Category: NaPoWriMo2026

POEM: The Struggle Bus

Published 30 April 2026 by Fievel

The Struggle Bus

I hopped aboard the struggle bus
as April came to its end.
Random naps and nights
of too much sleep.
Unlike a normal bus,
the struggle bus has no rope to pull,
no button to press to signal your stop.
You get off when it lets you off,
and you’ll be where it wants you to be.
The oddest thing about the struggle bus?
If you disobey the rule and stand
ahead of the yellow line
to catch a glimpse of the driver,
you’ll find the driver is you.
Very Empire Strikes Back.

/ / /

30 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 30 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: It’s Almost Over: A List

Published 29 April 2026 by Fievel

It’s Almost Over: A List

The American Empire.
Hockey season (not really).
Capitalism.
Basketball season (closer).
The idea that billionaires are acceptable.
The Red Sox season (I hope not).
The idea that the rich are acceptable.
The Kind Bar I’m eating as I type.
Taurus season (I looked it up).
National Poetry Month.
This poem.
OK now it’s over.

/ / /

29 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 29 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: Kill The Cop In Your Head

Published 28 April 2026 by Fievel

Kill The Cop In Your Head

I fucking hate cops.
You fucking hate cops.
Everybody fucking hates cops.
Well, not everybody.
Some folks love licking boots.
Some folks love protecting the rich.
Some folks are racists.
Some folks are just plain stupid.
But the rest of us?
The rest of us fucking hate cops.

/ / /

28 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 28 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: Horatio

Published 27 April 2026 by Fievel

Horatio

When folks call me “sir”
I say I’m non-binary.
Not to be a jerk,
but to point out that
there are more things
in heaven and earth etc.
I often feel like an impostor gay,
probably because it took so long
to remember my true nature.
I feel even less qualified to be trans,
as if I’m wearing another’s uniform.
I poke the polite balloon
with my little pin of protest.
I dream of a new philosophy;
of a day when I am enough.

/ / /

27 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 27 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: Ballpark

Published 27 April 2026 by Fievel

Ballpark

We sat for the anthem,
stood for the Sox,
liberated our hot dogs,
met some Mainers,
cheered for the runs,
laughed at the hecklers,
awwwwed at the kids,
drove back home.

/ / /

26 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 26 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: Transformation

Published 25 April 2026 by Fievel

Transformation

As I get older, I look more like my dad.
Not more like him than I do my mom,
but more like him than I did when I was young.
When I lift something heavy I make his face:
bottom lip out, tight expression.
When I drive I sometimes find
my left index finger across my mouth,
or both hands drumming on the steering wheel.
Our skin looks a lot alike, too,
and until I shaved my goatee,
even our general appearance,
at least from a little distance,
was very similar.
What makes all this even more interesting,
is that my dad and I share no DNA.
We’re not related at all, except in the way
human beings are generally connected.
I’m no biologist, but I’m pretty sure
the nature/nurture argument is about behavior,
not about me turning into my dad physically.
My dad is becoming someone new now,
as dementia begins its work. In that absence,
I don’t mind taking on some of his presence.

/ / /

25 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 25 of National Poetry Month

2 Comments

POEM: Puzzle

Published 24 April 2026 by Fievel

Puzzle

I’m on the porch, listening
to the new Metric album.
My cat is asleep on the bed inside.
Sometimes a dog goes by.
Other times there’s a bluebird.
These are the pieces I put together
as I try to make a life.

/ / /

24 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 24 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: 2500 Years After The Buddha

Published 23 April 2026 by Fievel

2500 Years After The Buddha

I charge my phone with a portable charger
so my phone will remain close to me
then I walk into the other room and recharge
the portable charger so that next time
I want to keep my phone close to me it’s ready.

/ / /

23 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 23 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: Spring Vignette

Published 22 April 2026 by Fievel

Spring Vignette

Rain has been threatening all day.
The breeze moves leaves but not trunks.
A series of small birds flits
from power line to porch wall to grass.
There is no music in my headphones.
There is a lull in the dog parade.
I’m falling asleep, even as I write this line.

/ / /

22 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 22 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: My Job

Published 21 April 2026 by Fievel

My Job

I sit in a room alone
and play songs
for the people I assume
are listening to the radio.

Every 15 minutes or so
I talk into a microphone
to the people I assume
are listening to the radio.

You have to take a lot on faith
to do this job, otherwise
it can seem a little unhinged.

Then again, it takes faith
to talk with people
even when you can see them.

Maybe even more,
come to think of it.

/ / /

21 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 21 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: The Inexorable March Of Human Progress

Published 20 April 2026 by Fievel

The Inexorable March Of Human Progress

The first recorded use of ginseng
as a medicinal herb
was in 196 AD in the
Shen Nong Pharmacopoeia,
a Chinese text.

In the 1500s, China and Korea
fought over control
of ginseng fields;
both nations used it
to treat convalescing patients.

One thousand eight hundred and thirty years
after its introduction, ginseng is now
an ingredient in 16-ounce bottles of Arizona Green Tea,
although it appears several places down,
after high fructose corn syrup.

/ / /

20 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 20 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: Marvin The Paranoid Android Is My Spiritual Advisor

Published 19 April 2026 by Fievel

Marvin The Paranoid Android
Is My Spiritual Advisor

I’m glad you’re here, they said.
I knew they didn’t mean
the Indian restaurant.
They meant here here.
Still breathing.
I smiled, probably a wan smile,
except I’m not sure what “wan” means.
Anyway I smiled because
what can you say to that?
“That makes one of us”
doesn’t really cut it.
(I looked up “wan” and it means
“suggestive of melancholy.”
Nailed it.)
I’m on a bunch of meds these days
but not the meds for my brain.
I’ve been taking them for 20 years
and honestly I’m not sure what the point is.
This is probably where that one
Krishnamurti quote should go.
Can anyone look around
at what we’ve made of all this
and react with anything other than
rage and horror?
Me either and I don’t see the point
in pretending.
We finished our lunch, paid,
then went to the bookstore
across the street,
where we each got a book.

/ / /

19 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 19 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: Disposal

Published 18 April 2026 by Fievel

Disposal

A gentle fling!
with the plastic dustpan
and another mouse
lands in the bushes
that divide the neighbors’ yard
from ours.
One more victim
of the cat we talk to
like a baby,
who at night
becomes Mr. Hyde
to the rodents
on our street.

18 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 18 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: Foreign Exchange Student

Published 17 April 2026 by Fievel

Foreign Exchange Student

They didn’t know what to do with me,
so they gave me access to the AV room.
I’d sit there for a few hours every morning,
watching VHS tapes of concerts
by Dire Straits and Sting.
Some days I’d go with the class to lunch.
I was partial to the fried rice
with the red pickled ginger on top.
In the afternoons (if not earlier),
I’d ride my bike around town,
stopping into the shops
to have my little conversations.
Nobody cared about my grades.
They didn’t count for anything.
And as I was the first exchange student
in this northern industrial town,
most people were more curious
than anything else, as if a movie
were being filmed in town,
or a plane had crashed on the outskirts.
In the end I learned to speak Japanese
better than the students who ended up
in school together in the big city.
If I wanted to talk to anyone,
it had to be in Japanese.
These days I would choose silence.

/ / /

17 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 17 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment

POEM: The Sometimes Fox

Published 16 April 2026 by Fievel

The Sometimes Fox

There is magic in infrequency,
I thought as a fox walked
by the studio window this morning.

I sometimes see this fox
in the parking lot
of the radio station,

moving from one
set of bushes to another
in the pre-dawn dark,

disappearing
almost before
I register that it’s there.

Today, though,
the sun was up,
shining on its fur

as it emerged from the trees
only to slide,
seconds later,

behind the fence
around the satellite dish,
vanishing into the ether.

/ / /

16 April 2026
Charlottesville VA

Day 16 of National Poetry Month

Leave a Comment