Have the Russians taken over Amazon?

 I am a long-time Anazon customer, and will no-doubt continue to buy from them, if I can, but sometimes it's pretty hard to do.  I just now wondered if the Russians have taken them over.  As to that, I don't know what else to call it.  Typical day:  I decide to buy some sausage.  Amazon takes me to a wide variety.  After some time I select two kinds and after some difficulty, Amazon moving things around while I'm trying order.  Then I want to pay for them so I press on "purchase" but Amazon doesn't send me there.  It gives me an advertisement for something else -- don't know what -- didn't read it, so I deleted it.  That ends that.  The Purchase option is gone.  I really want those sausages so I try again, again press Purchase, but this time I don't delete it, this time I press he arrow to the left, and end up on another page that doesn't let me purchase anything, I didn't read that page either -- just deleted it.  Which ended threw me out of my quest to purchase sausage.

I sat staring at my computer screen, considering whether to try a third time.  I do feel sorry for Amazon.  Maybe it isn't the Russians who are hacking them with weird screens trying to sell the customer something while he is on a quest to buy something else and not in a mood to be jerked around.  Maybe it is the Chinese.  This is not the first time some agency has discouraged me from buying something from Amazon.

I checked my refrigerator.  Nope, still no sausage.  Maybe I'll make a trip to Stater Brothers.  Surely, they'll have some  

My fist

The concept was just a bit ago

Clear; then in its midst I lost

The ability to move.  I must

It seems, be able to clench

My fist and then my mind in that

Order.  Without that I merely dream,

Drifting like a slow moving cloud

Whose outline seems fixed until

Measured against another. 

Even if I think out loud and in

The brief time past look down, 

I can watch my fist unfurl.

On a sunny Friday nearby

 

“Just swallow the sunshine”

Pressed the Shadow.  Well

For him to say in his hiding.

I’ve lost substance by his

Side these passed few years,

Cloven from shielded eyes.

The last of us trudged up

Here to set our baskets down

Saying one to the other,

“This much is good” and

Began to weep.  There

Was music pulsating 

Behind.  Urging inexorably

Our staying here in this

Place till we

Who can still stand

Crane our necks and stare

At the sun till we go blind.

Marching, Marching

 

Pushing open the wrought-iron gate

I’d had enough of just looking in –

Needing to be there on the other

Side.  I let it slam behind me.

The clang introduced an

Element of doubt.  I had skills

My history proved them,

But no evidence of this,

Clicking through to a place

I’d neither studied for

Nor imagined.  Looking 

About I saw they neither

Dressed nor looked like me

Their hair hung in tatters.

Their homework was rolled up

Under their arms.  Up on the

Walls, well armed guards

Walked to and fro; yet

No one challenged me for

Being there.  It wasn’t long

Before I learned my place.

Life moved swiftly then.

My dreams of Susan

Faded.  My doubts

About being there when

She was not diminished.

The cripple-ness in my knee

Began to spread.

Outside in the morning

Walking across the front lawn

Early in this chirping-crisp brisk

Morning – the sun blinking its

Bright light through the trees,

Breezes meandering, spread

Widely enough to stir the leaves,

And grasses and flowers beneath them.

How often did I wake here

Trousers cinched with a broad

Belt, my ancient Ninety-two

Pulling them further down than

They did when we were new?

I might know if I were thinking

Clearly, the way to the top.

There was a time I wouldn’t stop

On such a morning until I stood 

Up there, drinking espresso

From my thermos’ cup, but I

Can’t make it beyond here, this

Morning, being too old and feeble

For anything more than this.

Sailing back from some place else

 

We were often there, taking 

The stairs two at a time

While the chance of falling

Wasn’t a consideration, and

A helping hand being there

Was for touch and not

Really for help.  I recall

The touch.  I thought I could

Handle losing it, but failed

To understand the breaking

Down of her understanding,

That withdrawing

Touch of consequence, 

Memory loss, loss of most

Of what she was.  I would

Have stayed at sea if she could

Have stayed, but she was

Slowly leaving in her mind,

Me hearing her go in every

Conversation, time trickling away

Like sand through my fingers.

My Old Pen

 

There was a blaring 

Back up beyond the hill we’d 

Just come down.  Someone 

Pursued us.   A bull horn

Voice strengthened and

Threatened.  Unable

To think, I stumbled

Away as well as I could. 

I had been writing and

Raised my hand with a pen

There clinging.  My other 

Held a walking stick

And at my feet Jessica bared

Her few remaining teeth.

My pen was knocked away

And my poor hearing

Turned their sounds into

Raucous screeching.  They

Shook their heads at

My conspicuous ineptness

In this now-righteous domain.