Two Poems

by Jeffrey Burghauser (February 2020)

Alpküche, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, 1918

 

Not That It Does Me Much Good

 

I have learnt that an apartment can’t

Quite be yours till filled with the décor

Of your problems. Later griefs would grant

Sequel principals. For instance, your

Workplace is a Where you cannot lay

Claim to till you’ve known the queasy grey

Of returning, having rushed away

For some family emergency.

 

Once, I boasted no idea (in love,

As the sun descended in its spite)

Whether I enjoyed a spasm of

Real bewilderment or of delight.

 

Now, with thinning hair & painful knee,

Well, the difference is clear to me.
 

 

 

Bay on the Coast of Fehmarn, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, 1913

 

The Seafarer

 

The sea is a quilt unfurled

Over Earth’s unsteady knee.

Every man is lent the world

(All the wiser men agree)

As if by implicit pact;

I’ve been lent it, though, in fact,

Quite begrudgingly.

 

Only sleep can integrate

An entire day’s fresh re-

Mórses into some self-hate

That’s discrete & orderly,

Till I undertake to cross

The uncivil, various,

Apprehensive sea.

 

 

 

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Jeffrey Burghauser is a teacher in Columbus, OH. He was educated at SUNY-Buffalo and the University of Leeds. He currently studies the five-string banjo with a focus on pre-WWII picking styles. A former artist-in-residence at the Arad Arts Project (Israel), his poems have appeared (or are forthcoming) in Appalachian Journal, Fearsome Critters, Iceview, Lehrhaus, and New English Review. Jeffrey’s book-length collection, Real Poems, is available on Amazon and his website is www.jeffreyburghauser.com.

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