Into The Mystic Pint (or My Ode to Guinness)

Into The Mystic Pint

Ah, The Guinness.

Another fine draw of the mystic pint.

Whether ‘tis nobler when poured in the glass,

or when poured down the throat,

‘tis a question to ponder indeed,

said one barrister to the other.

But ‘tis not such a conundrum

so worthy of debate at the bar

as long as there be
another bottle on the wall, of said bar.

Or even better

another keg in the cellar, of said bar.

And at said bar, what a fine judge you are!

Truly noble indeed!

Yes, thank you, dear friend,

I would take another draw.

‘Twould be a mistake to ponder further.

Ah, The Guinness!

Another fine draw of the mystic pint!

Magnificently we will flow

into the mystic indeed.

Mark Bohrer

January 2015  North Andover, Mass.

The Sign Says: No Returns (poem)

The Sign Says: No Returns

Life is a gift

that

someone else picks out for you.

And now you’re thinking –

Will this fit me?

And what if people see me wearing it?

But you sigh –

Yes I saw the sign,

so now it’s mine.

Can I regift it?

May 2015  North Andover, Mass.

The Second Fiddle Speaks Out

The Second Fiddle Speaks Out

The fiddle rests lightly,

cradled under my chin,

resting on my neck and skin.

I draw the bow

and the vibration in the bow

vibrates the string,

and the string, the wood of the fiddle,

and the wood, my neck.

We vibrate.

We’re hummin’ the same tune.

Before the concert,

the maestro looked at me.

I heard them speak,

but the words tripped

on their way through my ear.

What I heard was something

else, but

it was more wonderful

just the same.

So that’s what I played.

Everyone looked on in amazement.

Mark Bohrer
November 2015 Andover, Mass.

SouthChurchViews-Old-and-New

It's interesting to see how South Church has changed over the centuries, since this meetinghouse structure was erected in 1861.  Here are some views. I want to find out more about when the church was painted white, apparently sometime after 1920, according to the date on the photo (bottom left side) which was taken on School Street in 1920). Knowing how congregational churches work, how was that decided? Whooh, I'd like to hear what happened when the first person stood up at a church meeting and said, "You know, I think the church would look better painted white."

Echoes on the Ipswich and Essex Road (poem)

Echoes on the Ipswich and Essex Road

This poem was read 

at the Parson Barnard House

300th birthday celebration

September 2, 2015

Standing here,

under the sun of an early day,

warm clapboard siding

runs under my hand.

Standing here,

along the front of the old colonial,

square cut nail heads

hidden in the wood

press against my fingertips.
The strike on nail by hand-forged hammer
still echoes to my touch.

Careful joins of the old growth cedar

trace invisibly on my skin.

These old growth trees still stand,

though turned sideways on this house front,

now three hundred years.

A surprising fate, yet they remain.

Careful joins of odd length clapboard –

why these runs of five, five, four, two, four?

Careful hands chose the best lengths,

set them right

on that early day,

now three hundred years.

Half hidden behind the house, a barn stands

unmoved on its foundation of glacial stones,

stones cleared by horse and hand from this field.

A narrow diamond window stares me in the eye,

looks back into darkness.

A round-columned side porch, open like a greeting,

steps to a kitchen garden. There the mistress

once walked to raised beds,

her thyme and sage to gather.

A triangle topped pediment, half columned,

their homage to the spirit

of another past and place,

ordains the entry door. Above, bullet pane glass

paints sunlight on the stair and empty parlor floor.

Standing echoes

of first and second period men and women

are in these frames and walls.

Here, one second before,

their children, sturdy and quiet,

stood and watched from this same sunlit door.

Standing echoes of the past,

standing echoes of their minds and hands

press on me, push into my mind,

speak to me with wordless voice.
How can wood and glass and stone

ache to tell me who was here

on that early day,

now three hundred years?

They started here with rough unpainted frame

when life was rocky and hard,

and madness against neighbor

was one time too near.

A diamond window’s dark light

revealed flinty souls.

On to painted saltbox, add a columned federal porch,

the frame remade 

by these men and women of rising freedom,

and a rare matching rise of grace.

The men who built these walls - 

The women who set these frames - 
I can feel their hands

in what they made and left.

I love their shape,

I love their rough grace
and high simplicity.

These wooden frames remain,

like markers on the shore
of an inland New England harbor,

unsurprised when seas retreated,

unmoved by passing tides.

Standing on the Ipswich and Essex road,

against my fingertips

press board and nail and hidden joins.

How can I hope to know

the minds and hands of those who crafted

these simple protections from the wind and rain?

Yet I feel

the minds of men and women

who made these simple frames.

Yet they remain,

these places to stand and sit,

to dine and play,

to divine and pray.

Echoes of men and women

are standing here,

under the sun of an early day,

now three hundred years.

Mark Bohrer

May 2015 North Andover, Mass.

My poem is published in the North Andover Citizen!

Here's the link to the online version:  North Andover Citizen - on wickedlocal.com

Here is the front page:

Here are pages 4 and 5:

Article and poem opposite the "Your News" page

And here it is, zoomed in to the poem:

Bradstreet School Still Stands

Bradstreet School Still Stands                       

The old brick façade gazes silently down,

watching the quiet yard of school days past.

Empty halls echo, life and lessons are done.

Windows stand dark, the welcome door is held fast.

For these brick walls, the bell has rung.

Here lively feet and playful voices once gathered.

Days began with a class on the swings and bars.

So keen to learn – a jest – not all so eager

for the school mistress bell to sound the start.

Take your seat, hands folded, sit straight for teacher.

Pens out, books open, the lesson’s begun.

Perhaps the hand of an earlier mistress

guided their pens, though her hand held a quill.

She walked the same land, a poet’s page was her canvas.

She reared her own, with goodly words instill’d.

In the verse that she wrote – to her child not yet born –

was it meant for those who gathered here each morn?

Perhaps you saw far to your red brick namesake.

Would you nod your assent, to what your words began,

to lessons learned under your good gentle name?

Surely taught – as by your own careful hand –

the pupils and teachers you trained,

your descendants became.

The purpose that guided the build of this frame

has carried on to other rooms, other doors.

This mistress is left, behind her fence, her gate.

Decision made, by town citizens okayed,

this red brick lady will stand no more.

Only some stores, in-town homes, and a plaque –

Leaving the mind’s eye, and a gift, in the heart

of those with town colors of scarlet and black,

of those in her care who studied and taught,

of those with the spirit of sturdy red brick.

The good gentle spirit of our mistress poet,

with her own at her knee as she taught and pen’d,

has carried on to those who were not yet born,

has carried on to those who guide with sure hand,

has carried on to those who teach all as their own.

When this brick lady is gone,

some will yet understand –

Bradstreet school is still here.

Bradstreet school still stands.

Mark Bohrer

December 2014  North Andover, Mass.

"Bradstreet School Still Stands" posted on the fence when the school was being torn down (background).

The poem had its start this past December when I drove past the then shuttered Bradstreet School. Somehow that day, the sight of the old school building sitting by itself behind the closed gate, surrounded by the snowy schoolyard, gave me an idea for a poem. My daughter had gone to kindergarten at Bradstreet when it was last in use as an Early Childhood Education Center. I felt sad to see it sit there empty and unused for so long, and I felt this even more keenly when the town decided that it should be torn down. 

 

For a few weeks I mulled over these thoughts. Then I parked there one Saturday afternoon in December and put the thoughts on paper. The poem is what resulted. 

                

I’ve enjoyed reading poetry all my life, but only recently read Anne Bradstreet’s poems.  I was really amazed at how good and accessible they are, even after these centuries. She was a really remarkable woman. And this town was her home. I tried to capture something of the spirit she conveyed, and my feelings about Bradstreet School.

I've since heard that Bradstreet School was actually named after Anne's husband, Simon Bradstreet, who was governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. But where Simon spent much of his life away in Boston in service to the colony, Anne lived and wrote here in this town, and I feel that the name of Bradstreet School is hers as much as Simon's.

 

I’ve written poetry before, but was especially happy to write a poem about and for North Andover. I hope people enjoy it, and think about all of those who dedicated their lives to teaching the children of our town over the years - and centuries.

If you'd like to read some of you Anne Bradstreet's poems, you can find them here: http://annebradstreet.org/annes-poems/  
The site is the work of  "The Friends of Anne Bradstreet", chaired by Karen M. Kline, Poet Laureate of North Andover.

The Good Pilot (poem)

The Good Pilot

The good pilot knows his plane

What it can do, what it can’t

Others might know takeoff power, rate of climb, service ceiling

He knows how to restart an engine that’s freezing

He knows how to crab in a cross wind

Knows how to land it dead stick

The good pilot knows his way 'round the sky

When to fly under clouds, when to turn back

Others might know albedo, isotherm or wind shear

The clouds he can read, he knows weather by feel

He knows how to navigate storms when they darken

Knows how to fly those dark valleys of heaven

The good pilot knows his route

To the home field today

No need for a chart, no flight plan is filed

He vectors on final, he pilots by heart

The instruction is done, no more touch and go’s

All his flight hours logged, at last returns to his love

At the home field she waits, sees the wheels kiss the ground

Takes in his last taxi and turn, her vigil ends at the gate

Patient during the post flight, magnetos check, engine off

She knows her man, was willing to wait

She opens the door as he flies through

Again they are one, no longer two

The good pilot is home

July 2014 Written in the air, somewhere over America

In memory of my dad, Joe Bohrer, Jr., the good pilot, and my mom, Ann, his love.

My mom passed away on July 23, 2006, and my dad on July 2, 2014. On the flight returning from my dad's funeral, with my son Nick sitting next to me on the plane, I sat there wanting to write a poem for my Dad. 

I was on the flight leg from Detroit to Seattle, I sat on the plane and knew I had to write a poem for my Dad. I just started putting words down on paper. That’s what they say – if you want to write something, start writing.  The first two tries didn't go anywhere, but then the third try brought me the phrase “The Good Pilot”, and the main idea and structure came with it whole, just like that. I never know how this happens, but somehow it does. 

As I wrote it, it turned into something more – a love note to both my dad and my mom. I didn’t know it would take that turn, but poems have a mind of their own.

While I was growing up, Dad took us kids flying all the time. Thinking back to those flights, I can still visualize what Erie PA and the area around it looked like from the air. We heard about flying so much from him – it wasn’t possible to have a conversation with him about any topic that didn’t end up being redirected to be about flying! I was able to use some of the flying terms I heard all the time, and work them into the poem. For anyone who never met my dad, "Good Pilot" has a dual meaning – "good" applies to both pilot and man. 

 

I wanted to read a poem at my father's funeral. I didn’t have the right words that day. But that's what motivated me to write "The Good Pilot". Peace.

poem copyright 2014

elyptical

elyptical - MORE SONGS OF CHEERFUL MENACE

after an amazing career that saw them known as one of the greatest unknown bands of recent times, some additional songs were found in the elyptical vaults

here are MORE SONGS OF CHEERFUL MENACE

BLACK VELCRO DRESS

IN YOUR HEAD

WEEP FOR THE CRYING

FLOWER GUY

HERE'S SOME SOUND

AN EVIL NUN

THAT CREEPY SONG ABOUT MY FRIEND

SO EXACTLY HOW DID PEOPLE GET SO STUPID

WHEN THE LATE EVENING CALLS IT QUITS

ROT

(YOU'RE SO) BLONDE

LONG SONG WITH THAT HIDDEN SONG ABOUT A CRAZY ASIAN LADY INSIDE IT FOR SOME REASON

"All their fans know the sound - yes, that was definitely an elyptical song!"
 
CD Songlist:
1) Intro - George Harrison
2) LS Bumblebee - Peter Cook and Dudley Moore
3) Rocket Man - William Shatner
4) Ballad of Bilbo Baggins - Leonard Nimoy
5) Ouch! - The Rutles
6) Stairway to Gilligan's Island - Dr. Demento
7) What's The New Mary Jane - The Beatles
"There is no higher praise than a loving parody." 

 Amazon Review

When The Night Calls It Quits By  Mark J. Bohrer "Beatles Fan" (New England, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME) When we look back, this will be seen as a milestone album. I don't say this lightly. June 22, 2011 Top of Form Bottom of Form Top of Form Bottom of Form This review is from: When The Night Calls It Quits (MP3 Music) This is one of those rare albums where every song is different and interesting. Almost every song has an original lyrical, musical or sonic idea. Best of all, the songs all sound "organic". By organic, I mean that the music and lyric are one piece, where the music and the words effortlessly make a greater whole. There aren't too many bands that can do this. Start by listening to any of these: Blind, Deeply Sympathize, Meet My Friend, Cheers to the Sound, New Morning (a long one that has a gem of a song hidden in the 2nd half). Well worth getting, and gets better with each listen. These guys are great songwriters and instrumentalists. All around, kudos to Eclyptic! These guys should be famous!

Dr Who: Day of the Doctor

We saw this last night - Jill, Nick, Debbie and myself - at Loews in Methuen. Even for those who you haven't seen much of the Who story (as I'm guessing applies to many parents), this movie is entertaining and very enjoyable, and is well worth going to.

The story, acting, special effects (including 3D) and the Who-vian humor (as always) were just great.

Cheers to the Dr Who writers and producers! Well done!