Four Poems by John Harold Olson

Understanding Your Air-cooled Volkswagen Engine with Regard to Agatha Christie

 

One regret that intrudes

At 3 in the morning,

not the predictable chain

of failed relationships,

stranded and broken on 

on D-Day fields.

 

Nor the year I spent drunk,

the divorce year where I was

Sleepy John Estes repeatedly drowning

off the Floating Bridge,

My daughter reaching out

As I threw up my arms.

No, something else.

 

Pernicious.

What does that mean?

For most of my days

I have lacked the unifying agent.

I didn’t see it until I was almost old.

 

All those years

 

It was right there all the time

In the Agatha paperbacks all over my house,

The stack of Agatha Christies my mother

Bought at the church sale

one rainy night

that made her happy

But interested me

Not at all.

My resistance like the 

stubborn will to deny

God.

 

In the VW 

school, long haired 

motorheads learned

the deceptively simple

Teutonic systems of

The Bug.

 

How to get it started

On the side of the road

At 3 in the morning.

 

Watching my friend

taking the small parts

and assembling the

Tinker Toy construction

that was the VW engine while

rain lashed and Spirit

Played on a greasy little am/fm radio 

on the shelf.

 

“Every system-

Air

Fuel 

Spark

Cables

Vacuum-

They all work in concert

Or this thing 

Is a slow as 

as spiritual growth

In the modern world,”

He said, with John the Baptist

hairy clarity,

Vivid eyes.

“Slow then dead”

 

I got Agatha

when I was broke 

And alone

More then the puzzle,

It was the system of harmonies

a person hears

as life replays

While you are going 

down off the floating bridge.

Throw up your hands.

Rotator Cuff 

 

The ointment smell rising

From beneath the ace bandage

Wrapped round and round

The shoulder, chest

In aid of the rotator cuff tear,

Piece missing, raw socket

Against screaming nerve.

 

Hurts bad with a throwing

motion, 

but I can still swing a hammer,

unload adobes, torch rebar.

The struggling engine, crew cab bumping 

Through the beautiful California dawn.

The beating these trucks take.

I apologize to Junior and Israel for the

Menthol smell.

 

Here is where you get surprised.

“It’s alright,” Junior said, “We’ve all been fucked up.”

“What are you, heat ointment and ace bandage? Junior asks.

“Yeah,”I say, “it only hurts when I stop.”

 

“Puedes trabajar entonces?” 

Israel wants to know.

“He says, ‘Are you gonna work?’”, From Junior.

“Yeah, puedo trabajar.”

“See Israel? I told you,” Junior taunts.

 

Stop right there and try to place 

this vivid piece in the puzzle.

In the challenging, endless sky?

Cityscape of lost pity?

In the tangle of branches?

Next to the Pooh Bear?

The loving donkey?

 

No, it’s from another puzzle.

One somebody else is working on.

Sunday

 

We went down at dawn

and took a swim 

in the warm arm of the lake,

as warm and narrow as a river.

 

Then, we went back 

And got ready for church,

The boys in clean cotton plaid,

The girls in berry coloured dresses.

 

We walked down the sandy way,

Around the shrubby corner toward 

The bells.

 

Creator of the Stars of Night,

The Holy Ghost,

The shady church cool

Beneath the steeple.

 

Outside in the sun,

The lake sparkling blue 

Through the birches and the

black cherry grove.

 

The dogs, ducks and geese,

The donkey brays with the bells.

Road To Cripple Creek

 

Went up the trail like 3 snails 

And camped at the log

lean-to built against the cliff

 

The beaver pond

with rock cold

crystal water

 

The sun went down 

like a trick

stars deep like drowning

 

The fire

The tea

that bit like whiskey

 

Wildcat screaming

woke us up

then happily fall back to heavy oxygen sleep

 

Moving past the opening

Like an ocean liner

The bear paws through the campfire ash

Looking for cans

 

Dallas sitting up

With his pistol

“No”, said Jean, sotto voce,

the roundish bear

hulked off in the starlight.

 

Morning,

Through the green horse meadow

To the cut and the trail

Down to the shoebox car

 

Cripple Creek

Half ghost town

chili, eggs, and a cold beer

“In ‘Nam,” Dallas said, “I used

To try to will myself to death.

That’s nuts, right?”

 

“You’re not nuts,” I said. 

“Not even close.”

John Harold Olson - Is a retired Special Education teacher in Las Vegas. Transitioning to being a hospice volunteer.