Three Poems by John Grey

by John Grey

Red and Green

The traffic light goes red

and I stop beside a homeless guy

who’s set up on a traffic island,

a wiry unshaven guy

in a “Red Sox Cap”

and an old moth-eaten jacket

though the temperature is in the low eighties.

His face is scar-saturated.

My sympathy can’t look away.

With a practiced lack of expectations,

he points to a sign that sums up his life

in a doleful two sentences

then stares at me with a plaintive

“there but for fortune” expression.

My choice is either stare back

or reach into my wallet.

I’m just about to do the latter

when the light goes green.

There are a bunch of cars to my rear.

I don’t want folks beeping at me,

so I drive off, wallet intact,

the homeless guy no richer

for briefly knowing me.

Then the traffic lights

take on new meaning.

Red is for guilt.

Green is for getting off lightly.

In the Last Forest

Forest at its finest,

long before the swing of axe,

the rattle and roar of bulldozers –

trees sway in the breeze –

rustling branches

soft in their sound,

and trunks creaking

like ancient souls –

rings worth of lifetimes

yet green of leaf and needle –

a drifter’s resting place,

a brocade to sieve the sun –

nature as required viewing,

as incorporated sound,

mostly whisper but sometimes

an overwhelming hymn,

that choir of the old ones

up in the loft of light.

The Dear Poem

I sometimes call you “dear” out of habit.

I mean nothing by it and yet I mean everything by it.

Often the word, “yes” inspires it.

So “yes dear” is a common phrase in our language.

But there are times when we’re close together

and I feel your pulsing heart against mine,

and all is warm, and the moment is particular,

that “dear” comes out softly, slowly, and far from perfunctory.

That’s when I can feel all of the word’s meaning

passing from me and into you.

I can’t pretend to know how it is for you to hear it

but the fact that you cling closer when I express

how dear you are to me is an indication I should

keep it in my vocabulary.

And still, when I leave, I say “bye dear.”

When I arrive, I say, “hi dear.”

It’s just comes out. It’s natural.

The deeper “dear” is not offended.