Bananas.

Long banana leaves, agonized, brown and yellow in the torment of fall, crumple to a trunk that holds proudly the last hanging bunch of summer’s labor, ripened before deep cold comes to sap its strength.

“I am the last of what I hold

I am the strength of what I bear,

Cling tight sweet ones,

For the gardener comes to shear’”

Now in my hands, the hide, beneath yellow jackets, they scream, ‘unzip me’.

Gleefully I taste: ti’s the fruit of love and labor; that birth of sweet satisfaction.

Soldier Dies

She felt the beauty and compassion of being there.

It hasn’t left me.

I can feel it inside.

Comes to leave

leave slowly

Leave a shadow.

No, I won’t be lonely.

She shivered.

No, I won’t be empty she prayed.

I’ll remember all of this.

She tried to promise herself.

I’ll cling to every moment.

He is my soldier buried,

I so wish he could be besides

Tender thoughts passed through her.

I love him so.

Tears came.

More tears came.

She knew he lay dead and buried.

Never would she be able to see the image of his bravery, 

those final moments when he had to do and die.

Ammunition volleyed and thundered

when In honor he charged.

Dismal sleep–he slept, ready to be dead.

Dying is made a rare gift for some. 

For me?

Deep in trenches, glare, flies, hot wind, 

a great sun rakes, sweat, grit. 

Bullets twang, hit the wire, hell’s a frying fire, airplanes moan.

 

A black spot broods over fellow soldiers drunk with fatigue.

I am going mad because of the guns.

I could never have imagined this.

I will die if you forget me.

Pain turns into poetry.

Desire for reticence fights against a desire for vengeance.

Old eyes are full of memories. 

Hold tight to feelings.

It’s hot, its all sun.

 Too still the air.

The wind is dead, my messenger dog is dead.

Distance to the horizon is endless.

Day and night, day and night on sand

Over splintered rock my feet move forward

Horizon to hell is nearest.

I charge

to die.

Safe

Through misty panes

Thick green light

Plunges.

My gulling, choking dreams

Hold a hanging face

With innocent tongue.

It sings:

It is sweet to die

For my country

Stay low

Don’t fight,

Don’t die now.

Stay Low Don’t Fight

I dug trenches

Into the earth.

Made long scars.

The land between

A wasteland.

Bombs fell on it

Gas choked there

Barbed wire crawled 

All over it.

Men died on it

The earth wanted blood.

                                  Left

It isn’t till the tide goes out that you see who has been swiming naked.

Wonderful News

September 2018

My five books: 

Now available to the public throughout the Sarasota Library System, Florida, USA. 

Can be purchased through Barnes and Noble in the USA.

Available through Loot company, and others in South Africa.

Through Amazon, all books are available world wide.

This September, I shall be meeting with other potential distributors in France.

Within the next six months my new books: 

Poetry, Short Stories and Letters will be similarly published and distributed.

I wish to thank those many readers who have recommended my work through their praises and comments.

In France I shall be headquartered for the month of September in Samois-sur-Seine. It is on the banks of the River Seine closest to my dreams.

Thank you,

Peter Frickel.

My dear friends.

I am in a tiny village, the southwest of France, in the Pyrenees. This part of the Basque country is a world of mountains, Godliness and height. Believe me, being here clothed in silence and creative thought makes life expansive. I do not feel insignificant.

Every day, I write. 

Ideas and words and plots and characters and travel memories fill pages; that  accomplishment binds me to my desires–I am doing what I love.

Thank you for your letters and stories. I read them, reread them; they are full of passion. You write well, my friends. Yes, I agree, suffering shows itself in many ways, sometimes it is unkind, but be forever aware, it is an integral part of the struggle to lay out the narrative. For me, the struggle sinks into the soul, severe, it stays, leaves of its own accord.

I concur, a writer must, under all circumstances, write the truth, and write it well. It takes courage to write from the heart and not be overly concerned how others interpret the work. We must stay strong, my friend, for there are no protecting miracles for us writers.

From my room, through a clear window pane, I watch the big yellow butterfly. Observe it flutter about, see it upon different flowers. It rests longest on what captivates, does not take too much. Time of the butterfly’s visit is never overly stretched for there is an intimate balance between its stay and the giving of the flower. We must strive for such balance, balance between our work and the pleasure of the reader. 

I would like to add, at the confluence my publishing and its eager acceptance by the public there was joy. My writing and the happy reader became one, became like the single stream of water that flows beside my cabin. Yes, it is like a good deed that is indubitably part of the man who performs it–there is no shadow.

Keep writing good friends.

As always,

Peter.