Category: Poems

Ray Romine Poems

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Shall I Collect Stamps?

The things they don’t show in their seed catalogs
Will grow better and faster than seeds;
I refer, don’t you know, to the chickens and dogs,
To the insects, diseases, and weeds!

Now, gardening’s something I’d go for–yes ma’m.
It’s a hobby I ‘d cherish and love,
Were it not for the self-same unspeakably dam ‘ —
*

*(Please refer to the verse just above)

by Ray Romine Sunday, July 8, 1945

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Shaken Shylock

He is quite a shrewd bargainer, known near and far
As a tight so-and-so who on other folks thrives.
But, with things as they are,
He just bought a used car–
Now, that certainly is a hard bargain he drives!

by Ray Romine Thursday, September 13, 1945

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Seven’s A Crowd

Last Sunday was Memorial Day,
The Whites, they came to visit–
Which in itself is not enough
To hatch a pome, or is it?

The Whites (just Two), they used to come:
We Four would talk, and listen
The while the other fella told
The things that we’d been missin’.

But Decoration Day they came,
And brung a family with ’em:
Farewell to peaceful talk of yore–
Goodbye to Four-way rhythm!

For Barbara from the upstairs howled,
(Who’d bedded been, quite cozy)
While from in front, tied to a tree,
There yapped their doggie, Rosey.

Between the howls, the yaps, and yowls,
The uproar and commotion, ยท
The Whites, we heard, were very Well,
(Or so we had a notion).

But harder STILL to understand–
You’ll prob’ly think me nosey–
Would not small Barbara Ann hve been
SUFFICIENT, without ROSEY??

by Ray Romine Monday, June 7, 1943

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Settled!

Back and forth across the nation
Flies the blame for our inflation;
But it’s here, and what is more, it
Is too plain who’s paying for it.

by Ray Romine Friday, October 19, 1951

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Set Your Sights A Bit Lower, What?

I once possessed notions about crossing oceans,
And visiting South Sea isles;
But now I em older, my dreams have grown colder
By an eight or nine thousand of miles.

One day I was certain some day I’d be flirtin’
With dough, and a helpmate in mink;
Schemes haven’t developed: the wife is enveloped
In muskrat or rabbit (I think).

Yes, I owned ambitions for priceless conditions
To make my existence a pipe;
But as a go-getter I might have done better,
For I am the dreamer type.

Although we’ve no bankful, and ought to be thankful
For six rooms, a job, and a car–
I cannot be puffed by just this when I muffed my
Chance to do better than par.

I once possessed oceans of rose-colored notions
That painted a life full of smiles:
My day-dreams were folly, for I’ve missed the trolley
By an eight or nine thousand of miles!

by Ray Romine Monday, September 4, 1944

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Sermon In Stones?

I asked a writer,
After reading some of his verses,
“Where do your ideas come from?”

He regarded me a little curiously,
Then he said,
“Take a stone,
One stone…
Any stone.
There’s an idea–
A lot of ideas.
Is a rock a miracle to you?
Do you understand that stone–
Know anything of its history?
How it was made?
By what means it got to where it is?
If, to you, it’s
Just a stone–
And just there–
And why get excited over it, and all that,
Why, then,
You’d be hard put to find ideas
Anywhere in the Universe.

Surely that stone
Ought to produce,
With all that’s happened to it,
At least an idea a year–
And that’s several million ideas!”

I was a little shame-faced–
But I’ve been regarding rocks–all rocks–
A bit suspiciously ever since.
I wonder what they’re thinking?

by Ray Romine Tuesday, October 22, 1946

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Serenity: A Definition

DULL winter day? Because it’s gray
Background for berried hedges?
Do fairer climes boast frosted rimes–
And snow around the edges?
Or summer hours’ colored flowers
Present a fairer story
Than this film run by twilight sun
In all its winter glory?
His life is right whose inner sight
Calls all creation brother,
Who sees no day in any way
As poorer than another.

by Ray Romine Tuesday, December 30, 1952