» Poetry

Two Poems

Jose Hernandez Diaz

Ode to the Weekend

Time to break free of routine
By jumping into another routine
Watching too many sports on a plethora

Of cable channels teams I grew up

Watching based solely on proximity

Now I root for them for life

Organize schedule around games
What season is it check the sport on TV

Football means pumpkin patch

Halloween Thanksgiving

Basketball spring lilacs Easter

Baseball in the summertime

Besides beachside barbecues

The weekend means relatively loose
Like prose poetry aesthetics or anti-aesthetics

Spontaneous open to discovery

Whereas weekday grind feels more

Like Poetry with a capital “P”
Like Shakespeare’s sonnets

On meter rhyming and on point

Ode to the Skateboard

When I was young, I wanted to ride you
But it was hard to find the right balance

Settled for the smoother less hip longboard
More convenient, less falling on the pavement

Skating was born in southern California
Like Hollywood cinema or Burritos with French Fries

Inside of them when we were young

My friends all skated or played sports

Free and unassuming no responsibilities

Now they’ve mostly traded it in for blue-collar jobs

And picture-perfect families to support

The skateboard, however, remains an iconic

West coast symbol of freedom, irreverence,

Expression, though it can also simultaneously

Be found at the Olympics on mainstream commercials

Selling the timeless image of youth and vigor

Seems far from early gritty days of Venice Beach

Boardwalk before bohemian Venice

Became gentrified by millionaires, techies,

Venture capitalists, not necessarily

Complaining just observing evolution

Besides purity is for saints and martyrs