Four Poems|Tim Kahl
The Crows
for Martha Kight
The crows were here before us.
Let’s make them fly to far off fields.
Rid the city of their horde.
They infest the grid with their shit.
Oh my gosh! Did they crap on your fancy car?
Go hose it off, buttercup.
The Leafblowers
Silence calms the leafblowers.
Their shrill drone attacks my pith.
Chaos rains down on my armchair.
All their bodies are swept away.
What a mess! It happens every autumn.
Can’t anyone make trees behave?
Unprepared
A man who says he’s unyielding
isn’t well-prepared for death.
The pearly gates fling wide open.
Critique, judgment—then paradise.
Mean old prick. Won’t let you by without a pass.
Did you pay him? See the light.
The Moon
The moon’s beauty is touched with paint.
Its face quiets hard-nosed critics.
I play bawu under her glow.
She flirts at night, hides in the day.
Hey, old girl. I know all of your secret spots.
Stay with me here and keep warm.
Photo by Viktor Talashuk on Unsplash
BIO:
Tim Kahl [ http://www.timkahl.com] is the author of Possessing Yourself (CW Books, 2009), The Century of Travel (CW Books, 2012), The String of Islands (Dink, 2015) and Omnishambles (Bald Trickster Press 2018). His work has been published in Prairie Schooner, Drunken Boat, Mad Hatters’ Review, Indiana Review, Metazen, Ninth Letter, Sein und Werden, Notre Dame Review, The Really System, Konundrum Engine Literary Magazine, The Journal, The Volta, Parthenon West Review, Caliban and many other journals in the U.S. and abroad. He is also editor of Clade Song [ http://www.cladesong.com]. He is the vice president and events coordinator of The Sacramento Poetry Center. He also has a public installation in Sacramento {In Scarcity We Bare The Teeth}. He plays flutes, guitars, ukuleles, charangos and cavaquinhos. He currently teaches at California State University, Sacramento, where he sings lieder while walking on campus between classes.
