Poems Niederngasse

John Vick
Wind Surfing

A plane casts its shadow
on the purple-hued mountain lit
by a burnt tangor sunset.  Will
the weather hold?  The glass of Eli's
windshield shimmers in the slowly waning light.

Early the next morning,
low clouds move over the plains;
shadows of the encroaching air mass rob
the royal mountains of light and the flat
terrain appears as though through misted glass.

Eli looks out past
the plains, the olympian mountains
rising behind his light blue windsurfing
board.  In the shadow of the scud cloud, he sees
the distant sheet of glassy grey rain encroach on his plan

to surf like a champion
across the sandy plains, no shadow
to Doyle and Games Junior - who
can sail across a field of railroad spikes
as if over glass.  Glass reflects sunset light off the mountain

and makes Eli grateful.
The storm steers away from
the mountain and Eli nimbly lights
his passion for the surf, as fast as a shadow
gliding across a glass plain, hand on mast, below boom.

20 February 2005, round  I, poem 6

John Vick, a professional neurotic, resides in Minneapolis.  A titless wonder by trade, Vick is interested primarily in flash, short fiction and poetry. It rarely occurs to him that people may ask, "What is a 'titless wonder'?"  When that happens, he reluctantly tells them it is a military term for a male secretary.  He is not in the military anymore, thank god. email:   John Vick