SCARECROW

How’s it look? I ask,
slipping my arms into the sleeves

of the scarecrow’s battered coat.
Good, she says,

but I already know the truth,
and by portentous coincidence,

the sky has just turned the same
disquieting shade of gray

as various diseases of the mind.
I hold my arms out like so

and assume the somber expression,
including opalescent eyes,

of someone remembering something
he wished he didn’t,

children overtaken on the road
and the shrill little cries of the sun.

© Howie Good

THE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE

They were there when I got there
and still there when I left,
wearily wheeling my ash can
and long-handled broom
into unfamiliar precincts of dawn.
Oh, how they oohed at you,
the bareback rider in the poster,
expostulated on your red match-head hair,
your faded and peeling pink costume
encrusted with Fourth of July sparklers,
your white horse whirling round the ring
like a storm of paperweight snow.
After the side street summoned me,
they stayed on, as though they heard
the ringmaster cracking his whip
for attention; the note in his voice
reminding them of something.

© Howie Good