A Poem by Al Ortolani

Kansas as Wine Dark Sea

 

Sometimes on misty mornings—

I stand as Odysseus at the window,

floating on the roof of a barn.

The pitch is steep so I have to straddle

the peak, each leg planted

by a rubber-soled shoe. I hold

the weathervane, one of the few

originals roosters in the county, and

by leaning left or right, I pretend to sail

through waves of fog, lightning rods

trailing behind like untied

ropes from a mast. Pretty much

that’s where it ends—a few curtains

of disguise. Chickens rattle through

the open doors. A black snake

muscles below the hay bales.

Penelope teaches Honors English

to ninth graders in Overland Park.

Telemachus, a KU graduate,

has moved to an apartment

near a micro-brew in Waldo.

 

 

 

Al Ortolani is a high school English teacher. His poetry and reviews have appeared in journals such as Prairie Schooner, New Letters, Word Riot, and the New York Quarterly. He has four books of poetry, The Last Hippie of Camp 50 and Finding the Edge, published by Woodley Press at Washburn University, Wren's House, published by Coal City Press in Lawrence, Kansas, and Cooking Chili on the Day of the Dead from Aldrich Press in Torrance, California. He is on the Board of Directors of the Kansas City Writers Place and is an editor with The Little Balkans Review.