SURREALITY
by Robin Shwedo
©: Robin Shwedo, 1995
Driving home from a surreal afternoon,
the lights on the bridge remind me
of strings of pearls,
glistening,
glowing
against the grey velvet sky.
There are few cars ahead of me,
spaced apart,
their taillights like sparking rubies,
following the sensuous curve of the bridge.
Glancing when I can to my right,
the distant headlights on the north bridge
spanning the bay
are like diamonds,
glittering on their moving strands.
The pavement slowly drifts toward the left,
pointing the car into the soft sunset;
the clouds have parted just enough to turn
pale pink
and
peach,
soft as worn flannel,
drifting into the wet grey rose petal clouds.
Almost as quickly as a hummingbird’s wings,
the liquid colors turn,
becoming pale yellow,
pencil-sketched clouds
turning to charcoal.
The rise of the bridge pulls me towards the sky,
then slowly,
gently
lets me drop back to earth.
Maybe Van Gogh saw the world the way it really is,
swirling skies and all.
I wrote this shortly before writing Ybor Afternoon. There's just something almost magical about the lighting at sunset, especially if one is driving on a bridge with lights reflecting off the water underneath.
This is from the book Revolutionary Broads and Other Nightmares, which is looking for a publishing home.
Monday, January 31, 2022
Friday, January 28, 2022
WORKING CLASS, EBB AND FLOW
WORKING CLASS, EBB AND FLOW
by Robin Shwedo
©Robin Shwedo, 2018
I
For years,
my ex and I lived for the weekends.
Unemployed for months,
living in the house next door
to his parents,
a house they'd inherited,
he'd finally found work,
bringing in a weekly paycheck –
pittance, though it was –
when combined with
food stamps and
no rent,
it paid the bills, if just barely.
Friday,
after work,
we'd gather the kids,
pile into the car,
and go to the nearest Albertson's,
a farther drive than
the Winn Dixie,
but newer and cleaner.
After the weekly shopping,
reminiscent of going to the A&P
as a child
with my parents on Fridays,
we'd stop by the neighborhood Wendy's
for dinner,
always a treat.
Burgers, fries and sodas,
a big deal for the kids,
and no cooking or clean up,
a big deal for me.
Every week,
we'd see the same families,
kids in tow,
having Friday fast food dinners,
feeling comfortable enough
for some conversations.
“How was your week?”
“Great, and yours?”
When one family's boys spent too much time
in the rest room,
Mom'd tell the youngest,
“Go tell your brothers
to quit homesteading
if they want to eat.”
We all laughed at that.
Now, years later,
if someone takes too long,
the family code is that
they're homesteading.
We'd watch the sky
across the street
darken in the winter,
stay light in the summer
as we ate.
Then, finished,
we'd tell the other two or three families
we'd see them
the next week.
Gradually,
kids grew, jobs and hours changed,
Albertsons built a new, closer store
that took us closer
to other fast food places.
I wonder about the homesteaders.
II
His parents split,
and the rental became
his mom's home.
She lived with us for a month or so;
you relegated her,
in her own house,
to the utility room.
Finally,
I told her to come inside.
You lost a job,
found another,
lost it,
found another.
In desperation,
I found and took a job
with a future,
and, after a contentious weekend,
moved us out of your mom's house.
She mourned,
wanting us back.
But six people in a 2-bedroom place
was rough.
The rent in the new place
took a third of our income,
then went up more.
I lost my job,
in part because
you were too proud to do
“women's work,”
laundry,
dishes,
cleaning
while I worked full time
and you stayed home,
watching TV and the kids.
A job
revolving around
physical work
required more than three hours of sleep a night,
and catching up on weekends.
You then took a job,
while I stayed home.
III
Three moves later,
you leave to find work out of state,
leaving me to care for four kids.
I find work
while going to school full time.
We move,
and you come back.
You promised to change,
and found a job
you loved
(security in a topless bar).
You spent weekends at
the flea market,
and took a job there,
working with a friend,
running errands while he ran the booth,
helping him sell radios and such.
The security job failed,
and the flea market was your main job,
paid $100 a week.
Sy (“Hi-Fi Sy”) offered our oldest a job –
his first –
making almost as much
as you on weekends.
Finally, the stress of
work,
kids,
not enough money,
too much rent,
and other nonsense too its toll.
We had to move again.
IV
Every place we looked,
they'd rent to me,
even with four kids and a dog.
But you'd somehow jinx the deal.
Finally, you checked with a rental place.
“Sorry, you don't make enough,”
the man told you.
Our income was $20 a month shy
of 1/3 the rent,
which meant they wouldn't
rent to you.
The next day,
I took off from both jobs and school,
went to the rental agency
and fast-talked the same man
into handing me keys
to two houses.
“Take your pick,” he told me.
I picked one,
paid the rent and deposit,
and had us in the next day.
You lost,
found,
lost,
found
several dead-end jobs,
finally finding one you loved
only when I'd
asked you to leave.
With your own place to rent –
a cheap efficiency –
you made do.
I took a job driving cab,
took a few days off
when you died –
the job had no health insurance,
which meant you neglected your health –
then worked hard,
long,
12-hour days.
Met another driver
who knew how to treat a lady.
He'd nursed his late wife,
a waitress in several diners,
when her cancer showed up,
was cured,
then came back.
A man who'll care for
a dying wife
is a real man.
We married eight years after her death,
three years after my divorce,
and your death.
We both worked,
then had to quit
when our eyesight
started to fail.
I cared for him
as he'd cared for her
during his final years.
V
Working class life
is so much harder than
life for the rich.
The hours are long,
the pay is crap,
the rents are high,
the little bit of Obamacare
is being pulled away
by the obscenely rich,
making health care hard to come by.
It's the working poor's work
that has built up the rich,
built on our backs,
giving them their life
as they pull aways ours.
Someday –
probably soon –
the revolution will knock
the crap out of those rich who don't care.
Be forewarned.
This is a newer poem (written 6/17/18 – 6/18/18) from an upcoming book titled Working Class Poems, which is looking for a publisher.
by Robin Shwedo
©Robin Shwedo, 2018
I
For years,
my ex and I lived for the weekends.
Unemployed for months,
living in the house next door
to his parents,
a house they'd inherited,
he'd finally found work,
bringing in a weekly paycheck –
pittance, though it was –
when combined with
food stamps and
no rent,
it paid the bills, if just barely.
Friday,
after work,
we'd gather the kids,
pile into the car,
and go to the nearest Albertson's,
a farther drive than
the Winn Dixie,
but newer and cleaner.
After the weekly shopping,
reminiscent of going to the A&P
as a child
with my parents on Fridays,
we'd stop by the neighborhood Wendy's
for dinner,
always a treat.
Burgers, fries and sodas,
a big deal for the kids,
and no cooking or clean up,
a big deal for me.
Every week,
we'd see the same families,
kids in tow,
having Friday fast food dinners,
feeling comfortable enough
for some conversations.
“How was your week?”
“Great, and yours?”
When one family's boys spent too much time
in the rest room,
Mom'd tell the youngest,
“Go tell your brothers
to quit homesteading
if they want to eat.”
We all laughed at that.
Now, years later,
if someone takes too long,
the family code is that
they're homesteading.
We'd watch the sky
across the street
darken in the winter,
stay light in the summer
as we ate.
Then, finished,
we'd tell the other two or three families
we'd see them
the next week.
Gradually,
kids grew, jobs and hours changed,
Albertsons built a new, closer store
that took us closer
to other fast food places.
I wonder about the homesteaders.
II
His parents split,
and the rental became
his mom's home.
She lived with us for a month or so;
you relegated her,
in her own house,
to the utility room.
Finally,
I told her to come inside.
You lost a job,
found another,
lost it,
found another.
In desperation,
I found and took a job
with a future,
and, after a contentious weekend,
moved us out of your mom's house.
She mourned,
wanting us back.
But six people in a 2-bedroom place
was rough.
The rent in the new place
took a third of our income,
then went up more.
I lost my job,
in part because
you were too proud to do
“women's work,”
laundry,
dishes,
cleaning
while I worked full time
and you stayed home,
watching TV and the kids.
A job
revolving around
physical work
required more than three hours of sleep a night,
and catching up on weekends.
You then took a job,
while I stayed home.
III
Three moves later,
you leave to find work out of state,
leaving me to care for four kids.
I find work
while going to school full time.
We move,
and you come back.
You promised to change,
and found a job
you loved
(security in a topless bar).
You spent weekends at
the flea market,
and took a job there,
working with a friend,
running errands while he ran the booth,
helping him sell radios and such.
The security job failed,
and the flea market was your main job,
paid $100 a week.
Sy (“Hi-Fi Sy”) offered our oldest a job –
his first –
making almost as much
as you on weekends.
Finally, the stress of
work,
kids,
not enough money,
too much rent,
and other nonsense too its toll.
We had to move again.
IV
Every place we looked,
they'd rent to me,
even with four kids and a dog.
But you'd somehow jinx the deal.
Finally, you checked with a rental place.
“Sorry, you don't make enough,”
the man told you.
Our income was $20 a month shy
of 1/3 the rent,
which meant they wouldn't
rent to you.
The next day,
I took off from both jobs and school,
went to the rental agency
and fast-talked the same man
into handing me keys
to two houses.
“Take your pick,” he told me.
I picked one,
paid the rent and deposit,
and had us in the next day.
You lost,
found,
lost,
found
several dead-end jobs,
finally finding one you loved
only when I'd
asked you to leave.
With your own place to rent –
a cheap efficiency –
you made do.
I took a job driving cab,
took a few days off
when you died –
the job had no health insurance,
which meant you neglected your health –
then worked hard,
long,
12-hour days.
Met another driver
who knew how to treat a lady.
He'd nursed his late wife,
a waitress in several diners,
when her cancer showed up,
was cured,
then came back.
A man who'll care for
a dying wife
is a real man.
We married eight years after her death,
three years after my divorce,
and your death.
We both worked,
then had to quit
when our eyesight
started to fail.
I cared for him
as he'd cared for her
during his final years.
V
Working class life
is so much harder than
life for the rich.
The hours are long,
the pay is crap,
the rents are high,
the little bit of Obamacare
is being pulled away
by the obscenely rich,
making health care hard to come by.
It's the working poor's work
that has built up the rich,
built on our backs,
giving them their life
as they pull aways ours.
Someday –
probably soon –
the revolution will knock
the crap out of those rich who don't care.
Be forewarned.
This is a newer poem (written 6/17/18 – 6/18/18) from an upcoming book titled Working Class Poems, which is looking for a publisher.
Wednesday, January 26, 2022
STORM
STORM
by Robin Shwedo
©: Robin Shwedo, 1985
It's growing dark outside.
I wander out;
the clouds are rolling in,
slowly churning,
climbing
over each other.
The air has a certain feel,
expectant,
ready to charge,
held in suspended motion.
Somewhere,
someone has recently mowed their space;
the scent lightly perfumes the air.
Splat.
The first rain drop hits right on my nose.
I wait, watching the tentative drops splatter on the sidewalk
in front of the house.
Slowly,
I wander back inside,
curl on a chair in the darkening room
and watch as the light-and-water show begins.
Summer tends to be the rainy season in Florida, with the Tampa Bay being called the Lightning Capital of the U.S. This was written after one such storm.
This is part of Love, Feelings and the Seasons of Life.
by Robin Shwedo
©: Robin Shwedo, 1985
It's growing dark outside.
I wander out;
the clouds are rolling in,
slowly churning,
climbing
over each other.
The air has a certain feel,
expectant,
ready to charge,
held in suspended motion.
Somewhere,
someone has recently mowed their space;
the scent lightly perfumes the air.
Splat.
The first rain drop hits right on my nose.
I wait, watching the tentative drops splatter on the sidewalk
in front of the house.
Slowly,
I wander back inside,
curl on a chair in the darkening room
and watch as the light-and-water show begins.
Summer tends to be the rainy season in Florida, with the Tampa Bay being called the Lightning Capital of the U.S. This was written after one such storm.
This is part of Love, Feelings and the Seasons of Life.
Tuesday, January 25, 2022
BIKE RIDE, JULY 1
BIKE RIDE, JULY 1
by Robin Shwedo
©: Robin Shwedo, 2017
I'd been a runner for years
until the remnants of an old injury
side-tracked me with pain.
It wasn't so much the day-to-day stuff that hurt,
more like the pounding-on-pavement
that aggravated it.
But there it was:
my bike,
taking up space
and calling to me.
Ride, it called.
So I did.
The first day of the second half of the year
fell on a Saturday.
Running clothes on
(still a runner),
I peddle down the driveway
and head for my running-route, cross-country.
The nearby stables,
smelling of horses,
sweet hay,
and manure,
went by quicker than I'm used to,
while the smells and sounds
fill the air.
Several horses whinny,
and a radio fills in the void
between chatter
as two women clean the stable,
another grooms a horse.
Keith Urban finishes a song,
and Dolly Parton begins
as I ride out of earshot.
Across the three-lane avenue –
one lane in either direction,
separated by a turn lane –
I continue cross-country.
There's a spot
just past a moved-in house on the left,
a canal for rain over-flow and town houses on the right,
just past where the woods begin,
that I can feel loved-ones.
That may seem strange,
but it always had a sense of mystery at this spot,
a place reminiscent of the woods
my grandmother and I passed by several times,
a place that seemed to spark
Grandma's imagination.
“Did I ever tell you about the time...,” she'd begin.
And so I think of Grandma as I ride through here.
I've since begun thinking of others,
dead and gone,
but not forgotten
by any stretch,
as I pass by.
Back on the three-lane avenue,
I pass the front of the town houses
with their blooming Hibiscus shrubs
in yellow,
pink,
and red
along the sidewalk.
One of the townhouses
sports a couple of neon signs
on the porch facing the sidewalk,
an older couple sitting under the signs
while drinking coffee
and talking.
I continue on my ride,
lost in my thoughts,
waiting for the time
I can run,
but enjoying the scenery
all the same.
Written on July 1, 2017. This is part of a growing collection, titled Poetry for My Mother, and is a good partner to my poem titled Running.
by Robin Shwedo
©: Robin Shwedo, 2017
I'd been a runner for years
until the remnants of an old injury
side-tracked me with pain.
It wasn't so much the day-to-day stuff that hurt,
more like the pounding-on-pavement
that aggravated it.
But there it was:
my bike,
taking up space
and calling to me.
Ride, it called.
So I did.
The first day of the second half of the year
fell on a Saturday.
Running clothes on
(still a runner),
I peddle down the driveway
and head for my running-route, cross-country.
The nearby stables,
smelling of horses,
sweet hay,
and manure,
went by quicker than I'm used to,
while the smells and sounds
fill the air.
Several horses whinny,
and a radio fills in the void
between chatter
as two women clean the stable,
another grooms a horse.
Keith Urban finishes a song,
and Dolly Parton begins
as I ride out of earshot.
Across the three-lane avenue –
one lane in either direction,
separated by a turn lane –
I continue cross-country.
There's a spot
just past a moved-in house on the left,
a canal for rain over-flow and town houses on the right,
just past where the woods begin,
that I can feel loved-ones.
That may seem strange,
but it always had a sense of mystery at this spot,
a place reminiscent of the woods
my grandmother and I passed by several times,
a place that seemed to spark
Grandma's imagination.
“Did I ever tell you about the time...,” she'd begin.
And so I think of Grandma as I ride through here.
I've since begun thinking of others,
dead and gone,
but not forgotten
by any stretch,
as I pass by.
Back on the three-lane avenue,
I pass the front of the town houses
with their blooming Hibiscus shrubs
in yellow,
pink,
and red
along the sidewalk.
One of the townhouses
sports a couple of neon signs
on the porch facing the sidewalk,
an older couple sitting under the signs
while drinking coffee
and talking.
I continue on my ride,
lost in my thoughts,
waiting for the time
I can run,
but enjoying the scenery
all the same.
Written on July 1, 2017. This is part of a growing collection, titled Poetry for My Mother, and is a good partner to my poem titled Running.
Thursday, January 20, 2022
At A Check-Cashing Place, On A Dreary Day
At A Check-Cashing Place, On A Dreary Day
by Robin Shwedo
©Robin Shwedo, 2014
Grey, dreary day, first week in January,
I stand, waiting for a pay-day loan.
Ten more minutes, and I can get it.
Rules say that one must wait 24 hours from paying off the last one
before getting another loan.
A radio plays in the background, offering adult-alt-soft rock and occasional chatter.
Paul Simon is singing Graceland,
Ladysmith Black Mambazo laying down the background rhythm.
“I'm going to Graceland, Graceland, in Memphis, Tennessee,”* he sings.
An old woman,
crippled up from life,
eases into the place, shuffles up to the teller window.
The man with her – son, perhaps? neighbor? – sits down on the cheap office chair to wait.
“I need to borrow $400,” the old woman states in a flat, raspy whisper,
as though saying it much louder and with any kind of intonation
would give the statement a life of its own,
thus making it more than she can bear.
Several more people wander in,
needing money,
needing more until their next pay day.
Graceland ends and the Eagles follow up.
I turn and lean against the window where the teller,
who is helping the old woman,
will help me in – now – five minutes.
I stare out the bank of windows taking up one wall
and part of another.
It is dreary, dark, and will probably rain sometime this afternoon.
If it were up north – New England, say, or mid-west –
snow would be imminent.
The teller glances at me.
“One more minute,” he says in his thick Brooklyn accent.
His voice stands out in the Florida winter,
telling of snow days and shoveling snow
neither of us no longer need to do.
There was a time when I thought that all of this was gone,
when I would never have to come in here again.
Money was there in what seemed to be abundance.
And the it wasn't.
“Okay, you're up,” Brooklyn tells me
as the old woman shuffles off.
*©1986 Words and Music by Paul Simon
There are places where money is tight and pay-day advance businesses and pawn shops abound. Good? Bad? Depends on who you ask. This poem simply tells of one person getting a loan. It is part of a book titled Working Class Poems which will soon be looking for a publisher.
This was first posted on October 20, 2016.
by Robin Shwedo
©Robin Shwedo, 2014
Grey, dreary day, first week in January,
I stand, waiting for a pay-day loan.
Ten more minutes, and I can get it.
Rules say that one must wait 24 hours from paying off the last one
before getting another loan.
A radio plays in the background, offering adult-alt-soft rock and occasional chatter.
Paul Simon is singing Graceland,
Ladysmith Black Mambazo laying down the background rhythm.
“I'm going to Graceland, Graceland, in Memphis, Tennessee,”* he sings.
An old woman,
crippled up from life,
eases into the place, shuffles up to the teller window.
The man with her – son, perhaps? neighbor? – sits down on the cheap office chair to wait.
“I need to borrow $400,” the old woman states in a flat, raspy whisper,
as though saying it much louder and with any kind of intonation
would give the statement a life of its own,
thus making it more than she can bear.
Several more people wander in,
needing money,
needing more until their next pay day.
Graceland ends and the Eagles follow up.
I turn and lean against the window where the teller,
who is helping the old woman,
will help me in – now – five minutes.
I stare out the bank of windows taking up one wall
and part of another.
It is dreary, dark, and will probably rain sometime this afternoon.
If it were up north – New England, say, or mid-west –
snow would be imminent.
The teller glances at me.
“One more minute,” he says in his thick Brooklyn accent.
His voice stands out in the Florida winter,
telling of snow days and shoveling snow
neither of us no longer need to do.
There was a time when I thought that all of this was gone,
when I would never have to come in here again.
Money was there in what seemed to be abundance.
And the it wasn't.
“Okay, you're up,” Brooklyn tells me
as the old woman shuffles off.
*©1986 Words and Music by Paul Simon
There are places where money is tight and pay-day advance businesses and pawn shops abound. Good? Bad? Depends on who you ask. This poem simply tells of one person getting a loan. It is part of a book titled Working Class Poems which will soon be looking for a publisher.
This was first posted on October 20, 2016.
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