. I have prospered
Well and more than well without you. Still, you are my heart
And I am weary and seek to die." "Selfish as ever!"
Said his heart. "Ages have passed since we were one.
 I have no wish to rejoin you, nor do I think
That it is even possible. This is not how the story goes.
Some youngest son, some clever girl, was meant to find me,
Against all odds and slay you by stilling me
With one shrewd thrust of an enchanted blade
Or the sound of three syllables not meant for human tongue.
Why, then, did no hero ever come nor heroine?"
"New stories replaced the old; desert sands concealed the way across;
Few got past the demons. The destined slayer
Was, I believe, slain by me in his cradle. At the time
I thought it a prudent bit of work. I regret it now."