Frank Bana Poems

Surely G-D herself
On a short Sabbatical

Taking a break from
...

I never expected to live so long
In those shell-shocked years when lymphoma came
In the proliferate shadow of the nuclear bomb
With wars fanning out like toxic flowers
...

Can you believe those two, the whole day
Sitting by the screen door window
Staring at the sunlit green
Waiting for a gopher
...

Ripeness is all. From which vantage
To view this curving orb
Tapered to a finely rounded waist?
...

The aircraft in ascent, I swore
To write something of beauty, that would prove
Enough to lighten hearts, and cause
The world to celebrate, elders of Zion
...

I will try
To dance for you as once I danced
Barefoot in the heavy summer night
In the heart of the Bamangwato lands
...

For Russia or any nation state
To 'claim' the North Pole to itself
Is monstrous. The riches of
The natural world
...

The winding melody fell to rest
Upon the word Shalom
Small intake of collective breath
The doors of the arc slid apart
...

These dollar bills, dead personage revered
While men who asked the future fell
And do not show their faces here, nor at Rushmore -
Dangerous to whom, and how, whose money on the bullets
...

He is so often there
Corner of 44th and Lexington
At the breakfast hour
Tall and thin, matted hair
...