by Sue Binder
SPECIAL EFFECTS
A Book of Poetry
By
Sue Binder
Copyright 2012 by C. S. Binder
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden, without the written permission of the author.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cover image used under Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike License.
About the Author
However, her pride and joy are her four children and five grandchildren and her special Goberian dog, Bakey. She currently resides in southeast Colorado.
DEDICATION
To our faithful dog, Bakey. Thank you Kris for the following special words:
He’s old. He’s blind, and he’s deaf. I hafta help feed him and clean up after him. He wakes up at night and needs my attention. I stumble out of bed to help him. He walks slowly and never straight. When we go out, he is slow and I hafta slow my pace to keep up with him. I clean up his puke and any other mistakes he makes.
But dammit, I LOVE MY DOG.
Kris Binder, 2012
Table of Contents
CHECKBOOK
PASSWORD
STORM
BLACKOUT
MENTOR
STAR TREK FANTASY
MEN DON’T TELL
ACCEPTANCE
EXTERMINATION
DISILLUSIONMENT
THE MEDIAN
FLORESCENCE
THE BOX
NEW YEAR’S EVE
ALIEN
EXALTATION
CREATION
BLACK AND WHITE
TOURNAMENT
BURN OUT
EQUILIBRIUM
LAMENTATIONS
DENOUEMENT
TROPHIES
COIT
RESURRECTION
CONCERT
REGENERATION
SPECIAL EFFECTS
CONSORT OF A GOD
TRIPOLI
EXTINCTION
MURAL
ERUPTION
FIRST AMENDMENT
THE ROAD
AMTRAK REVISITED
TROUBADOUR
CHECKBOOK
Ancient Writing
Unearthed by archaeological dig.
Folded manuscript
With inscriptions that can be read
Only by the initiated.
Arrows and circles
Crisscross columns,
Which have been erased,
Crossed out,
And rewritten in inks
Of mysterious colors.
Thus, will the centuries ponder
The runes of a primitive culture.
(Originally published 1990 Chinook, Otero Junior College)
PASSWORD
I punch in summer
With a negative response.
I type in ocean
With the same result.
Like an android programmed
To self-destruct,
I repeat the action,
My soul obsessed.
Sand, Starry Night,
Beach Boys, and Fire.
But the words are just words
That never relate.
The Password is lost.
The link to the Server
Can never be traced.
STORM
Dead branches and discarded McDonald’s cups
Line the driveway and clutter the lawn
That I spent four days raking in advent of Spring.
The trash can clatters down the alley
And joins the neighbor’s laundry
On the lawn of the Methodist Church.
Dust drifts into the cracks
Around the window sills
And sifts into the kitchen sink.
Pellets explode against the window,
As lightning burst across the sky,
Leaving behind a world of shadows.
Power lines nap
And the town drops to attention
Paralyzed by the storm.
Silence.
Four hours of data input
Snatched by the wrath of the storm.
BLACKOUT
Two months of waking up each morning
And finding it the same as yesterday.
Two months of drifting through the hours
Until night dispenses unconsciousness.
People speak, but I don’t hear their words,
Only sounds that echo, without meaning
Through the common space we share.
I try to work, and find myself
Unable to type one word after another
On the blank page before me.
I avoid interviewing people
And hide from political rallies.
I let my answering machine take all the calls
And pretend that I’m not there….
Two months….I wander like an alien
Upon the planet to which I was born.
Just when I think I have been
Overtaken by existentialism,
The doctor diagnoses my malady.
“Sinus infection.”
Four pills a day, and I am born anew
Resurrected into the human race.
MENTOR
Toiling at the typewriter every day,
When the words refuse to come,
Wondering if I’m truly gifted
Or if the gift can be learned.
Struggling when the mailbox
Fills up with bills and rejection slips,
Until I no longer anticipate
Acceptance.
Then one phone call
Breaks the silence of frustration.
One success, however, small
In a voice that says,
“You touched my soul.”
And I turn back to the typewriter
And the words begin to flow.
STAR TREK FANTASY
Molecules scattered through the galaxy
Waiting for Scotty to beam me up,
Reformulated into one Composite Me.
Lost upon an ice planet
With only Mr. Spock—
A destiny most illogical, but gratifying.
Sharing the Command Chair
With Captain James Kirk,
In preparation for my own starship.
Computerized surgery,
Laser instrumentation,
McCoy as my Medical Mentor.
I wake.
The living room carpet lies rough against my skin.
Once more I failed to make it through
Late night reruns of “Star Trek”
And the Enterprise crew.
MEN DON’T TELL
I wiped the blood from my ear,
And rinsed the rag into the drain.
I thought about calling Jack, my friend.
He might listen, he might hear my pain.
But, no, I shut the thought out
Before it had time to grow,
Jack was out.
So was Joe.
And Mike would laugh all the way to town,
Where he would spread stories all around.
I thought about my father,
But he would never comprehend.
And a woman? One who would take sides
With the one who was victimized?
That would never make my nightmare end.
No problem. I’m a realist. It’s a small world.
If I tell one single soul
Soon everyone would know.
So I rinsed the rag into the drain.
I washed away the heartache and pain,
And forgot about Mike, Jack, and Joe.
ACCEPTANCE
Why only now do I understand
How you accepted life,
Living with constant dissention
As a tormented mother and wife?
Why only now do I comprehend
The pain of your bonds and fetters?
Could I have done it differently?
Could I have done it better?
Could I being bound by identical chains,
Not having the future’s key,
Could I have done it better
Or even differently?
EXTERMINATION
Silent vapors
Creep through each cell,
Permeating the tissues.
No battle cry alerts the prey.
No symptoms signal the toxic intrusion.
But somnolent eyes
Droop in warm receptions,
Trusting the anonymous friend,
Whose laughter confounds
The fragmented family
Who only perceive him as Death.
DISILLUSIONMENT
Like warm, wounded blood
It slowly seeps
Pervading through each thought—
And finally creeps, unseen, unfelt
Into a vital part,
Where it takes form and radiates
Into substantial shape—
Demoralizing, devitalizing, disintegrating your heart.
(Originally published in The Antelope, 1971,
Lamar Community College)
THE MEDIAN
Somewhere in the middle is the place where I belong—
For I’m neither tall nor short, I’m neither weak nor strong.
Somewhere in the middle is the only place for me—
I’m neither famous nor obscure, neither bound nor free.
I’m somewhere “sitting on a fence” with reflections on either side,
Belonging not to any group, but never cast aside.
Somewhere in the middle shielded from each test,
Somewhere in the middle is the me that I detest.
(Published in National Poetry Press and “The Antelope”, Lamar Community College, 1971)
FLORESCENCE
Having spent the time to help them grow,
I found them laying in a row,
Their blossoms butchered beyond recognition.
Pulled from the earth, fertile and damp,
Their roots squashed by a hefty tramp,
They were withering and dying, without ambition.
Oh, God, forgive the vagrant who plundered so,
Who destroyed flowers commencing to grow,
Who yanked them up carelessly, flaunting tradition.
Forgive the fool who plucked blossoms unripe,
And left them to shrivel in the darkening night,
Sowing regression and destroying ambition.
(Originally published in Shore Poetry Anthology, 1971)
THE BOX
Down in the box I slowly crawled,
Submerging even my head,
And you folded over the cardboard flaps,
And silently closed the lid.
These rigid walls won’t let me pass
Though the world continues its spin
I know just where I belong,
Held tightly by the walls within.
The days pass by, they swallow me up,
As I cry out from this damned space.
But there’s no middle ground,
No escape the agony of this place.
I ‘m left with only a silent scream,
In this prison you offered me.
How could I know that once I climbed in
I’d never again be free?
(Published originally in “Chinook” Otero Junior College, 1981)
NEW YEAR’S EVE
Was it really so much—
My wanting to dance?
After years of walking
Through all that I did,
After sitting and watching
Through high school proms
And company parties
That were strictly a bore—
I wanted to dance.
Music punctuated my brain
And I waited, hoping for a chance.
You sat and listened to idle chatter,
And watched three men stagger from the bar in song.
And I asked you if you wouldn’t try.
I fidgeted as women-libbers spotted prey,
And maneuvered them onto the floor—
And knew that I was prudish not to…
But I sat and listened and tapped my fingers on the table
In rhythmic patterns to the music.
Still my feet ached
And my body strained,
While my brain vibrated with frantic impulses.
Hours later, I slowly undress,
And climb into a cold, empty bed.
The drinks rip at my head—
And tears slide down my gown.
I feat the years
Have smothered all I was
And all I ever hoped to be….
(Originally published in Chinook, La Junta Junior College, 1981)
ALIEN
A homecoming dinner,
Ham and apple pie.
Hot coffee brewing,
Aunts, uncles and cousins
Perch on rigid chairs,
Crowing over exploits of offspring
And MasterCard purchases
Like HD TV and DVDs.
Family albums,
Memories I’d rather forget.
A marriage shattered.
Six hours of gin rummy
And conversation
Punctuated with accusations
Of a squandered inheritance.
I reaffirm my destiny.
EXALTATION
From the mortal’s conversation
She weeds out clutter and rearranges his patter
Into correct usage, form and connotation.
Intricate concepts of philosophy,
Anthropology and archaeology
Spit themselves out in her exchanges
As easily as the masses
Flip on their TV sets.
Humanity retreats,
No longer willing to sacrifice themselves
Upon the altar of Trivial Pursuit
To the High Priestess of Literacy,
Who will accept no tainted offerings.
They forsake her,
Even as she ponders evolution and theology.
Evoking wisdom
Within university walls,
Each night she retreats to her celibate apartment
As her PHD yellows on the wall
Above her Macintosh.
SEMANTICS
I kneel in the pew,
And my head is bowed,
Trying to concentrate
On this Christian ritual of death.
Guilt and pain
Dwell side-by-side,
Infesting a soul
That can only gasp “why?”
“He was a good husband
And a good father,”
Intones the minister
In final conclusion.
I ponder offenses,
Atonements neglected.
Resentment flows,
As the words rise like incense
In hallow tones.
So many ways to shape a sentence,
So many philosophies
To bring to the grave,
To thread strength through the fiber of family.
Unknowns can be left unspoken
And half-truths buried with the dead
.
Ministers aren’t supposed to lie.
CREATION
Pinpoints of stars
Illuminate the sky,
As I trudge along the path,
Alone.
Each night I walk this way
To where I do not know,
But uncharted urges
Lead my feet and disrupt my soul.
No one else can follow
Into the channels of my mind.
No one else can focus
On that I’ve left behind.
Here in the darkness
I walk alone,
With creation imprisoned
Inside my soul.
BLACK AND WHITE
I can still remember
When movies were black and white,
Tom Mix rode the silver screen
And Flash Gordon fought Emperor Ming.
I see them yet
When I push the buttons of my Magnavox,
And my satellite dish
Brings the world to me—
HBO, Cinemax, ESPN, and MTV—
24-hours of American variety.
I wouldn’t have it any other way,
But sometimes I drop at the end of the day
Before the Great God TV
Cynical of all that I survey.
If I could but press the VCR and play back yesterday,
Would the world still be only black and white?
TOURNAMENT
Like opponents in a Scrabble game,
We’re face to face and tile on tile.
I choose each letter randomly,
Forming order out of nonsense.
Then you, oh, Ancient Rahab,
Spell Genesis with mocking tones,
Your laughter echoing through the centuries.
I subtract a “Q”, a “J” and a “Z,”
And tally up the points
Thought the outcome never varies one jot.
