THEIR FLEEING

by Robert Farmer

“Nearly 60 million people have been driven from their homes by war and persecution, an unprecedented global exodus that has burdened fragile countries with waves of newcomers and littered deserts and seas with the bodies of those who died trying to reach safety.” —New York Times, June 18, 2015

Their fleeing

is from these times
mired in apocalyptic struggle
spread through and by power
coated with ancient enmities and beliefs
brought up to slaughter and stagnation.

Safely sequestered, we trace the ways to today,
tracking back through old empires
and all manner of community
to rest in those imaginary ages
ruled by honored sages who left us

with stories of Tang poet-governors gathered
round wine and evening composition,
calm in the certainty of their world
and accepted sureness
of suffering and death.

Yet even they flaunted rants
on injustice of their times,
satire buried in language
which led them to exile
in far provinces.


Robert Farmer is a retired forester who lives in Cleveland and occasionally publishes poems in small journals.

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO JOHNNIE

by Robert Farmer

BEREA, Ky. — I WAS raised amid the coal fields of eastern Kentucky, but I was always drawn to nearby Berea. The hamlet, tucked into the lush green hills on the western side of the Appalachians, has a long legacy of equality and free inquiry — among other things, it’s home to Berea College, the first integrated and coeducational college in the South. There are lots of folks like me in Berea, who came here for its professed openness and diversity. But we had a rude shock last week, when the City Council voted 5 to 3 against an ordinance to ban discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. The vote illuminates a new reality for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans. The equality divide we face is no longer between red and blue states, but between urban and rural America. Even as we celebrate victories like this month’s Supreme Court order on same-sex marriage, the real front in the battle for equality remains the small towns that dot America’s landscape.  --Small Towns, Small Hearts, The Battle for Gay Rights in Rural America, Silas Housecoat, NY Times, October 22, 2014. Image source: Angela Worldtrekker.

Whatver happened to Johnnie
who wouldn’t dress out for high school gym,
loved chatting up the girls,
rode them around
in his blue convertible back in ’48.

Once later when we gathered,
smug from foreign places,
he spoke of wild parties in San Francisco
and looked the part
long before our little mountain town
woke up to the world and The Castro.

I’ve looked everywhere.
We’ve lost him.
He’d be about 83 now.
Probably dead.
Back then they just disappeared
from little towns all across the country.


Robert Farmer is a retired forester who lives in Cleveland, Ohio and occasionally publishes poems in small journals.

REVIEW: FALL CONCERT 2010

by Robert Farmer

 

To the piano in his own sweet way
on the arm of the conductor,
while the packed-house crowd stood,
sang Happy Birthday through tears.
On his ninetieth, not just another gig.

He pulled us back to festivals
and the 50’s college stands,
our youth now gray throughout,
old ladies in dress circle
dancing again to Take Five.

His chops still simple, straight, lyrical,
no pyrotechnical improvisation.
Our age ordered silence on the solos
as we grazed back through lives
to sounds once lost,
now avengefully heralded
by today’s Downbeat recognition.

The Cleveland Symphony played backup,
then stood and cheered.

 
Robert Farmer is a retired professor of forest ecology who lives in Cleveland. He occasionally publishes poems in various journals, including New Verse News.