Poetry by Richard Sean Gross

Pennsylvania Winter
By Richard Sean Gross

Soggy ground grass yellow-brown
Grey sky cold rain chill wind
Snow on the side of the road
Dirty with cinders and exhaust
Maybe some garbage and salt
Melts by day black ice at night
Short days dark afternoons
Dreary dismal depressing
The rich have left for Florida
Children pray for a snow day
Wet feet at the bus stop
Muddy playground cold metal
Parking lots crowded and cold Christmas shopping in the dark
Dead trees sell for a pretty penny
Lawsuits over nativity scenes
Part time work for department store
Santa’s permanently laid off from factories

RantinRave
By Richard Sean Gross

see more severed heads than bare boobs on TV
to protect innocent children &religious whackos
political correctness neutered free speech
news media never reported it, fuzzed it out
State can execute you but it’s against the law to kill yourself
Who owns the body? Police State?
patriots wanting to defend the constitution attacked the Capitol to kill
Veep and Speaker Watching democracy die right before my eye
met a young lady, a virgin or a vegan, I think her name was Megan
I told her she gotta lot of what men like
she was taken aback but I didn’t take it back
once the land of the free & home of the brave
now the residence of the easily offended

Unfathomable
By Richard Sean Gross

knew nothin’ at birth, knew all at twenty
by forty figured out I knew nothing at all
made a mess, a disaster I can’t fix
in a place Inever thought I’d be
nothing like I thought it was
can’t live, can’t leave or die, can hope
life is not a river but an ocean
a river follows its course to a place
adrift on the sea, no land in sight
no telling when or where I land
what shore I wash up on
no answer to the mystery the universe
what the future holds
how does it end?

Oh, It’s You
By Richard Sean Gross

I didn’t expect to see you again and I guess you felt the same.
I didn’t like how we parted and I’m sure you feel the same.
Didn’t know how to handle it, still don’t know what I should’ve done.
In youth I had an impetuous energy unharnessed by wisdom.
Now I have the wisdom but not the energy to go through it again.
The age at which I dealt with you was not the age at which I could have.
Funny how you never have the right tool when you need it.
A hammer when you need a screwdriver, a screwdriver when you need a wrench.
There should have been an age when I was old enough to handle
an adventure that I was still young enough to want.
Some age when I had the skills I needed to do what I needed to do.
It’s like it took a lifetime to fix the engines on a ship that now has a rusty hull.
For all the effort, it will never be seaworthy. Do you know what I mean?
Of course not. You never did. Why do I bother?

That Day
By Richard Sean Gross

I remember that day like it was last week
I woke up late for work at Ollie’s Bargain Outlet
Called my boss, Scott, told him I was on my way -“Turn on the TV!”
I asked why -“Just turn on the TV,” he said. -“See ya when you get here.”
I remember seeing one of the twin towers on fire – smoke billowing out
I got a glass of Turkey Hill Orange Tea before sitting down again
I saw a plane hit the tower – I thought it was a replay
The newscasters were silent- They weren’t sure either
I wondered how fast that plane was going when it plowed into the tower
They said that both towers had been hit by airplanes
Both towers struck! – How can that be?
I remember thinking – this isn’t an accident – Terrorism!
Scott set up a TV in the stockroom- the first tower was collapsing
I said that thousands of people worked in those towers and that
hundreds of people were likely on those planes – Is that. is that…
people jumping? – Anger welled up in me as the tower came down
My parents always remembered the day Kennedy was shot
Where they were, what they did, how they felt
Does every generation have a day like that?
When everyone sees the same unforgettable event
I wanted to remember the date: 9/11/01
I can’t believe I thought I’d forget
Even if there wasn’t all those documentaries
I’ll never forget.

Haiku

By Rich Sean Gross

Lifers have a voice

Just because they buried us

Doesn’t mean we’re Dead

Just look at my life

Realization haiku

Always so Angry

Mean to Stephany

Yelled at teachers on strike

Even yell at Cops

Always so angry

the Devil is my anger

Stop lettin’ him Win

I know God is Real

Gave me a sign when I asked

Longshot horse like Me

80-1 odds

Just like my Commutation

Rich Strike and Rich Gross

Life’s about people

not about the stuff you want

Can’t take it with You

Haiku

By Richard Sean Gross

Time in the bucket                                Hate Security

Isolation Location                                 If you can’t piss in the cup

Try to remain sane                                You go to the hole

Done time in the hole                            Pandemic Lockdown

Security Level 5                                   Separate from family

Didn’t do nothing                                  Worst Christmas Ever

In isolation                                           Eastern State Prison

Mental Health decompenses                   solitary confinement

Prison doesn’t work                              drove people insane

Love books in the hole                           Light on all night long

but they must be paperback                    No human contact at all

Hardbound Weaponry?                          Supermax evil

How do I do this?                                  Doing time with time

If you gotta go, then go!                         Debt comes due so do something

With you in the cell?                             Duly diligent

Do not try to treat                                  Do not try to help

Incarcerate addiction                             Punish the mentally ill

Obey the law now                                 Make them go away

Do not defend them                               Video Visit

Prison is the solution                             Despite poor sound quality

to all our problems                                Good Conversation

A Tricube Poem on GOD

By Richard Sean Gross

At day’s end

be humble.

Rest with God

Did your best-

Just leave the

rest with God

Until we,

forever

Rest with God

That Sound I Like
By Richard Sean Gross
8 January 2022

There is a sound I like but don’t know how to spell
The sound of snow underfoot, not slush, snow below 32
As you crush it with a shoe, compact it in a footprint
Sorta sounds like… budgee? but that’s not really it
Doesn’t snow like it used to, too warm to lay or stay
Most folks will never know that sound I like but cannot write
Today I walked on 3 inches at 22 degrees
I had almost forgot about that sound I like

Places
By Richard Sean Gross

I been in the right place but had the wrong mind
Been in a bad place where I got myself right
Need a good place to rest my body & soul

The Five Stages of Why You Can’t
By Richard Sean Gross

I. you’re too little.
II. II. big boys don’t cry
III. III. wait til you’re older
IV. IV. listen to your elders
V. V. you’re too old

Dog Stars
By Richard Sean Gross

I had always heard it was when not if
Yet I’m as surprised as anyone
Dog tired of this virus that keeps dogging us
Politicians fighting like cats and dogs

I knew he had an ego, hates to lose
but I thought there was a limit to how big the lie
His lawyers as loyal as dogs, while
politicians fight like cats and dogs

I knew the Kremlin still thought it theirs, yet
I did not expect the dogs of war
Humans treated worse than dogs when
nations fight like cats and dogs.

Recovery
By Richard Sean Gross

When harm happens in the community
Victims lose more than blood & money
They lose their feeling of safety
Their belief in the goodness of others
The sense that the community cares
Trust must be rebuilt, safety restored
Engage communities & offenders
So victims can get on with their life
And people can begin healing.

can’t see light, so much time
long dark night of the soul
it’s not right, so much time
time enough for everything
no more kite, so much time
who can give me a light?

GOT THIS
by Richard Sean Gross

they say i dont know what to say
they act like i dont know how to act
they think i don’t think
i feel them, but i got this.

Untitled
by Richard Sean Gross

I, I’m, I’m a, I’m an,
I man, I manage, I’m an age, I’m an agent,
4 change.

A Thing Of Beauty
by Richard Sean Gross

First time in a prison cell
A bare concrete floor and a cinderblock wall
I’m scared, confused, alone with no bail
No lawyer, and no friends at all
There’s a metal toilet and a metal vent
The air is cold and stale

Outside the window, more to the jail
In the concrete courtyard I see a green shoot
Stuck in a crack, a lonely weed
Born of a windblown seed, wall at it’s back
Putting down roots, pushing skyward
It is unloved, unwanted, unneeded, like me
Fighting for life against odds

Determined to grow, thrive in this place
This place of forgotten seeds
This little weed has something to say
“I’m here, I’m alive, get out of my way”
This living beauty doesn’t care it’s in a prison
It found earth, air, and water here
It’s making its way onward, upward

This weed is what I need to see
I have a life to live, stories to tell
I can’t win, I’m guilty as sin, but I’ll grow in this concrete shell
I’m here, I’m alive with a million ideas
I’ll find out what my life is really about
I’ll find a way out.

PRISONBLIND
by Richard Sean Gross

Blind in prison
I cannot see my pen pals
Can’t see the places they describe
Don’t really know where they are
They tell me of experiences I can’t relate to
Limited to last century’s technology
Cloistered in this concrete convent
Never used a cell phone
I want to see the ocean

Prison is blind
They only want your number not your name
Only see your browns not your face
Classified and categorized statistically
Level 3, LIFE, W, M, five-seven
You are a commodity to be shelved
A warehouse of forgotten humanity
I can only describe this to them
My pen pals cannot see it

STUFFED CABBAGE CASSEROLE
An essay-poem by Richard Sean Gross

That’s what the menu calls it but it isn’t actually either one
Most certainly not what anyone would call stuffed cabbage
Not what I would label a casserole yet I don’t know what it is
My prison stretches definitions to suit their needs

The menu is full of dishes that sound much better than they taste
Meals that make men go to bed hungry – an unconstitutional punishment
The kind of punishment that turns kids into thieves, then delinquents
Then on through the pipeline to unemployment and incarceration

I worry that someone somewhere thinks the food sounds good
“Oooh, they’re eating Poultry Parmesan and Oriental Poultry Pasta”
“No wonder they keep going back to prison over and over”
“I bet they lay around waiting to be served”

I hear those who say that if people come back to jail, it must be kay
It pains me that people could be so unaware, people who might otherwise care
It’s not that prison is a nice place, it’s that outside’s a rat race
For those who get out it’s hard: No car, no job, no credit card

Everyone who’s leaving says: “This time will be different”
Some say “I won’t do drugs this time” – I believe them
Others say “ I hope I don’t do drugs this time” – I worry
Some are back so fast I should say ‘see ya’ instead of ‘goodbye’

It takes more than jaul to cure addictions
Leaving men hungry doesn’t eliminate want
Incarceration’s isolation exacerbates mental illness
This place isn’t solving the problems that bring people here

Things are not always as they seem
Stuff we’re served ain’t what we ordered
Taxpayers are not well served
Neither at those who eat here

PHAMOUS PHOENIX
By Richard Sean Gross

A poem to a phoenix rising in Pennsylvania – a place which tries my patience
Blinding white concrete & shiony concertina construct this carceral cathedral
This monument to mass incarceration in it’s twilight
Long delayed & litigated – smaller portions on smaller trays
Costing north of 400 mil. – still not done on arrival
Our most famous resident is Cosby – most guys here are long forgotten
Built for security & isolation not for ease of movement
Waiting at doors opened from afar – nuisance for both staff and resident
Cell lights turned on nocturnally from a distant control
They don’t seem to know just how they want to run it
They’ll figure it out without me – run it without scrutiny
We managed to leave the mice & roaches behind
I’m sure they’re lookin’ for us – I bet they’ll find
This place of no escape

GHOSTS OF GRATERFORD
by Richard Sean Gross

Wetzel wanted to close it so bad for so long
Wanted to bury it’s rep, it’s culture, it’s pride
The way it just kind of ran itself
Got rid of protesters, complainers, and troublemakers
It will be different at Phoenix they told us
We will run it like in the mountains they said
Tried to convince us and themselves
Vandalized our meager possessions
As they took us to an unfinished jail
They brought along the same old staff
All their buddies, rats, and bad habits
Bright white concrete and shiny concertina
In the pictures they showed the press
A place is the people who populate it
Things may change but they stay the same
Seven years they planned it’s demise
Yet somehow in some way it did survive
Phoenix has the ghosts of Graterford inside

FREE LUNCH
by Richard Sean Gross

There are people with six figure salaries
Who cough up security protocols
Solving problems that don’t exist
Creating hassles for lower ranks

There are people with 6 figure salaries
Who chisel pennies away from prisoners
Trimming budgets for libraries and programs
Trying to cut as much as they earn

There are people with six figure salaries
Tightening belts for lower officials
While growing fat on tax dollars
Controlling lives of people they don’t see

There are people with 6 figure salaries
Awarding lucrative contracts
To well connected companies
For a free lunch

IMPOUNDED
By Richard Sean Gross

You’ve seen others like it so it shouldn’t be hard to
Picture this car up on blocks in the yard with weeds around
Sixties model rolled off the line shiny new and baby blue
It was cool, fast, im[pulsive – ahead of its time
Alright on the straightaways – loved to hug them curves
Not disciplined for racing – more the awesome party car
It saw some places did some wild stuff outran the cops
Had a pretty good run before it got impounded
Something wrong with it wrecked itself – people got killed
Was a time I knew it needed fixing – wasn’t sure how
The age at which I needed to was not the age at which I could
Now I know I can fix it – finally got the right tools
Will I get the chance the time or will it rust away?
Time is not a friend to an old car sitting idle

Rust takes metal back to dirt
We all end up this way
Ashes ashes we all fall
Maybe I will run again

PHuX-us
By Richard Sean Gross

ON HIS KNEES
Thought about standing
So they knocked him flat
Face against concrete
When they let him up
On his knees
Said ‘ thank you’
For what?

Blues Alive 
by Richard Sean Gross

Here 3 months without yard
Now only every other day
Record rainfall this year
Cold when it’s not wet
If only a few show up
They take my yard
As if it’s my fault
Finally I get there
Walk for an hour
Feels like
I’m going somewhere
Feel alive

About a Mushroom 
by Richard Sean Gross
A poem about a food I haven’t had in 17 years.

In the dark
Anchored in dung
Reaching for the stars
A psychedelic cousin outside the law
This one’s a fun guy -ideal dinner guest
Destined for a pizza pie or a creamy soup

SPOON
by Richard Sean Gross

white plastic spoon
stirring coffee
easily discarded
only used once
gigantic planet
essential to life
destroyed by a plastic spoon
used only once

About A Tree
by Richard Sean Gross

There’s this tree at the bend in the road
Been there forever
|t’s an Oak or a Birch. I don’t really know
Big thick around
The scars make it a beautiful tree
Sturdy old tree
Trouble is, cars hit this tree all the time
Some have died
County wants to chop it down
Safety, they say
Sits right there, can’t jump out of the way
This killer tree
Waving its leaves at drunk drivers
Trying its best
A tree of life or a tree of death
Don’t really know
Gotta’ kill it before it kills again
Death penalty
A tree don’t have no right to life
Gonna’ miss it

Trumpery
by Richard Sean Gross

Trump is a czar among mere men
Somehow He won the election
With help from Vladimir Putin
He reminds me of Richard Nixon
Without the foreign policy acumen
He gave a belligerent speech at the UN
Delegates gasped as he vowed destruction
He has very little respect for women
Or America’s tradition of immigration
If the people really want a Republican
Why not a Bush, or Pence, or Speaker Ryan?
There’d be less damage to our reputation
And less risk of Armageddon!

But
by Richard Sean Gross

I know the reason for day and night
but not who invented fluorescent light
I know the reason for snow and rain
but not for memory loss from my brain
I know the reason why animals mate
but not the reason for religious hate
I understand why things are warm or cold
but not why some die young and others old
I know why there are seasons in the year
but not exactly why we are here
I understand memory storage and retrieval
but not why there is good and evil
I know why people lose teeth on meth
but not the reasons for life and death
l know I got fences to mend
but not when the world will end

Me Write Goodly

I say funny stuff all the time.

He’s not looking well, I says to the Mrs. never seen a man quite that color before. “His family say he’s fine,” my wife retorts. His heirs have not called a Doctor, I says, they just keep a quiet vigil at his bedside.
“Do you suppose he’s mentioned us?” she asks. What, you mean in his will? I says, I doubt it. “Perhaps we should summon the Doctor,” she says. That would be a kind gesture for our old friend, “Inheritence or not,” we say in one breath.

Life in Color
by Richard Sean Gross

It gives me the blues
that the world is all shades of grey. No certainty. No truth.
Don’t know the difference between
alabaster, eggshell, and cream. Magenta, mauve, violet, crimson, all a purple haze to me.
Raised on pink bellies and purple nurples,
I’ll bea yellow belly thru my golden years. No silver linings or blue ribbons,
just grey skies and white lies. No red wine and salmon,
just orange drink and olive loaf.
A red hot romance once in a blue moon, not Snow White, more like black ice.
No yellow ribbons round old oak trees,
be damn lucky to ever leave this beige & brown.

Bookendings
by Richard Sean Gross

Recognition will come in time Time enough for everything
Things I’m working on are pretty good Good stuff for people to read over Over time I will finish my works Working out the details of the plot Plotlines that amuse and entertain Entertainment that makes people smile Smiles that translate into awards
Award winning work that makes money Money for me and for charity
Charities meriting recognition

Window to the World
by Richard Sean Gross

I love that oldmirror that hangs on that wall Above the half moon table right there in the hall Right next to the picture of the girl from St. Paul
The three legged table crowded with gear Everyone uses it, I can’t keep it clear
“Could someone take their things offof here?”
Gazing on that mirror from inside my den I see all that goes on in the kitchen
“Who’s cooking, what’s for dinner, and when?”
As the front door opens the mirror fills with light Our streetlight’s position does the same at night “Who’s that who’s arrived now without an invite?”
The door to the water closet squeaks just a bit So I always know who is taking a shit
“Let me know if a candle needs lit.”
If anyone decides to climb the stairs
A reflection of shoes my mirror shares
“I knew it was him by the shoes he wears.”
The mirror fell one time in a Thanksgiving brawl Abou:t whether to shop downtown or at the mall “If you ladies broke it, I’ll notify the law!”
Cleaning that mirror is not a chore A task I both treasure and adore
“I need cigs if you’re going to the store!”
From my chair I note all who come and go While seated I judge them -friend or foe
‘You’ll never guess who’s here!’ -“I know, I know.”

Talking to a Dead Poet
Richard Sean Gross

(RSG): Hey Poe, did you know that Baltimore named a Football team after your poem?
(POE): I killed myself partly because stupid people think sport has import.
(RSG): Cheer up, dead man! People do what they can. Not everyone has the same talents that you possessed.
(POE): I shall possess you if you keep annoying me thusly.
(RSG): It would be cool to be possessed by the soul of Edgar Allen Poe. Are you busy on Halloween?
(POE): You shall be dead someday, friend. We will settle the issue then.
(RSG): So is that a yeah or nay on the Halloween thing ?
(POE): Die, Gross, die.

Movement
Richard Sean Gross

It amazes me, everything is moving Air masses, currents, tectonic plates
Earth spinning a thousand miles an hour
Moon Circles Earth Earth Orbits Sun Sun In Precession
Galaxy spinning on collison course with another Universe expands, time soars, everything moving
but me

Adjusted for Inflation
by Richard Sean Gross

I was very young for very Long
Back then everyone knew me as Sean
Free run and fifteen cent candy Bars
Could not wait to take on the World
Positive I would be President
Life got real nasty Real Fast
Still don’t know how I shoulda’ handled It
Everything I tried made it Worse
Failure and fifty cent candy Bars
Hated my school hated my Home
Now I’m doing prison for Life
A maddening sameness rules my Life
Such is life behind Bars
Eighty-five cent candy Bars
Now I go by Rich

Polluted
by Richard Sean Gross

I feel the way this sky looks
Dark clouds above me stretching to
An angry red sunset in the west
The pollution makes it this way
It has been my mood all day

Taw Tail
By Richard Sean Gross

that particular peculiar pacific personage
who’s wildly wondering when we wherefore will-do whistlestop knot 4 nothin’ negotiating numerical nonsense
growing genteel gadfly genomes getting gory glorified decrepid departmental directives don’t do diddly dot because belittlemental betterment barbituates brains readily regurgitating rehabilitation rhetoric
intrepid incommunicados interpret ed inside phrenological fratricidal freakazoid’s files algorithms arranging allowable exits

otherpoem
including newords
by Richard Sean Gross

In the othertime before words Otherwrought otherburdened men Otherindulged in other wordy backwords For words opened intercourses anew Frontwords brought inwords out and about
Onwords to an acme of illust riou s expressions
Afterwords we will wonder why there weren’t more words

Kindless
by: Richard Sean Gross

Is kindness just a bold-faced lie? Something you say to soothe a friend
Who believes in something so much That it would hurt if you didn’t
Share the belief?
Sure I believe Second coming, Paper money Parole eligibility
Political correctness
Those pants do not make you look fat
I’m sure it will work out just fine
I agree with your idea, Boss I bet the check is in the mail The lady is not a tramp
What could possibly go wrong?

Tuesday
By Richard Sean Gross

Used to know Tuesday from Sunday
Knew Tuesday by things scheduled
Work to be done, appointments
Now there’s nothing there
Looks a lot like Sunday
Matter of fact
Every day does