There're Birds On Butler's Farm

I heard the word; there're birds

on Butler's farm;

Lewis let us know; there're birds

on Butler's farm!

Like a cat stalks prey,

I paid alert to the word;

there're birds on Butler's farm.

Big black bearded birds

that spike and spur

and rake the jakes,

birds whose gobbles resonate

on through the hollows

of Butler's farm.

The Pilgrim

As a poet, I am on a pilgrimage

to a higher place, to a

state of mind where aesthetics are paramount.

My eyes are the scribes

to the wonders of the world,

my heart, the gold at the end

of the rainbow. My sensory

perception is my precious

and lasting treasure.

From those of you who love me for what I am,

I will accept your love 

as a parched field absorbs

a soft summer rain,

in return, I will bestow

my life unto you in bountiful

yield.

--Pete Rheaume

Crows On A Gut Pile

Illustration by Lois Rheaume

From my deer shack

on this clear, windless,

frosty morning with

the sleepy moon fading,

I see three crows on

a gut pile. On this clear,

cold, frosty Thanksgiving

morning I watch my

brothers, the crows, raucous

and boisterous, bickering

over this gut pile.

What a bountiful holiday

as they feed heartily on

the entrails of that buck

I shot just a week ago.

And what a glorious Thanksgiving

this cold, comfortable

frosty morning is

for me, as I watch with

wonder at these black

rascals, these shiny black

scavenger scoundrel

cousins to Poe's raven.

They're so beautiful, and

such a perfect symbol of

the wild, natural world.

--Pete Rheaume

Jockeys

The jockeys in the derby

are a sight to behold.

Their colors are of candy

canes and rainbows.

They are poets and they

are clowns.

As forsythia is yellow

they are fancy,

as the oriole is marked

they are dandy.

Their banty dress

represents the cocky cackle

of clever buffoons and loons.

They ride their magic rides

'yon the hours of the noon;

they host these merry sprints

'neath the distance of the moon;

they jingle like the music

in the melody of tune,

and they twinkle like the

silver in the silver of a spoon.

Let 'em run, let 'em run

as a shot from a gun!

Watch 'em move, watch 'em move

'stride those flashing dashing hooves.

--Pete Rheaume

Oaks In The Corn

Illustration by Lois Rheaume

Have you ever seen lone oaks
standing in the corn? Massive,
spreading, sprawling white oaks
that reach out as would mammoth
arms to accommodate a yawn in
the dawn of yet another day,
standing in one venerable place.

For decade upon decade those
oaks have generated oxygen
for all who breathe. They have
rendered shade to many a tired
team, resting after a forenoons
plowing. Those oaks have
accommodated a thousand squirrels
and have nested a myriad
species of birds. They have
fattened countless deer and
wild turkey on their sweet
mast.

Those poetic trees have lived
so long, if their acorns were tiny eyes what would they have
seen? If their lobed leaves
were ears what word from
Appomattox they would have
heard!

Farmers, don't cut and bulldoze
those oaks that live
in your corn. Please, work
around their girth one more
planting, one more harvest.
Stewards of the land, spare
those lovely, giant oaks that
so fatefully eluded the settler's
axe.

--Pete Rheaume

Ann Arbor

You, city of surprise

and commotion,

delight me every time

I walk your merry streets

and watch your human theatre.

You're magic Ann Arbor,

so avant-garde they come

from everywhere to hear

your music that floats 

on Michigan air like melodious winds.

You beckon scholars

from all edges of the globe

who share their thought

and Greek with your

community of thinking minds.

As holiday begins

co-eds giggle in your pubs

and tease young men

with shakes of their

pretty heads and

glorious bodies.

Example of urban

conscience your city

is fresh and clean,

where people reside

in handsome homes and

support good civics.

Within that residence

stands a coliseum

resembling roman yore,

where sinewed bodied

athletes perform for you

like padded cladded

gladiators donned in the

maize and blue.

Yes good city,

you offer myriad delights; I'll come

again enjoying them

and have a dandy time.

See you later,

Ann Arbor.

--Pete Rheaume

Lament To Pontiac And Tecumseh

I am so sorry Chief Tecumseh

I could cry dear Pontiac;

what has happened to your 

loved ones in the swamp of Sanilac.

Our white ones came en masse 

with their axes and their saws;

how they raped the giant virgins

in the hills of Ogemaw.

How they poisoned all your

water at the flats of Saginaw.

I am so sorry Chief Tecumseh,

I could cry dear Pontiac.

Multitudes of bearded men

as kind as sweet Marquette,

could fill the lakes with tears

as we pitifully regret

that the squashes and the

pumpkins of the Potawotomi

lay fossling 'neaththe landfills we tainted

chemically.

I am so sorry Chief Tecumseh

I could cry dear Pontiac,

that the smog above the

valleys not the writing of

the smoke, or the lights

along the skyline not the

stars above the oaks. Andthe wolves of Osceola are

now playful fatted dogs and the

spirit of Menominee is

lost in acid fog.

Tittabawassee's fishes prove 

too putrefied to eat, as the 

garbage in Mecosta's woods

is dumped in vulgar heaps.

I am so sorry Chief Tecumseh,

I could cry dear Pontiac,

that the screamin wail of

engines of the oily machines,

in the forest of Huron

and the mighty Manistee,

is not the rumble of the

thunder or the eerie osprey's

scream as they mutilate

the land of lages the spirit

left pristine.

And if the coureur de bois

could see the slime beneath

the thaw, they 

would convulse within

their graves across the Keeweenaw.

I hope our gifted doctors

from the school at Washtenaw,

would voyage back

in time with canoes of 

pentathol,

to inoculate your

squaw and your little red 

papoose, against Caucasian

illnesses that choked them

like a noose.

I know our fluent Francais

priest who loved you 

as his own, admired you,

learned from you,

and had his soul

made whole

It seems that change does

rearrange the course of

human plans, like the glacier

slowly sculptured the

prehistoric lands.

Historically what happened

here from the Soo to

Lenawee, is the smothering

of your culture of

intriguing native ways,

that was strangled by the fingers

of our more assertive race;

you could not withstand 

our pressure, you would not

endure our pace.

I am so sorry Chief Tecumseh,

I could cry dear Pontiac.

--Pete Rheaume