April 2024
Scott Waters
scottishwaters@yahoo.com
Bio Note: I am a poet and songwriter living in Oakland, California. When I was a teen growing up in Indiana, my family had a pet raccoon named Ranger. Decades later, it still seems like a dream. My poems have been published in Third Wednesday, Main Street Rag, and many other journals, and I published my first chapbook, Arks, with Selcouth Station Press.

Communal Meal

Traveling in northern Myanmar,
he stumbles on a mountain village 
where toothless old ladies
yank out clumps of his blonde hair
for good luck.

Despite his throbbing scalp
and the dried blood on his hat, 
he stays a few days and finds
the villagers charmingly oblivious 
to world affairs — “War in Ukraine?
What is Ukraine?” —

and kindly condescending:
“Oh you poor dear,
you don’t have a cow?
No community kitchen?
You have to cook all alone
in your own house?”

After midnight, on his cot
by the open bamboo-framed 
window, he watches the Big Dipper
ladle the darkness into 
a wooden bowl. Later,
on the dreamy brink of sleep, 

he raises the bowl to his lips.

Lift

Four years old
holding her father's hand

"Do you want to ride?"

the great illuminated wheel tumbles
in her green eyes

she nods
ticket already crumpled
in her sweaty fist

rising and rolling backward into the dark
stomach dropping around her ankles

a warm river fills her
like milk
in her favorite Elmo cup.

~

Thirty years on
professor of mechanical engineering by day
a regular at the boardwalk by night

her house decorated
with framed photos and drawings
of Ferris wheels
from around the world

lamps, tables, knick-knacks
all on the same theme

now watch
as she steps out her front door
at 8 p.m.
right on schedule

footsteps quickening
like heartbeats

through the short line
past the knowing leer
of the fat man
with his hand on the lever

settles into the greasy seat alone
skirt fluttering
as her lover groans into motion
wheeling upward

and rocks her deep
into the neon
night.

Ranger

The softness of his black hands,
or paws, or whatever they were,
that’s what I remember best—
washing kibble in the dog’s bowl,
lifting each moist pellet
to his mouth, the thoughtful chewing
behind that black ball nose
and the legendary mask—and wow!
How thick the silvery fur
along his back, the ringed tail
like a luxurious afterthought,
a floppy exclamation point 
to emphasize that this—This!—
is a creature of the outlandish Earth,
preposterous as the planet itself,
with no business padding
through the rooms of a middle-class
Indiana household or roaming
across the seats of a 1970s
Pontiac station wagon prompting
double-takes from passing motorists
or chasing his ridiculous tail around
the disbelieving sun.

©2024 Scott Waters
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