Canyon of Tears by G. Louis Heath

Fate agitates in the sheer canyon in the

Sparse shadow of starving pines clinging

To stoic cliffs. Teens skylark in kayaks and 

Old men paddle in canoes to fight surging 

Rage. The river shrugs off intruders on its 

Roiling shoulders, slashes skin, splinters bone.

Rocks find all in the stained blanket of time to 

Eddy un-happened sadness. No one escapes. 

No birth or station, no wealth, grants a pardon.

Jagged rock happens to all in the eternal canyon

Of angry water and bitter tears. Rock happens.

G. Louis Heath, Ph.D., Berkeley, 1969, is Emeritus Professor, Ashford University, Clinton, Iowa. He enjoys reading his poems at open mics. He has published poems in a wide array of journals. His books include Leaves Of Maple and Long Dark River Casino.

Philosopher Stone by G. Louis Heath

The philosopher who spoke carried such conviction

in his words, I even doused my cigarette and stopped

thinking sexual thoughts about the woman nearby.

That for me is real attention. Pitch black outside, I

imagined this hall a deep shaft in a gold mine. We had

gathered as Miners of Reality, Seekers of The Truth.

I yearned to mine nuggets to guide my life, a true train  

wreck.

The best-selling pop philosopher at the lectern in hunter-green

business suit—a power suit who does power lunches?—plied

his philosopher stone over a long train of high-octane thoughts.

He went on over an hour. Still, no thought, no word turned gold

as flies buzzed in the stale, muggy air.

G. Louis Heath, Ph.D., Berkeley, 1969, is Emeritus Professor, Ashford University, Clinton, Iowa. He enjoys reading his poems at open mics. He often hikes along the Mississippi River, stopping to work on a poem he pulls from his back pocket, weather permitting. He has published poems in a wide variety of online literary journals.

This Building of Good Bones (Old Main) by G. Louis Heath

This building has stood, a brick-faced sentinel

on this limestone bluff for over a century.

It is a building of good bones, bones that

have borne many classes and their profs.

These good bones shouldered each new

class with sturdy grace, rejoiced at successes,

cried over failures, and mourned untimely

deaths. Its rooms have known the good

bones of youth, bones that carried books,

laptops and who knows what in those

backpacks.

Those young bones have found their legs as

we never dreamed they could, so very well,

and walked to a golden dawn and beyond,

far beyond, to many lives well lived.

This building is proud of those lives whose bones

walked these halls and how it shaped them.

The tears it sheds now as its old bones give

out are tears of joy for the many young

bones that walked its halls and built strong

futures here.

  *My university will close in a few weeks, in May, 2016. I wrote this poem for that impending, historic occasion.  

G. Louis Heath, Ph.D., Berkeley, 1969, teaches at Ashford University, Clinton, Iowa.He retires in May, 2016. He enjoys reading his poems at open mics. He often hikes along the Mississippi River, stopping to work on a poem he pulls from his back pocket, weather permitting. He can be contacted at gheathorov@gmail.com

Grow Flowers in the Sand by G. Louis Heath

In this place where boredom rules,

the malls are rich and opulent,

full of toys to buy, to entertain.

But the mindscape is a desert

without oases.

On the desert a great sandstorm blows,

furious with mall patrons.

The sand wants to visit their homes,

smash their tawdry bijoux

with silica hands.

Smash all toys.

Strike the white flag.

Grow flowers in the sand.

G. Louis Heath, Ph.D. Berkeley, teaches at Ashford University, Clinton, Iowa. His books include VANDALS IN THE BOMB FACTORY, LEAVES OF MAPLE and LONG DARK RIVER CASINO. His interests include writing poems and short stories, hiking, and serving on the Clinton, Iowa Human Rights Commission. He can be contacted at gheathorov@gmail.com.

The Thinning Darkness by G. Louis Heath

was filled with compulsion, with fragrant,

exotic confusion. The scent of bougainvillea

and jasmine floated through the live oak,

draped in Spanish moss, lit by the gibbous

moon now etching a dawn.

He leaned against the tree, holding her. She

felt his strength, and felt protected. Yet the

prehensile way he embraced shadows

of a childhood no moon or sun could dispel

sounded the silent alarm.

She felt him as a fastness. Yet he was holding

to her as a two-year-old might cling to a

mother’s shoulders in the dark, after the

night light had failed.

The tension in her spine, bone-words, spoke

to him. Under the tanned skin of vacation,

the long night of partying around the island

tingled, simply heaven, the finale of a honey-

moon that should have been a vacation for two,

not a sandy, conchy extension of a sacrament

that would begin a life together,

but mostly apart,

and only for four months, and two days,

till in the final hours the bone-words found a

translator.

G. Louis Heath, Ph.D. Berkeley, teaches at Ashford University, Clinton, Iowa. His books include VANDALS IN THE BOMB FACTORY, LEAVES OF MAPLE and LONG DARK RIVER CASINO. His interests include writing poems and short stories, hiking, and serving on the Clinton, Iowa Human Rights Commission. He can be contacted at gheathorov@gmail.com.